Devoid of Inspiration Bento

Last night I meant to do some cooking so that I could wake up and have a tasty little morsel to bring in with me to work, but since I was putting the kids to sleep, the chances of this happening were suddenly drastically reduced. My daughter has finally reached the age where her days without a nap go by smoothly and night time is quite pleasant. We went through this pretty rough stage in kindergarten where she still needed a nap, but did not get one and therefore, when she came home, immediately began her nightly transformation into a FREAKING TASMANIAN DEVIL.

No seriously, everything from the color of my shirt to what I chose to force down her throat for dinner was suddenly criticized with a Category 5 child hurricane. And you can forget about a scream-less bath. Some nights I’d just barely get through putting her clothes on without getting kicked in the boobs before just tossing her onto the bed, where she’d fall asleep within 30 seconds. Now, she just pleasantly goes to bed and is usually asleep in 5-10 minutes.

The problem with Buddy is that he does still get a nap, which means that even though bedtime is 9 PM, he’s still playing airplane with his fingers and asking questions at 9:45. Eventually, sometimes I just get so bored waiting that I fall asleep too. Goodbye everything I had planned to do that night!

As a result of so much sleep, I got up “early” today. Or rather, on time, which is 6:30. Usually I can’t bring myself to get out of bed until 7 AM now, because I’m still so spoiled from winter break sleep-ins. Unfortunately, that didn’t mean I knew what to make, so I just cooked rice and hoped that something would come to me.

Nothing really did, so I decided to treat myself with a full cup of rice in my bento today. I mixed the rice with some Seto Fumi Furikake and made myself two onigiri. I was able to make them both exactly the same size by dividing the rice in half before shaping them with my hands. Since I used furikake, I didn’t salt my hands up.

It’s the worst idea to have absolutely no plan for your bento, but that’s where I was. I ended up using a couple of Kirkland honey ham slices to make a ham blossom, a trick that I learned from Debra at hapa bento. I then filled the rest of the box with cauliflower , a baby carrot, cucumber slices (all of which I’ll eat with some hummus and more carrots), a lady apple, and kiwi slices. For fillers, I used green leaf lettuce and more purple kale. I’m almost out of the stuff, so I have to make a trip to Don Quijote soon to get more. It also tastes great with hummus.

Devoid of Inspiration Bento Points Calculation

1 cup of white rice – 5 points
3 oz deli sliced honey ham – 3 points
fruits and veggies – 0 points

Total: 8 points

Snacks: sweet potato, 2 bananas, carrots and hummus, bosc pear

Weight: 153.8 lb

Yes, I am rapidly gaining weight. The cause?

Being born the wrong gender. And since I’m drinking enough water each day to bathe my children in, I’m currently a walking bloatation device. I just have to tell myself that I probably won’t be losing any weight this week, but that it’ll all come off eventually.

I’ve walked to work every day since starting, which means that I get about 10 miles of walking done each week. It’s become a pretty enjoyable experience for me!

This weekend I will be giving a bento demonstration for a nice group of ladies at the Ikebana International Honolulu Chapter 56 New Year’s Luncheon at the East-West Center. It should be fun!

P.S. Many thanks to Jenn for the bento title.

P.P.S. Do people even use P.S. anymore? I’m bringing it back!