Snack Ideas for Kids & How to Stop Them From Eating All Your Food During Breaks

Hey, hey, hey Everybody! Going to make sure that I'm good on Facebook and Instagram and we're gonna hop right in! Okay, so welcome welcome, welcome! Tonight we're gonna be talking about how to(hold on let me just a little bit hey lady Tanisha over on Instagram thanks for tuning in um) tonight we're gonna be talking about how to make sure that your kids are not eating up all your food over spring break let me know if your kids are on spring break. 

I'm in the Atlanta area so most of the counties that are here kids are on spring break and if they're not yet then it's coming up in the next week. And, I actually saw this meme that was hilarious and it was talking about to tell your kids, so they can know to not think that they are eating four or five meals a day. Because, I know that when your kids are in the house they think oh I'm home and I'm gonna eat all the stuff in the pantry because they have no sense of time or things like that and so we'll be talking about how to kind of manage your kids so they're not eating up all your food, while they're in the house so, let me know if your kids are on spring break or spring break is coming up over on Instagram Tanisha said that it's over now and they'll go back tomorrow okay so you are free and clear um but she said they did eat all day all her food so hopefully these tips can help you for summer break or I know some counties have like a fall break or like I spring not spring break it's like a weird thing in between spring break in the end of the year so hopefully these tips can help you with that. 

And, I haven't introduced myself yet thanks for tuning in my name is Chef Ashley Shep I am a meal time strategist and a personal chef in the Atlanta area and I hope busy moms get dinner done faster without having to order takeout and so if you are just tuning in tonight we're gonna be talking about how to have some healthy snack ideas for your kids and also how to make sure they're not eating all of your food all day while they're in the house on break if your kids are not currently on a break this could also work for the weekends like if you're at home a lot on Saturdays then that's another time where for kids time just seems like it just does not really have any any boundaries or things like that and so that's another time where they'd like to eat all the food in your house. 

So, my first tip for you is one that some of you might already do but it's worth repeating is to make sure you set boundaries. And what I mean by that is just like you would with anything else for your kids. So let's say, you are having them with their room like maybe their room needs to be clean a certain way. Like, I know growing up if I wanted to go anywhere to go over to somebody's house or just certain times within the week I had to make sure that my room was clean or I wasn't gonna be allowed to go. And so with that same thing with food, you want to set boundaries for your kids. So maybe that looks like having a timer, so that okay they can have their snack at like 11 o'clock for the morning snack and then maybe they can have their snack at like 3 o'clock. And that's gonna be helpful to actually use the timer because for kids, if you think about it during the school day all of those things are kind of set up for them they don't really have to think about when are we doing this is or this it's just ok so I come in I unpack my book bag there's structure and there's boundaries that are already in place. So, it's not something that kids are really having to think about it's just something that kind of moves them through the day and for those of you that don't know I'm actually a teacher by trade and so I'm speaking from that area of expertise. But one of the things that was in the jiff or not the jiff but the meme that I saw was to remind your kids that they only eat at school once or twice. Your kids if they have breakfast at school they're eating twice a day if they only have lunch at school they're usually only eating just that one meal a day in the time that they're not at home with you. Some schools do a lot of snack time depending upon when your lunchtime is, so max your kids are probably eating three times a day at school and it's not gonna be a full meal and so a lot of times if they're saying oh I'm hungry or I like when are we gonna eat whatever a lot of times is that because they're not actually hungry it's because they are bored or because they're close to the foo,  it could be because they see you eating.  I know for a lot of parents they have to hide the food they're eating so they don't have to share with their kids and so those are things you just want to kind of keep in mind so when you set up those boundaries in that structure think about your kid is your kid one that is easily easily wanting to have a snack when they're like playing video games or watching a movie and nothing you can't do those things but we kind of want to help our kids to be able to self-regulate so they're not having to just think oh I'm bored let me go get a snack or oh I'm sitting in front of the TV let me just go get a snack because that's a natural reflex that they maybe have been doing so if this is making sense you let me know in the comments okay so Tanisha said great topic she needs this well hopefully this has been helpful and then on Facebook all right so we're good there okay um so setting those boundaries so like I said you could use a timer but this could also include picking the snacks for them so if you have a kid that they don't always make the best decisions when it comes to snack time when they're given that option what you can do is kind of limit their options for them and that could start from not buying things that are things you want your kid to eat like I know growing up and even now we didn't really have potato chips in the house and if we had them it was like for a party or we went to someone else's house and got them so it wasn't that we weren't allowed to have them my mom just didn't keep them in the house so if they're not in the house then it's just not our option for it wasn't an option for us and it's not really an option here in my house and so with that it's gonna make it so obviously your kids don't have that as a choice and then you're getting to choose the things that you want them to have so maybe you're picking options that they like but then also kind of eliminating some of that for them so this is a little easier if your kids don't go with you to the grocery store to pick out these options but if they do just like any other boundary you set as a parent any other thing like when you give them a bedtime when you tell them like it's time for bath like any other thing like that food is the same way in it and it could be something where you explain to them that I'm doing this because I care about your health I'm doing this because I want to make sure that you're able to get your thoughts together and make sure heads not filled with junk and not saying you have to completely eliminate those things and we'll talk about what types of snack options are good later but you do want to kind of narrow those options for kids. 

So another thing you can do is to color code your options. So for example, if you are making snacks for them, you can use like little decorative tape like washi tape it sticks to things but it comes off smoothly, it doesn't leave a mark. And I was telling one mom the other day that she could put like bins inside of her fridge or inside the pantry so maybe you have like your sweet snacks or maybe have your salty snacks and maybe the salty or like green and then the sweet ones are like yellow or something and so if your kids if you're allowing them to have like a morning and an afternoon snack. Then,  you would tell them okay so you can get the green snack and the more or you can pick which one you have one but you can only have one from this container and one from that container and so that way they get to decide hmm do I want to have my sweet snack in the morning or driving away until later so they're getting some type of choice. It's not completely restricting them but you have already made the choice of what those snacks are for them. So hopefully this is making sense to you all in it that it's helpful if you have not already please share this out to parents who are going to be on the struggle bus for Spring Break or who are who just need a little bit of help and it doesn't necessarily have to be for Spring Break, it could be after school because that's another time that window between getting off the bus to dinnertime is another time we're snacking happens and that's fine but we want to make sure we have some structure around that so all right.  

My next tip is to help them to be able to pick smart snacks and so once again we talked about this a little bit but picking snacks that are gonna keep them fuller longer and picking ones that are of course gonna be things they like. So if you have a bit of a picky eater this will be a little bit harder but you can actually let them have some say in it.  (Um) I know, like with my mom, she same thing we talked about a little earlier um with us she would give us options and so like if you know your kid likes fruit and they like crackers and they like like granola or something um let them kind of put their snacks together or let them decide. Okay, I want to have this one on Monday, I'll have this one on Tuesday and this one on Wednesday. So once again you're limiting it but you're giving them the option to pick when they're gonna have each of them um things like nut and fruits together are gonna be a good combination because the fruit will give you a little bit of that sweetness but then the nuts will give you the protein. That you need to make sure they're not coming back in the kitchen first snack again in 20 minutes or if your kids allergic to nuts and you could use chickpeas or another good option they're very versatile. They are gonna be something you could bake them, you can eat them raw. They're really easy to kind of just throw together popcorns another good option but with the popcorn it's not gonna fill you up as much as something that has a little bit of protein in it but it is a whole grain so it's it can be a healthy option and when I say that I don't mean like the the popcorn doused in butter and sugar and sugar if it's like a cinnamon sugar popcorn if you're doing like smart pop or skinny pop those are good options and they have some good flavors as well they're not gonna weigh your kids down Another option of smoothies or fruit, so you could get the little pre-packaged fruit cups and that's that's one thing that I think is also important to bring out because a lot of times of parents they feel like they have to or not that they have to but they feel like they're being judged if they don't do everything from scratch. And so that's now I'm here and that's not something I want to help perpetuate but even if you get those little fruit cups like that's better than your kid eating something that's loaded with a bunch of fat and if you're worried about their sugar intake then you can get the ones that are lower sugar or lower like in lower cert lower like they're in water instead of like fruit juice you could have them do whole fruit like the Halos or the cuties those are made so that they can easily peel them you don't have to  peel it start it for them granola is another good option you do want to kind of be careful about the amounts that they have of that just because it could be depending upon what kind of granola it is. It could be high in sugar and it is it is high and healthy fat depending upon the nuts that are in there but with all of these you can use those little snack- sized Ziploc bags and if your kids old enough you can put them in charge of filling those with their snacks or you can do it for them so that way there's easy to grab if you're gonna make them for them. If you're not there's definitely options that are already in like single size servings so for example like Ritz crackers I got the whole-wheat ones and they have like a little mini sleeve so I'm saying cuz normally to come in like the longer sleeve but they have ones that are like 1/2 or like a quarter of that and so that's easy just to put in like a bag or something or just to put it in the same way that it is and they can take that so those are some options all right. 

So my last one is to keep them busy when they're on break and so like we talked about earlier for a lot of kids and a lot of adults actually the reason why we end up snacking mindlessly is because we're bored or it could be because we're stressed or it's just a habit. Like, I've shared before that I used to have a habit of going to get ice cream on Fridays after work and at some point I'm sure that habit was because I really wanted it but I realized that it was just because it was just my brain was programmed to do that. And so our kids are the same way if your kid is programmed to get a snack as soon as I get off the bus they're gonna expect that snack when they're on spring break they don't kind of have that pattern anymore so it becomes a new opportunity for a pattern so you want to have your kids be on somewhat of a schedule not to where it's like down to the minute but maybe they have blocks of time, like okay once you wake up you get your breakfast things like that and then you're not allowed to have a snack until like 11:00 or you're not allowed to have a snack until whatever time you decide and that's where that timer will come in and be helpful if you if you don't have a timer if your kids smaller than that you could say or younger to where they can't really understand the whole timer thing you could do like a TV show amount so you might want to say okay so after you watch two episodes of this then maybe you can have snack.  And so it's kind of creating a time structure for them without telling them like an actual time if that helps a little bit um and when you create the schedule for them stick to it like if you're gonna ask you before that time is up if you don't think that they're hungry there's really no reason why they need to have another snack and I know for some parents like ah but I think my kid might be starving and you know your kid like you're gonna know whether or not they're really hungry if they're just bored and they want something to eat and I'm not saying starve your kid at all obviously but if you think about the time that they're not eating in a school day for example they get to school if you're an elementary school about 7:30 8 o'clock and then you're planning eating lunch until 12 11 or 12 depending upon what lunch you have during the day and they're not getting off the bus until like 3:00 so there's a good so there's a good amount of time in between when they're eating so it doesn't have to be any different when they're at home with you. (Um) So some ways to keep them busy during that time are also things like free activities so going to the library or to the park that a probably going to the park will probably work up an appetite for them so they probably won't want a snack after that but it's something that can help them get some fresh air and not always just rely on electronics or a snack to kind of keep them busy and keep them occupied so um those are my quick tips to help make sure your kid is not eating you out of house and home while they're on spring break or summer break and if you are looking for more tips like this when it comes to dinnertime snack time things of that sort then definitely sign up at my link that I want to put in here um Facebook is there and then on Instagram. I'm gonna see if I can pop it into the comments for you and this basically will give you insider access to my email list and what I do there is I send out tips strategies if you ever were not able to catch the replay of some or you if you were ever not able to catch a live version of something that I do I do send out the replay so that way you're not searching through social media to try to find it and I also give my email list advance notice for different things and different tips that I don't share with everybody else so let me see okay I post it on Instagram we're good there and post it on Facebook. 

So, um thank you all for tuning in and hope you have a good night and a spring break that does not include you being food less s have a good one.

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