Show Us your Life - What do you Feed your Kids?????

Kelly is back at it with the SUYL activities on Kelly's Korner and this week she wants the answer to the question, "What do you Feed your Kids?".  I am not so sure that Kelly or anyone else will get much inspiration from my child feeding routine, but here goes.

Breakfast:
Since Davey was old enough to start eating table food, I have made him pancakes or waffles for breakfast.  I use a microwavable pancake by De Waflebakkers and Great Value Homestyle Waffles.  I don't like using the Walmart brand of pancakes because I have found them to be very rubbery when cutting them, so I stick with De Waffle's. 

Both boys get to choose what they want, David generally chooses to have the waffles with JUST peanut butter on them, Jon likes his with butter and syrup (sugar free).  Recently I have added Malt-O-Meal Apple Zings cereal to their selection and both of them love having a bowl every couple of days (wow has this shaved some time off getting kids ready for school and eating time).  Jon loves fruit, so when I have banana's he likes to have his breakfast with a banana.

Every couple of days Jon will wake up and want nothing to do with pancakes, waffles, or cereal and chooses instead to have a yogurt.  When he is really off, he refuses any food and I will give him a Pediasure just to make sure he is getting something healthy in him to give him energy for the day (not like he needs much help in the energy department).

Lunch:

I make David's lunch every day for school, except for Friday's when I allow him to get pizza from the school cafeteria.  His normal packed lunch includes bottled water, turkey and cheese on whole wheat, and a side.  For his lunch side I usually pack a sugar free pudding, peanut butter crackers, apples w/peanut butter, or a cheese stick.  Every once in a while I will treat David with the 100 calorie packs of pringles or pretzels.  David is a picky eater in the department of vegetables and fruit, so it is tricky to get those into him.

For Jon I usually make him chicken nuggets, fish sticks, a corn dog, or a sandwich with a side like a banana or cheese.  Jonathan is my milk drinker, so he pretty much has milk with every meal and drinks water in between.  Neither one of my boys are juice drinkers, I have tried over the years to get them to drink apple juice or another fruit juice, but David won't drink it at all and Jon only likes to drink it on occasion.

On the weekends or when Davey is off from school I will sometimes make mac-n-cheese, hot dogs, ravioli's, noodles with butter, OR slices of home made pizza.

Snacks:

I let the boys have a snack mid morning and usually when David gets home from school.  We allow them to have pretzels, gold fish, raisins, yogurt covered raisins, gummy fruit snacks, animal crackers, vanilla wafers, and cheese sticks.  Jon will also sometimes choose to have another fruit but David will NEVER choose fruit.  In general I do not keep cookies and chips around the house for them to have on a regular basis, I would prefer for them to choose healthier snacks over flat out JUNK.

Dinner:

This is where I stand my ground because I don't believe in indulging picky eaters.  I am not a short order cook, so whatever I make for dinner the boys have to eat . . . . . or they don't.  I used to really fight with them on this and usually someone would end up in tears (sometimes me) but I have gotten tired of fighting with the boys to eat, so this is my general table rules.  They must take at least 1 bite of everything put on their plate and try it before they say they don't like it.  If it is something I KNOW they like and they are just not wanting to eat because they want to be someplace else (i.e. watching TV or playing), then I require them to eat x number of bites (in general the number of bites corresponds to their age).  In addition, my husband and I are the ones to say if they have eaten enough to have dessert (if there is one) or a snack later. 

It would be ideal if the boys would eat their fruit, veggies, and meat all the time, but they don't and I have realized it only messes up the dinner and sometimes the rest of the night, if I or my husband get into a screaming battle with the kids over what they are not eating.  So, until I am sure the kids are getting a good balance of protein and vitamens, I give them a vitamen supplement in the morning and in Jon's case, a Pediasure AND when all esle fails we make sure the cottage cheese is on the table, because both boys love it and it's good for them.

Do you have a trick for getting fruits and veggie's into your kids meals or snack time?????