Kids Lunch - Sending Your Love
Your kids lunch is a great vehicle for sending a loving message to your sweet one while you are working. This might be your only communication with your child during the day, so why not make it an expression of love?
The keys to a school lunch that makes the grade: healthy food, easy opening/eating, earth-friendly packaging, personalization, and of course, a message from mom.
Healthy Food for a Kids Lunch
Sandwiches are a good example of healthy food for a kids lunch. Try to stay away from white bread, and stick to whole grains. We like to buy rolls instead of bread to dress up the lunch routine. Listen to what your child wants in his lunch. Do they want cheese on their sandwich? If not, stick to something else. How miserable would you be if you were faced with something you didn't like for lunch everyday? Try to buy lean lunch meats that are free of preservatives and msg. If you can't do peanut butter due to classmate allergies, try sunflower seed butter. It's delicious and you can't even tell the difference. Buy real fruit preserves, not jelly for the sandwich. It's best to stay away from artificial sweeteners. This goes for everything in a healthy kids lunch.I always add at least one fruit or veggie to the mix. My kids love cut-up apples, carrots and edamame. Corn or broccoli is a good addition. Apple sauce is always easy. If you're on a budget, buy it in bulk and put it in reusable plastic bpa-free container with your child's name on it. It's better for the environment anyway. We are trying to stay away from drinking cow's milk, but there are plenty of soy, almond, and rice milks to choose out there (we are struggling to find tasty non-dairy cheese and yogurt substitutes). The organic take-with-you-yogurt knock-offs are great to toss in a lunch. A great kids lunch treat is gelatin without artificial dyes or ingredients. A lot of these natural, organic foods can be purchased at Trader Joe's for less than the name brands at the grocery store. Our pediatrician and dentist both recommend avoiding juice altogether. We're trying our best at this, but in the meantime we opt for real juices that contain 100% juice with no added sugar or sweeteners. Granola bars are a great idea for kids lunches - but somewhere this idea went terribly wrong. I like Kashi bars and Kid's Cliff Z-bars. The chocolate chip Z-bar tastes like a no-bake chocolate chip cookie but is packed with vitamins and protein. These are healthy convenience foods that are great for kids that need snacks in the morning or afternoon.
Kids Lunches: Earth Friendly and Easy
ABCnews.com revealed some interesting facts:
•Nearly one-third of all the waste produced in the United States comes from packaging, and food packaging comprises half of that amount, per the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
•School lunches are part of the problem. The average school-age child generates 67 pounds of waste per school year through their disposable lunches, according to the U.S. Energy Information Association.
•If every American child attending a public elementary school packed a waste-free kids lunch, landfill waste would be reduced by about 1.2 billion pounds every year.
Yikes!!!!
I have to admit, it is very difficult for working moms to be fabulous at their jobs, raise perfectly wonderful children, and coordinate reducing the world's landfill problem. But we can try. One easy way to get there is to start with a reusable lunch box. Let your child pick it out. If they want Ironman - so be it. If they want Hello Kitty - say "meow." The lunch box is going to be with them every day and they should identify with it. My younger son's preschool won't allow cartoon characters, so he picked out a nice turtle lunch box from Pottery Barn Kids, and we had it monogrammed with his name. He loves that lunch box. We paid a little more than the ones at Target or Walmart, but the Pottery Barn Kid's high quality construction has lasted the whole year without a hitch. Just remember to clean the box inside and out at least once a week with antibacterial soap or cleaner. Disgusting bacteria love to harbor in kid's lunch boxes.Another way to reduce the refuse is to use reusable containers instead of ziplock bags. This is a hard one. But it saves you money. Check out these adorable Bento Box kids lunches at
Parenting.com:
Cute Bento Boxes
Lastly, and I this is the hardest one: try to pack your drinks in a reusable drink container or thermos. This will also save you money. The one serving juice boxes are bad for the environment and bad for your wallet.
Here are some links for earthy friendly kids lunch ideas provided by ABCnews.com:
Litter Free Kids Lunch
EPA
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