This post is sponsored by Kroger.

A couple weeks back I posted some tips on getting kids to try new foods, a skill I think we’ve mastered at this point with Ava. And while some meals it’s quite the struggle to get both kids to eat, one way that seems to work the best getting both kids to eat is to make eating fun!

Fun (and easy) Lunchbox Ideas for Kids - The Overwhelmed Mommy Blogger

And how do we make eating fun? One of two ways:

Play Make Believe With Food

One that’s been working a lot for Franky lately is pretending his food and fork is a burst. We “tweet” that food all the way to his mouth, he opens wide and voila, comes back for more. He giggles and smiles and wants to “play” again! And for Ava, the same thing works like a charm.

But hey, I get it. We don’t always have the energy to sit there for an entire meal and play make believe with our kids and for some meals, your kids may not even be at home with you (like if they go off to school each day and eat lunch away for home). So that’s when lunch box prep comes into play:

Fun Lunch Box Ideas

We currently homeschool Ava so lunch is always at home but if you’re sick of tossing a full lunch box full of food because your kids don’t touch it then there are ways to make lunch fun, even when you’re not there!

We took a little shopping trip to our local Kroger to show you some fun kid-approved (and parent approved) lunchbox ideas. They’re affordable, quick and easy to put together, full of a variety of food groups to make sure our kiddos are eating healthy and balanced meals and best of all, they’re fun!

→ A Rainbow Lunchbox

We found foods in all sorts of colors and lined them up row by row, color by color and you know what? Ava loved it! Why? Because it’s fun! She scarfed this lunch down without me having to say a word and bonus points - it was so quick and easy to make too!

Of course there is such a wide range of ingredients you can use for a Rainbow-Themed Lunchbox but here’s what we used as we tried to touch on all food groups:

· strawberries
· string cheese
· mini cookies (from a Mini Cookie Variety Pack)
· green Apple slices
· blueberries
· rolled up turkey breast

And then our second cute lunchbox idea was just so much fun (and also super easy and quick to make).

→ A Mouse-Themed Lunchbox

You could switch this up and make different animals and shapes but here’s how we made this fun mouse-themed lunch box:

· peanut butter + jelly waffle sandwich (mouse head)
· small half circle cut out waffles (mouse ears)
· pretzels (waffles)
· blueberry (mouse nose)
· chocolate chips (mouse eyes)
· string cheese cut into cubes (because nice love cheese)
· orange slices (because they resemble cheese and I wanted to keep the “mouse” theme going

These are so much fun (especially for the kids) and they’re just so quick and easy to make which is great for us parents! So whether your kids are back in the classroom or you’re doing virtual or homeschool learning this year, Kroger has all of the ingredients to make lunch time fun for everyone!