great gifts for cooks

Check out this adorable caterpillar lunch idea. It's just one of many from this super-creative book by Mark Northeast called Funky Lunch: Happy Food for Happy Children.

Plus, he has a new book out now called Funky Party: Party Food for Happy Children. And it, as you may have guessed, adorable party food ideas for kids. Including another awesome caterpillar that caught my eye. I think I might just need to have a "Very Hungry Caterpillar" party some day!

Did I mention that it's real and you grow real miniature vegetables? OK. Just wanted to make sure.

Did you also know that eating these miniature veggies is pretty common and that they are called microgreens? You learn something new every day. 

You can buy this at a variety of places including uncommongoods.com or Amazon.

You're no doubt seen the super sweet Hello Cupcake! book around with its adorable cupcake ideas and instructions. Well, now those cupcake creators are back with a new book called Cupcakes, Cookies and Pies, Oh My! which includes not only cupcakes but cakes and pies as well. If that sheep creation on the cover doesn't get ya, I don't know what would!

If you've gotta do the dishes, you might as well try to make it a little more cheerful. I love kitschy plastic flowers of any kind so these are definitely on my radar next time I need new dish scrubbers! You can find them on Amazon or eBay and lots of other places that sell Boston Warehouse brand products.

Cake Sugar Designs has some way nifty technology which lets you come up with personalized cupcake designs which they print out using edible "ink" and mail to you. Then you just peel off the edible designs and lay them on your cupcakes. Sweet! And, well, sweet!

I didn't think it was possible for nesting dolls to get any cuter but I was wrong! Check out these nesting food storage containers at ModCloth called Bubby's Matryoshki Food Containers.

And while you're at it, there are these clever measuring cups to match! You can find these Bubby's Matryoshkas Measuring Cups at ModCloth as well.