Bento Supplies & Organization

I've been meaning to post about my bento supplies for ages now... but the cabinet I store it all in was a total disaster.  Enter A Bowl Full of Lemons and her Messy Tupperware Cabinets challenge.  So it's not exactly Tupperware, but still...

I think we can all agree it was time for a little organization!  Before we get to the "after" shot, I want to show you the supplies I've been working with.  I don't get terribly creative with Elle's bentos (I considered adding 2 creative bentos per month to my 2011 to do list, but decided that was a lot of pressure for 6am in the morning and that I could get creative with things like lunch box notes & new foods instead... for now anyway) but these supplies have been more than sufficient to pull together a bento 3 days a week for the entire first semester of school.

Here they all are: 

1 - sandwich and cheese/fruit leather/whatever other sliced thing I can think of to cut cutters 

2 - adorable little picks I absolutely love and use to dress up whatever boring or new weird food I have to sneak into Elle's bento.  I got these from Daiso Japan which has some really great cheap bento supplies... I think it may be just wholesale though... if you do a Google search for Bento supplies you'll find lots though.

3 - I have entirely too many silicone cupcake cups!  I do like having a variety of shapes, although I almost always just use the square ones, but you definitely don't need the quantity I have.  You can pick these up at Michaels or Jo-Anne's in the cake decorating section or even at Target in the dollar bin section sometimes.

4 - I've picked up bento boxes at various places - the Disney store, Sanrio, the pink oval one is the Sassy brand box from the baby section at Target, and the green one is a box I picked up at Old Navy in the check out line (it's pretty big, so I mostly just send that one with my Doug).  The insulated fuel mug is a new addition that I found at Publix for $5.  It's nice to have a variety of sizes so you have a size that will fit the stuff you have on hand to send that day.

5 - Oh I love the little monkey containers!  I found those on Etsy at a shop that doesn't currently have any bento supplies listed, but if you do a supplies search for bento, lots of fun things come up on Etsy.

6 - silicone dividers are a nice little thing to have in your bento stash!

7 - lastly, I have plastic forks & spoons.  These came with a picnic set I had, but a lot of the bentos come with them (especially if you buy them at Disney or Sanrio) or you can find kids utensils pretty much anywhere.

Are you ready for the AFTER picture?  Here it is:

I moved the coffee supplies to a cabinet next to where the coffee maker is & filled the shelves with boxes of glass wear & sushi sets instead.  I also pared down a set of stacking bowls that I only ever use 3 of anyway & more neatly arranged some serving dishes we very rarely use.  The bottom shelf is all those supplies I showed above.  The white box holds all the cutters, the silicone cupcake cups are stacked neatly in their original packaging, a little metal pail corrals the picks and all the other little bits, and the bento boxes are stacked neatly in the corner.

Organizing this cabinet should make making Elle bentos during her second semester even easier on me!