Hello! My 4 year old son is playing T Ball for the first time this year. Parents sign up to bring snacks after each game. The parents have been bringing juice boxes, Kool Aid, Gatorade, fruit snacks, cookies...A lot of these things we don't normally feed to our son-too much sugar! Also, he washes up and goes to bed when we get home so I really want to avoid the junk food. What would you suggest I bring when it's our turn for snack? I want it to be healthy, but still fun. The only restriction is no nuts.
Anything that is a finger food and hopefully not "junk" food. As you said.
Cut up fruit.
Cheese cubes
Grapes
Whole grain chips
Small bottles of water or Fruitables (already has water added and has veggies) to drink. For a snack, frozen berries, or crakers (Earth Best makes organic cheddar crackers - Sesame Street charachters, with added vitamins etc.), pretzels or sweet potato chips. Also Veggies, carrots, celery, broccoli etc. with hummus or some kid of dip...
Cheese sticks are usually a huge hit and are a lot of great protein and calcium. Easy to keep cool in a cooler. You also can buy prepackaged, presliced apples if you don't want to cut a heap of apples. I would not worry about kids passing up a healthy snack because it's not cookies and Kool Aid; their parents should be there encouraging them to try the apples and cheese sticks....
Juice boxes are all right IF they are wholesome juices and not just Kool Aid (kids do NOT need Gatorade! That is for people who are sweating major buckets and kids playing t-ball do not need to "replace electrolytes"!). The Fruitables brand made by Apple and Eve contains no extra sugars or food dyes and is in reasonably sized small boxes that aren't too much.
You can always bring pretzels or goldfish crackers-my boys get those a lot for after game snack. In soccer they get orange wedges. I am sure that I will be flamed here but veggies just do not cut it after a game. It is supposed to be kind of a treat/reward that the kids really look forward to. So I wouldn't go too "healthy". After Tball is not the time or place to make a statement about healthy snacking.
Orange slices, my kids like yogurt (the ones with no spoons required), granola bars (oats and honey has no nuts), ritz cheese ad crackers, string cheese, popcorn, graham crackers, and what Kim O. said apples, goldfish, teddy grahams....what kid doesn't like chocolate milk...
I usually bring roarin waters capri sun - juice box but with much less sugar. You can even bring small water bottles - the kids are mainly just looking for something cold to drink.
Snacks: there are those packs of apple slices and grapes, pretzels, gold fish.
I used to like to take frozen yogurts~
Watermelon is always a hit. Cube it and portion it into baggies
Grapes, string cheese .
Popcorn and fruit loops...again portioned into baggies. Super good together
in our leagues parents bring a whole sack of stuff. when we have early morning games I like to bring real orange juice, a small box of cereal, a gogurt and some kind of fruit. when it is lunch or dinner time I like a small turkey or pb&J sandwich, string cheese, fruit, and water, real juice, or propel. I do not mind if my kids have a little junk food. This saturday we have snacks and it is my daughters bday so we will have cupcakes included. It just needs to be BALANCED. My kids know to eat the good for you stuff and a little not so good but really yummy still. I will throw in a mini snicker bar or something like that but not a bag of junk. we recently had a mom that provided a can of soda (to 4-6 year olds a whole can???), a mini bag of marshmellows, marshmellow cookies, a bag of chips, and a candy bar. I would be ok with maybe 1 of those with something healthier but all of them? WAAAAAY too much.
On my son's team, we usually have a juice box, some kind of fruit, and something like pretzels, veggie chips, or crackers. They also often get something like fruit snacks or a fruit roll. I don't like there to be a lot of junk either and I got annoyed last week when someone put in popsicles!
We buy the Gogurts and throw them in the freezer. My son LOVES these, especially when they're frozen! No spoons needed, no crumbs, etc. Kids feel like they're getting the ice cream while still having something semi-healthy!
Aren't there requirements or guidelines already in place?
Our local YSA (youth sports association) requests only water and/or fruit for halftime/mid game. After the game it's a bit of a free for all, but still, most of the parents do something like whole juice and muffins, trail mix, granola/energy bars (semi-healthy.)
<sigh> I guess you can't control other people, right?
Just do the best you can, maybe a high fiber muffin with a few chocolate chips?
I took gogurt and capri sun roarin waters pouches.
Since my daughter has peanut allergies I just want to remind you that avoiding nuts is a good idea!
Apples, cheese sticks, water. Start a trend with the other parents!
Tell the other parents that juice, even the 100% real fruit juice kind, is exceedingly high in fructose, which is bad for everyone in large amounts.
How many apples would you have to eat to get a cup of apple juice? About 15. How about eat the apple and get the fiber and nutrients?
Sugar is sugar is sugar. NO JUICE. No Gatorade. No Propel. Kids need water. They're thirsty. They'll drink it.
I used to slice the big sunkist oranges and put them in ziplocks. If you refrigerate them overnight, they are delicious! The kids loved them :)
8oz bottles of Deer Park or SmartWater
Gogurt
We make homemade popcorn. Fun, pretty healty and a big hit with the kids! We did fruit once too, but that got pricey and many kids passed on snack that day.
