Packing Lunch

I don't have time to pack lunch for four kids everyday. My boys like to pack them in the morning so they're fresh, so if that's going to happen on top of all four of them getting ready for school, they are going to have to pack it themselves. I can help, but don't have time to do them all. It's a lot of work to decifer what each of them wants or likes.

When school started, I made a "menu" for the boys and called it "The Brother's Lunch". It's hung on the fridge everyday since then and the kids use it EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. to pack their lunches. I help the littles and I check them before the kids leave just to make sure they're not sneaking something they shouldn't or to make sure that they've got enough to eat.

This menu thing works great....most of the time. But, the way it was set up, they could take a yogurt stick and a cheese stick and their main dish item and that would be the extent of their lunch. Then, I'd get reports of still being hungry after lunch.

Today, I redid the menu and I'm hoping the boys love the changes. I separated the side dish column into two sections. They can choose one from each. Group A is fruit and veggies and group B is the dairy stuff and granola bars. I also listed a couple of optional tradeouts that they could do with approval....I don't always have jello or pudding made up for them to take, so they're on the tradeout list. I also added a snack section. This week, we started basketball practice immediately after school until 5pm and then wrestling practice follows at 6pm. Hopefully, when #2 has practice after school, we'll remember to send a snack so he's not starving when he gets home and before his next practice starts since we'll only have time for a quick meal before running out the door again. I see more later evening snacks/mini meals in our future!

So, since I found having this menu handy, I thought I'd share it with you. If you'd like me to e-mail you a copy that you can tweek for your own use, just let me know! I'd be happy to share. Enjoy!