Maple Leaves

I made this fall bento for T's lunch today.

• maple leaf-shaped sandwiches (one on whole wheat bread, one on honey wheat bread)
• Rold Gold Tiny Twists Cheddar Pretzels with maple leaf pick
• applesauce with maple leaf-shaped sprinkles
• Dare Maple Leaf Creme Cookie
• orange juice in a glass with maple leaves design

Linked to:
   Bento Blog Network
   Meatless Monday
   I Heart Lunch
   What's for Lunch Wednesday

Fall Finger-Painting

I remembered doing a wonderful finger-painting activity with T...I just didn't remember doing it two years ago!  Wow, how time flies.

Here's a repeat of part of that post from October 29, 2011.  You can read the original post in its entirety here.

T loved this finger-painting activity...because he didn't have to get his hands in the paint!
(--a sensory issue for him, related to Down syndrome)

You can see how he "gets into it" more and more as the activity progresses!

I found this terrific idea for no mess finger-painting at Sandy's site, Moments of Mommyhood.

We made these fall leaves with T's artwork.  They are hanging in our kitchen window.
Fall beauty at its best!

Pumpkins

I prepared this pumpkin-themed meal for T's lunch today.

• baby cut carrots and Ranch dressing in orange shot glass
• pumpkin spice marshmallows in paper muffin cup with pumpkins design
• jumbo pumpkin marshmallow
• applesauce with jumbo pumpkin sprinkles in pumpkin-shaped silicone muffin cup
• pumpkin-shaped pretzels
• peanut butter and jelly sandwich with pumpkin cut-out in center

Linked to:

   Muffin Tin Mom

Leaves and Pumpkins

I made a fall-themed lunch for T today.

In a leaves and pumpkins silicone muffin pan, I put:

• sandwich cut into maple leaf shape with maple leaf pick
• sandwich cut into oak leaf shape
• sandwich cut into pumpkin shape
• pumpkin-shaped pretzels
• green grapes with pumpkin pick
• maple leaf creme cookie
• apple juice in glass with leaves design

This lunch received a "thumbs up" from T!

Linked to:

   Bento Blog Network

   Muffin Tin Mom

Orange

This is an orange meal I packed for T to take to co-op tomorrow.

bottom layer:

• crunchy Cheetos
• pumpkin-shaped sandwiches with Twizzlers vines

top layer:

• mandarin oranges
• mini cupcakes with orange-tinted frosting (both) and orange sugar (top) and orange nonpareils (bottom)

Linked to:

   Bento Blog Network
   Bento Blog Network

Fall Tree

This is a fall-themed meal that T enjoyed today.

• tree trunk = pretzel rods
• tree branches = pretzel sticks
• leaves = leaf-shaped peanut butter and orange marmalade sandwiches
• maple leaf = Dare (brand) Maple Leaf Creme Cookie
• applesauce with fall leaves sprinkles
• milk in yellow cup with fall leaf stickers

T went for the cookie first.  :)

I'm not sure why he felt the need to stack up his sandwiches after eating his cookie? :)

Check out some other totally vegan meals at Bento Blog Network.
Check out some other autumn meals at Bento Blog Network.
Check out some other trees meals at Bento Blog Network.

Leaf Man

One of the books we read for week 4 of the Book-It! Program was Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert.  (~See my post dated Saturday, October 29, 2011.)  However, it wasn't until just today that we worked on this craft.

T made a leaf man out of leaves we gathered from trees in our yard.  (I saw the idea for this on another blog...but I can't remember which one.)

"A Leaf Man's got to go where the wind blows."
     ~from Leaf Man

T's Leaf Man

Linked to:



Update - Monday, November 28, 2011:

Okay...I figured out where I saw this idea.  The website is 2 Teaching Mommies.  :)

Scarecrow Meal

For supper tonight, T had a scarecrow muffin tin meal.

The "pumpkin patch" is a pumpkin-shaped muffin liner filled with romaine lettuce and jumbo pumpkin sprinkles.

The scarecrow is a peanut butter sandwich, topped with fruit roll-up overalls and shirt.  The patches are "sewn" with a food writer.  The hat is cut from an end piece of bread and decorated with a strip of fruit roll-up and jumbo leaf sprinkles.

The scarecrow face is:

     eyes - dried cranberries
     nose - triangle of fruit roll-up
     mouth - "X" sprinkles

The straw is potato sticks.

The bird is a mini heart-shaped sandwich, decorated with edible glitter and sprinkles for the eyes and feet.  ~Didn't have anything black for a crow...so it's a bluebird!  :P  (I forgot to add a beak....It looks a little like a walrus, eh?)

That's a haystack beside the scarecrow...more potato sticks, bundled with a piece of fruit streamer, and jumbo pumpkin sprinkles.

T went for the salad first.  ~No surprise there!

Check out some other muffin tin meals....

Autumn Falls

For week 3 of the Book-It! Program, we read books with a fall and/or harvest theme.

We read:

     Autumn Harvest by Alvin Tresselt
     Possum's Harvest Moon by Anne Hunter
     When Autumn Falls by Kelli Nidey
     Peepers by Eve Bunting

"Leaves on the trees fall--
 red,
 gold,
 yellow,
 brown,
 and
 orange
 come
 down."
      ~from When Autumn Falls

For week 4 (this week), we read books with a fall leaves theme.

We read:

     Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf by Lois Ehlert
     Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert
     Leaf Jumpers by Carole Gerber
     Leaf Trouble by Jonathan Emmett

T loved this finger-painting activity...because he didn't have to get his hands in the paint!  (--a sensory issue for him, related to Down syndrome)

You can see how he "gets into it" more and more as the activity progresses!

I found this terrific idea for no mess finger-painting at Sandy's site, Moments of Mommyhood.

Photos of the fall leaves we made with T's artwork are forthcoming.  :)

Update - Monday, November 14, 2011:

Here are T's fall leaves...hanging in our kitchen window.  ~Fall beauty at its best!

Comfort Food

Well, it definitely has been a Muffin Tin Monday kind of day at our house today!
T not only had a muffin tin meal for breakfast, he also had one for lunch.

Pinto beans and cornbread...southern comfort food for a crisp Fall day...made by my husband, no less!  (He makes the best pinto beans!)

What is that, in the back left corner, supposed to be??...you might ask?  ~Don't ask.  It's my failed attempt at decorating a cornbread muffin.  To me, it looks like an ear-less monkey...or a mane-less lion.  ~So sad.

Check out some other muffin tin meals....

Fall Breakfast

For breakfast this morning, T had:

• pumpkin-shaped toast with orange marmalade and raisins
• leaf-shaped toast with apple butter
• mini apple-shaped toast with red raspberry jam
• mini acorn-shaped toast with cinnamon-sugar
• applesauce with sprinkles in pumpkin-shaped silicone liner

I thought that if there was something T wouldn't eat, it would be the toast with the red raspberry jam.  I was wrong.  He ate everything except the toast with the orange marmalade and raisins....Actually, he came back later and ate that, too.  :)

Check out some other muffin tin meals....

Fruits and Harvest

The books we read for Book-It! last week had a fruit and/or harvest theme.

We read:

• Eating the Alphabet                                         by Lois Ehlert 
• Lily's Garden                                               by Deborah Kogan Ray 
• Pick, Pull, Snap!                                           by Lola M. Schaefer 
• Harvest                                                     by Kris Waldherr

We found Lily's Garden to be a very informative book.  The author created a calendar of the year seen through the lens of things planted, grown, and harvested.

We enjoyed the large, creative illustrations in Pick, Pull, Snap!  T had fun opening the fold-out pages to reveal the fruits grown and harvested.

We loved the watercolor illustrations in Harvest.

Fall Muffin Tin Meal

~Amazing!  We actually had a "real" muffin tin meal today...and on a Monday, no less!

Along the lines of a Fall theme, T's muffin tin meal consisted of:

back row -
     pumpkin-shaped sandwiches with Fruit Streamers "vines"...

     Cheez-It Scrabble Junior crackers, and milk in a Fall-colored cup

front row -
     ranch dip, carrot sticks, and applesauce with Colorful Leaves Mix sprinkles

This was T's first meal in a muffin tin.  He checked it out thoroughly....

Checking out the pumpkins

Oooo...cool!

What is that in my applesauce??!

~So pleased!

Happy Fall!

Check out some other muffin tin meals...

and some bento lunches.  This week's theme is pumpkins....