Some goodies I bought

Well I have been meaning to get to this local Generation Green store by our Trader Joe's store for some time. So today Mallory and Nathan and I went in there and for me going there is like going to a fabric store. Now I am not a clothes, shoes, housewares, furniture shopper. My Achilles heal in shopping is fabric stores and green living/organic stores. There is always something that I want or do not have in those stores and if I don't watch myself I could spend a lot of money. Well so we visited today and they have so many cool things in the store. They have tons of lunch packing stuff from Tiffin tins to metal lunch boxes with little compartments for different foods, they have recycles toys, tons of baby stuff (like usable sized saddle blankets) and lots of other cool stuff.

Well I was in this store because we have been having issues with Julianne and her lunch likes and dislikes. We started out the school year with packing peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. That lasted for about a month and then she decided that she did not like my bread (it was whole wheat bread) because it was not soft enough. I tried different breads (I refuse to buy white bread so she had little alternatives) and it still did not work. So we switched to ham and cheese but she did not like the cheese because it got too warm and she did not like that. Since Christmas we have been making roll ups which consist of tortilla with cream cheese and ham. This was a favorite when she was in preschool in Tennessee so we went back to that. Well that worked for a few months and now she is tired of that. So I went back to packing peanut butter and jelly. Well the lunches have not been eaten and she comes home grumpy and continually has a headaches. So that means that I have to deal with the wrath of Julianne after having not eaten or drunken enough all day. Additionally she does not like the juice box (what kid does not like juice boxes) that I pack she just wants water. Well we don't have a container small enough to fit into her lunch box. So for the past month I have been thinking about getting a smaller container and this was my day.

This is what we bought:

It is a small drinking cup and container to store hot/cold food. So we are going to start packing water and warm food so that she actually eats something. She wants me to pack a hard boiled egg for tomorrow, which is a strange requests but hey we will try anything. But I think that putting pasta in the container will be a good idea.


This is an adorable alternative to plastic bags that I could not pass up. It is called Snacktaxi. I hate using plastic bags for all the lunches that I have to pack her so when I saw this I thought it was genius. I was actually mad that I did not think of this idea. It is such a waste of landfill space and resources to make plastic bags so I was thrilled to see this idea. What it basically is a layer of cotton sew to a layer of nylon/polyurethane with a Velcro closure. You use it and then wash it in the dishwasher/hand wash or even throw it into the washing machine. They have different sizes for sandwiches or smaller ones for snacks. So I bought one and may make a few of my own that meet our needs.

Things I am grateful/thankful for:
-ingenuous ideas such as this cute plastic bag alternative
-shopping at stores that value organic/chemical free/recycled/fair trade practices
-our newly spread mulch