I need to come up with a healthy snack to bring in to my son's school for his birthday. The bar has apparently been set by another child who brought in applesauce robots- a juice box with an upside down applesauce cup on top and googly eyes, Halloween Whopper packs as arms and legs. Darn, I guess that means I can't just get away with a bag of tiny oranges. I would actually like to do something fun, and I was think of something with a Babybel as a base. There are a few cute ideas on Pinterest, but most of them involve taking a scalpel to each Babybel and carving out the wax, and no way am I doing that 33 times! Any brilliant ideas that won't take me a million years? All I could come up with was looking for a font similar to the M&M font and sticking that on red and orange Babybels (his name starts with M) so they look like giant M&M's. Any other ideas, with or without tiny cheeses?
Thank you thank you thank you!!!!!
I know, I know, I am kind of disgusted at my need to do something super creative. I can't help it- I need the best grade in the class :) It's a sickness!!!!!
Don't try so hard to "keep up with the Joneses" because the next mommy will be pulling her hair out trying to keep up with you! :)
Try to find something that's a bit healthy...
This one had a pic of Babybel umbrellas
http://www.diy-enthusiasts.com/food-fun/babybel-cheese-cu...
Have to say that while all those ideas are really cute...as a preschool teacher in the past I can say that the amount of time alotted for snack is about 10 mins. No time to wrestle things apart that have been glued, taped and pipecleanered together. A juice box and muffin with cream cheese frosting would be enough. Or a candy treat that can go home. It's not really the place for the treat Olympics. Save that stuff for parties at home.
Take a look at these pictures. I like the mouth made with apples and marshmallows and the mice made with strawberries! If the link doesn't work, I just googled creative healthy snacks and clicked on the photos.
https://www.google.com/search?q=healthy+creative+snacks+r...
You may not like it, but... why not just do what you were planning to do originally? "The bar has been set"? Really? So it isn't just a nice thing to do for your son's birthday, but it's a competition?
I don't get it. Really. I don't.
I'm guessing if he is young enough to want a googly-eye robot as a snack, then he is young enough that you have a lot of years left to suffer every year trying to best everyone else.
Good luck with that. It just gets harder.
Why not teach your son to appreciate what YOU do, rather than trying to be better than someone else? You'll save yourself a barrel of trouble down the road. I promise.
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ETA:
For what it's worth, I offered to get my daughter some babybel cheese for her lunches. She asked me to please not, b/c they were gross unless you ate them straight out of the refrigerator. So... I'd stick with Clementines. I love those, and so do my kids. And they are in season right now, so perfect. :)
Whatever happened to good old fashioned yummy cupcakes.?
Lots of cute ideas but too much work to do 33x over.
I would fill 4oz condiment cups with fresh fruit. Give out sword shaped party picks to skewer the fruit.
If you have the time, decorate the lid...
option 1 sharpie on a pirate face on the lid
option 2 using a black skinny elastic (joann fabrics has them) black felt and hot glue create a eye patch to go over the lid (under the cup). It will look like it is holding the lid in place. I would suggest cutting the materials all together and make them like a production line.
option 3 printout a pirate map top it with clear contact paper and cut circles and tape to lid
Suggested fruits: blueberries, raspberries, grapes, pineapple, mandarin oranges. I would stay away from strawberries as they tend to mold
ETA: If you really want to win "mom of the year" (lol) handing out crisp $2 bills will do it. If you can make jumping origami frogs with them ...BONUS! I can help you with them if your were next door but... AZ is just bit of a drive from MI. Here's the next best thing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEuAx7ODvdc
OMG, i just went to pinterest and that robot is one the top when I searched 'class snack ideas.' It is super cute. Another idea is a sandwich bag filled with grapes and goldfish with a clothes pin separating the two items. The paperclip is turn into a butterfly. I would use a sharpie and dot 2 eyes a nose and smile.
edit: I just looked at Michelle's link. That strawberry mouse it so cute. Also, there is a Babybel turn into an angry bird (sorry looks like a lot of work).
oh sweetie. let go of the need to one up the robot mom.
creative and fun is awesome but only if it's fun for YOU. the little steamrollers are going to snarf 'em up in a trice anyway, and the teacher won't thank you if you go complicated (and the robot sounds like it kinda was.)
and the other mothers will LOVE you if you send in a bag of cuties.
one of the most popular snacks i ever did was peanut butter cookies (pre-made dough cuz our mennonite store has incredible raw dough, and cheaper than i could make it myself) with chocolate pretzels snapped to make antlers, and M&M eyes and rudolph noses.
but that's pretty sugary for a school snack.
khairete
S.
The robot is cute and clever-but with all the sugar and sticky raisins-I wouldn't have that as a snack unless the children brush their teeth afterwards-I think your idea is better and maybe take a fruit salad or berries-fresh, not in a package. Good luck!
I saw the cutest thing on pintrest with a climintine orange, pealed, with a celery stick stuck in the middle. It looked like a pumpkin!
Cupcakes. Use applesauce instead of oil.
I haven't read the others, and I understand you want to be the best, but I really think the other moms will appreciate you more if you do something normal. No one wants the pressure of outdoing the mom who makes the robots which, quite honestly, make a much bigger impression on the moms than on the kids. So do everyone a favor and keep it simple. Set the bar low again so the moms don't all have to continue trying to one-up each other.
We had a similar thing happen with the snacks that were given out after soccer games. Rather than a juice and a couple of snacks, people were making these fancy decorated bags and including little toys inside and 4-5 things to eat. Too much! I refused to turn a post-game snack into a goody bag.
as a daycare provider...I HATE cupcakes. They are sooo messy!
I prefer cake, cookies, brownies, etc.
But you want healthy, so here's what I found:
http://www.pinterest.com/pin/142989356892334532/...cuter than cute!
http://www.pinterest.com/pin/79516749644090055/....snowmen, but still healthy & cute
http://www.pinterest.com/pin/79516749644090045/....this is great, & so would any fruit kabob
Good luck & enjoy.....
I made Halloween fruit kabobs that were a big hit. I did a rectangle of honeydew, a cube of watermelon, a grape, and a ball of cantaloupe. Then I took candy melts and drew a Jack-O-Lantern face on the cantaloupe and a Frankenstein on the honeydew. It actually only took about an hour to do. If you check out pinterest for Halloween Fruit Kabobs you can get the link - I realize that Halloween has passed but you can use the basic idea to come up with your own design.
And I totally get the drive to do something really awesome. There's always a competition in my head...
I used to make cat cupcakes.
Frost a cupcake w/ choc frosting.
Eyes: M and M's
Whiskers: Thin pretzels
Nose: Candycorn or any triangle shaped fruit pc or candy
Ears: Thick licorice cut into triangles
Mouth: Thin licorice
You can always frost the cupcake in his favorite color and use raisins for eyes, pretzels for whiskers, etc...
-2 apple slices w/mini marshmellows in between to look like teeth. It looks like a smile
-2 oval crakers w/a slice of strawberry connecting the two, blueberries for eyes. Looks like a bug
-fruit in ice cream cones
-mini carrots spread around a grape to look like a flower w/a celery stalk
-a piece of salami w/olive slices for eyes, red bell pepper sliver for smile, mini carrots for arms, halved cheese sticks for legs, applesauce for hair
-1/2 banana, choc chips for eyes, pretzel for wings, apple slices for ears (bug)
My first thought is a Rolo "pencil"
A ziplock sandwich bag that includes Babybel cheese (too expensive for me though), a tiny tangerine and a lollipop. The end.
I agree you need to not get sucked into the competition.
But I agree that making snacks appealing can add to the fun. Here's an idea that might be a little TOO healthy for your purposes, but I don't know what you are restricted to with kids who often have allergies or insensitivities. So if it's for a November birthday, look at the idea of a turkey: http://www.food.com/recipe/turkey-appetizer-194323
Another option is to use cupcakes in different colors and flavors, and create a long train (turn each one into a train car) - get a good sized board at the lumberyard, cover with foil (colored or plain), and arrange the cupcakes in a long line. Stack a few and do double-width to create an "engine", put small crackers or cookies on the side of each to create wheels (use tubed icing to make them stick), and put a few candies on top or the sides to look like windows or the top of a caboose. A tootsie roll can be the smokestack, and black licorice strings can be the smoke. You could use your little baby bel cheese for the large wheels on the locomotive. Pretzel sticks can be the little railing on the back of the caboose.
You can also make a caterpillar, arranging the cupcakes in an undulating shape, and attaching little candies to be the spots. Add black or red licorice to be the legs and antennae.
The birthday child gets the head of the caterpillar or the part of the engine he wants.
I found a lot of ideas in an old Betty Crocker or similar cookbook at the library and stole lots of time honored and simple ideas from that!
Wow! It sounds like Martha Stewart land there. At the west coast of Florida, we are not allowed to send in snacks for the class that are homemade. On my son's birthday, he gets a pencil and a sticker from the school. That's it. I just send in my usual boring snack everyday.
What happened to the days when moms sent in cupcakes?
You do sound very creative. I never would have thought of taking a babybel and putting M & Ms on it. Would the kids even eat that? I don't know. How about putting goldfish in a bag and call it a fish bowl?
You sound like you have a lot of time on your hands like me. I would suggest starting a cake business or something. I am looking to channel my creative energy as well.
