Healthy Lunchbox Launch!

AS the school year is now nicely underway, things seem to be thump-bumping along in fine fashion for team Gregarious! This is a welcomed feeling, as summer left me quite wrung out. Freelancing from home is a *fantastic* gig when your kids are in school... but a labyrinth of activity planning, work juggling, praying (and drinking, oh yes, you can do that... just not in excess!) and pretty much letting go of whatever "normal" routine you may be accustomed to during the school year! "Normal" people do not take their children to work with them on purpose... I think us WAHM types are our own brand of crazy! Innovative, ambitious geniuses... but crazy nevertheless.

SO, with sanity restored in the house (and mind!) I have been on an initiative to increase the variety and nutrition factor of my kids' lunches. Everyone defines "healthy" differently, so let me explain what I mean by healthy:

• Reasonable portion sizes
• Homemade as much as possible (reducing the number of ingredients that I cannot pronounce being ingested by the punk(ins))
• Different! And not just a different sandwich ever day - something that doesn't resemble a sandwich as much as possible  

Inspiration struck when I found these "Easylunchboxes".  They certainly have made portion sizes easier to judge, and somehow, those little boxes don't seem so overwhelming or perplexing as a bunch of empty sandwich bags. Oh yeah! We don't use as many sandwich bags these days, that has to be a (miniscule) environmental relief, right?

The easiest things to fill these little spaces with are fresh fruits and veggies - especially as we are still picking raspberries and grape tomatoes from our garden! YUM! I will miss those little treats soon I am sure. With that in mind, I decided to begin baking and freezing some foods that will fill their afternoon meal with some healthy variety.


The first thing I made this weekend were Raspberry Crumb Bars, which were very easy to make. Once they were cool, I sliced them and placed them individually on a cookie sheet to freeze. Now they come right out of a freezer bag as single servings to fit in the teeniest compartment of the Easylunchboxes. I think I got 30 little bars out of the recipe, which seems great to me!

Today, I decided to try my hand at some pinwheels. I started with a basic crescent roll dough recipe. I rolled each topped round of dough up into logs, sliced and baked for about half an hour.

Oven Ready

(but the link uses margarine and I use butter) which after spending the night in the refrigerator, I divided into thirds and rolled out flat. I topped one with turkey and mozzarella cheese, another with crumbled bacon and shredded colby-jack cheese, and the third I colby-jack and roasted tomatoes from our freezer.

The results were tested by my dude (except the tomato ones, those are for his sister, who fears brown bread... you see what I am working with...) and approved. Two went into his lunchbox for tomorrow, the rest in the freezer.

There you go! Two upgraded meal options in the freezer. I'm excited! What are your lunchbox strategies? I'm still on the lookout for ideas. Leave some tips in the comments for me please.