THREE RICE MICE

Tell your kids it's time to make these tiny rice critters and see how they run to the kitchen. Combine 1/4 cup leftover cooked rice with 1 teaspoon cream cheese and 1/2 teaspoon plain yogurt (or use 1 teaspoon whipped cream cheese instead of the cream cheese and yogurt combo). Stir in a pinch of salt to taste.

With slightly dampened hands, roll the mixture into 1 1/2-inch balls. Now add the features: green-pea eyes, corn-niblet noses, chive or cheese-stick tails. For ears? Try olives, cheese, radishes or anything that, well, sounds good.

MR. TOMATO HEAD

Bright and cheerful, these pea-brained fellows may actually tempt your child to eat vegetables. With a serrated knife (parents only), slice the top off of a cherry tomato or other small tomato. Reserve the top for the hat.

Scoop out the insides with a teaspoon, turn the tomato upside down to drain, then fill with peas. Ask your child to use cream cheese to glue on a pair of black-bean eyes, a yellow-pepper nose and a celery grin. Put his hat back on, and he's ready to paint the town red.

YELLOW-PEPPER SUN

Your child can brighten up his or her dinner plate with this vegetable sun. Cut off one side of a yellow pepper and remove the inner ribs and seeds. Cut a 1-inch circle for the sun (or substitute a carrot round) and add 6 pepper-strip rays.

FLYING FISH

Turn a handful of fresh snow peas into a school of fanciful fish. Begin with a snow-pea body, then add triangular fins cut from a yellow pepper (use a pair of clean scissors or a paring knife to do the job).

For a tail, cut a second pea pod into a "V." Have your kids give their finny friend a sliced green-olive eye, glued in place with cream cheese. Who wouldn't take the bait?

GREEN-BEAN SERPENTS

Snakes for lunch? Don't worry, all these serpents will scare up is a healthy appetite. Poke dry-roasted sunflower seeds into the back of a fresh green bean.

If the seeds fall out, keep them in place with dabs of mustard or cream cheese.



Photography By Shaffer/Smith