Our private and Georgia Pre-K kids are moving on to Kindergarten and many will pack a daily lunch. Establishing healthy eating habits early on can help your children have a healthy and balanced diet throughout their life. Preparing lunch boxes for your children can often get confusing as you want to ensure they eat healthy.

However, it doesn’t have to be difficult. With little effort, you can prepare nutritious lunches for your children every day. Here are some useful tips for packing a healthy lunch for kids:

Unleash Your Creativity

Like everything else, kids would be more interested in eating healthy food if it is fun for them. No need to spend hours trying to make creative lunches for them. All you need are some cookie cutters, cute drawings on a note, and dips to make things exciting for them.

• Cut out sandwiches with cookie cutters and add in sliced carrots or cucumbers
• Add apple slices or bananas on their yogurts with a smiling face
• Add hummus or other dips with sliced veggies

Mix it Up

Kids like to have variety in their food choices, along with the creative presentation. Here are a few things you can try:

• Invest in bento boxes with colorful lids and add in veggies, fruits, protein, and dessert. This is also great for portion control.
• Make homemade items to keep them interested, like assembling crackers with cheese squares and turkey pieces. Add some veggies and fruits too!
• Give their favorite sandwiches a spin using mini bagels, grain wraps, and even lettuce to replace bread.

Be sure to add in foods with different textures and colors.

Get the Kids Involved

They are bound to be more interested in their food if they took part in preparing it.

• Let them select their choice of lunch boxes
• Take them with you to buy groceries and ask them to select things from healthy options
• Allow them to cut fruits or veggies with a child-friendly knife and put them in their lunch boxes, or help them use the cookie cutter to cut out shapes for their sandwiches.

Bonus point: they will also learn more about healthy foods if you help them prepare their lunch boxes.

Keeping it Nutritious

Make sure to pick foods from three major food groups to add to their lunch boxes:

• Protein – low-fat yogurt, beans, reduced-fat cheese, peanut butter, and meat
• Fruits and vegetables – cut slices of fruits and veggies to make it easier for them to eat
• Grain – popcorns, low-sugar cereal, crackers or wrap, or whole grain bread

Limit foods like sweets and chips and avoid sugary beverages. Milk and water are the best beverages for their lunch.

Make Things Easy

Don’t make things difficult for yourself by trying to create extravagant lunch boxes. Keep it simple. Here are a few tips to help you:

• Plan ahead by creating a meal plan for the week on weekends. Shop for the things you would need or check the fridge to determine if there are items used in lunch boxes.
• Cut and freeze fruits and yogurt cubes overnight to create smoothies in the morning.
• Make wraps and sandwiches without any condiments a night or two before, and add in the lunch boxes with dips.
• Cut up slices of carrots, cucumbers, cheese, grapes, apples, and other fruits and vegetables over the weekend and bag them to add to the lunchboxes the next few days.

Having a healthy lunch will ensure your kids get the proper nutrition to do well in their class and stay active and energized throughout the day. It will also help them in forming healthy eating habits that will help them throughout their life.

At Mt. Elizabeth Academy, healthy eating is encouraged among the students and even the staff members to enhance physical and mental health. Our daycare offers after-school programs, vacation camps, infant care, childcare, pre-K early learning, and other early learning activities for families in Acworth, Marietta, Kennesaw, Brookstone, and other areas.

Get in touch with us today for more information.