Enter the terrifying world of whole food lunchbox lunches

Now, I whole heartedly approve of the new school lunch regulations in the US. I think is brilliant that our nation's kiddos are being fed food that is better for their little bodies and little brains. I have seen the menu at our children's school. It has improved a great deal from when I was a kid. They even have fresh, local fruits and veggies!

However, school lunches still definitely don't meet my food guidelines. Plus, I hate to push it when it comes to my kid's weird food allergies. They have something on the menu almost every day that my son is allergic to, and at five years old, sometimes he chooses what looks good without considering the potential for an anaphylactic reaction.

And now to reiterate the title of this post: enter the terrifying world of whole food lunchbox lunches. If you think trying to scrape together a nice lunch for the office without using processed food is difficult, try making one for a picky kid without the ability to heat up their lunch and about 15 minutes to actually eat it. All without being wasteful, as I hate the packaging waste involved in most lunches from home.

My first step was to invest in some more containers. Reusable baggies, little sandwich boxes, itty bitty plastic containers, thermoses, nice sturdy water bottles, BPA-free plastic silverware that I intend to reuse but won't cry if it doesn't make it home, and good quality lunch boxes were the first things I rounded up to make sure I'd be able to pack my kiddos lunches without wasting 16 plastic bags a day. Seriously, having handy places to stick all the fresh, good stuff makes for much easier lunch packing.

Next, I had to come up with some ideas that are portable and easy enough to pack for lunch every day. I knew that making their lunch prep as quick and painless as possible was going to be necessary if I was ever going to actually accomplish it. My grand plan? Fill up their lunches with fresh, raw fruits and veggies, a little protein, and a very small, but yummy dessert to keep up morale during the long school day.

And now some ideas for each of these things-

Veggies: Celery, baby carrots, broccoli, snap peas, baked sweet potato chips, bell pepper strips, cucumber slices, side salad

Fruits: grapes, apple slices misted with lemon juice so they don't brown, orange sections, fresh peaches and other stone fruit, bananas, bing cherries, pomegranate

Protein: yogurt, cheese slices, chicken or turkey salad, peanut butter for dipping, almond butter and honey sandwiches (on homemade bread, of course), mixed nuts, hummus, chicken and vegetable soup, lettuce wraps filled with shredded turkey and dilly Greek yogurt

Dessert: no bake chocolate peanut butter bars , zucchini or pumpkin bread, oatmeal pumpkin cookies , a square of dark chocolate, homemade trail mix with chocolate, or your family's favorite homemade dessert in a little bitty portion (I would feel awful for my kiddo's teachers if I pumped them full of sugar at lunch, since now that we eat a lot less of it, they get really nutty while under it's sticky influence.)

Water makes for a perfectly acceptable drink at lunch, and since my kiddos take a water bottle to school anyhow, they just grab it for lunch, too. If your school allows water bottles from home, I highly suggest taking them up on the offer. Remember how many kids put their mouth on the water fountain when you were little?? Yuck..just yuck.

Organic gardening- how we got started

I decided it was time to get this post written because, this morning, I woke up to sprouts! The organic broccoli and organic cucumbers I started indoors last Friday are germinated and starting to peek out of the starting medium.

This is very exciting because, though I gardened a lot as a kid, this is my first experience as an adult without the assistance of the years of experience my parents have accumulated. I haven't even had to call them for advice yet, thanks to bajillions of fabulous articles on the web. I'm sure the day is coming soon, though.

How did we get started?

First, I assessed the possible planting spaces in our yard. We decided to forego the planting of non-edibles this year, so no flowers for us! We have four beds already installed, one of which is very small ( 2ftx4ft). I watched how much sun each bed got throughout the day. I needed to plan how much space I'd have to plant where my fruits and veggies would get the right amount of sun (or shade as the case may be).

Next I started thinking about the things I'd like to plant, and ways to optimize planting so that we could get fresh produce for as long as possible. In the end, I decided I wanted to plant corn, jalapeno peppers, yellow summer squash, zucchini cucumbers, bell peppers, tomatoes (big and small), eggplants, strawberries, some winter squash, garlic, onions, white potatoes, looseleaf and head lettuce, spinach, broccoli, snap peas, green beans,  and assorted herbs.

Seems like a lot, right? It will be! Finding new ways to plant is going to be the key to fitting all of these vegetables in our small yard. Putting in permanent beds isn't really a practical option because we rent. There are TONS of ideas out there to make the most of your space, though. We're gathering fallen tree branches from a recent winter storm to build a teepee for the beans to grow up. We're asking around for abandoned vegetable cages so we can plop our tomatoes and peppers in nice sunny spots throughout the yard. I've gone in search of a couple kiddie pools that no longer hold water to act as strawberry beds. Be creative! You can find containers all over the place, so even if you don't have a yard, you can grow your own produce.

Since the weather is quite variable here in Kansas, we started our seeds indoors. I took a shortcut and bought a Jiffy professional greenhouse, which has space for 72 plants with little sphagnum peat moss pods that you soak to expand them for planting. You just poke a little hole, drop in your seeds, and lightly cover them. It was ridiculously simple this way, but it's not so difficult to start your plants in small containers or recycled cell packs from the purchased plants of years past. Organic starting medium is easy to find and very affordable as well. Maybe next year I'll get brave enough to make my own starting mix.

I set the greenhouse in a south facing window and I've been rotating it to make sure the whole tray is getting a fair amount of sunlight. I also planted some looseleaf lettuce and spinach in pots (cute red ones that I purchased for under $2 each). They are outside on the front porch, though they will have to come inside later in the week because we are expecting SNOW!

So far, we've spent about 12 man hours working up the soil by hand in the 4 existing beds and getting seeds started. Gardening takes time. It may also require physical effort. Having a yard full of fresh, delicious produce that I am positive hasn't been soaked in chemicals will be well worth the time and effort expended.

Growing our own organic produce and preserving what we can't eat will make eating whole foods more cost effective. Eating what we have in the gardens as opposed to running out to buy what we need for a recipe will not only be cheaper, but ensure we are eating fruits and vegetables that are at their nutritious peak. Plus I can buy seeds that are GMO free. Seeds of Change is a great, affordable company for organic, GMO free seeds. I found them at my local Wal-Mart, but you can also order online.

Here are some great resources to help you research how to get your garden growing!

Offers great breakdown of how to plant various fruits and vegetables:

http://www.organicgardening.com/

Last frost date by zip code:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/freeze-frost-dates/#b

Are you planning a garden this spring? What do you plan to plant? I'd love to hear your plans or even just your gardening dreams!

P.S., below you'll see pictures of my sprouts, the biggest bed all worked up, and my go-to gardening tools.