What is the label brand that everyone loves for labeling their kid's school stuff? In first grade all of our supplies are communal, so I really just need to label stuff like C's backpack, lunch bag, water bottle, bento box, etc. I've heard of Mabel's Labels, but I also remember someone having a specific Etsy seller that they liked for cheaper too.
Who wants to share their best ideas and hacks for packing school lunches? We did some lunch from home last year, sporadically, but it was just easier (for me) for him to do hot lunch. This year he has requested to do "home lunch" much more often, so I have to get my act together!
Feel free to add your questions or ideas for making back to school easier! I know we have lots of people with elementary aged kids now.
Post by Ashley&Scott on Aug 14, 2019 9:05:31 GMT -5
Name Bubbles are the labels we use & love. If you peel carefully you can reuse them. The school pack lasts a long time, I would caution against picking an icon that is too childish. In kindergarten we ordered a firetruck icon, now in 2nd grade it's a little more childish than DS wants. I've been able to just trim that part off but I wish I would have planned a little more carefully since they last forever.
For lunches, I try to only make lunch twice a week and make 2-3 at a time. It doesn't really take longer to make a few extra when you already have everything out but it saves so much time on the other nights.
My lunch tip is to think in categories. It makes it so much faster for me and makes it so the kids can easily help. My categories are a main, a veggie, a fruit and a snack. The main is usually a sandwich or sometimes I will make a cold pasta salad type thing on Sundays and then just scoop it into a container in the morning. Veggie is usually carrots or tomatoes or bell peppers. Fruit varies by season. Snack can be cookies or a bar or jello. The categories help me not have to think "what did I forget". Instead I just check that I have all the categories and I'm good.
We do name bubbles or I label stuff with my silhouette from vinyl. Some of our name bubbles have lasted years. An instagrammer I follow had a code for 20% off, JADE20, FYI.
For lunch, I put her in charge of picking whether to buy or bring. They send home the monthly menu and it was her job to read and highlight what she wanted to buy. It helped her read and gave the decision back to her. It worked really well for us. On sundays I would ask her how many days she was buying and then we would at least pre-pack her fruit into containers for the days she was bringing.
She really likes more desconstructed lunches right now. So I bought some silicone cupcake liners from amazon to help divide the containers we already had. Cheese, crackers, turkey roll-up, grapes, and a z bar is the current fave.
Post by minniemouse on Aug 14, 2019 9:23:25 GMT -5
I’m actually ordering new name bubbles for both kids this week. The daycare pack lasted 5.5 years for Dd2, and for dd1 like 7 years. We only used them on important stuff- coats, bags, winter boots etc. for school supplies that get used up - crayons, pencils etc - I print their names in a small font on clear return address labels. With communal supplies you don’t need to worry about that though 😊 I hate packing lunches, and hopefully they will buy this year. My biggest tip is figuring out how to manage all the papers coming on. Last year I bought 2 hanging paper organizers with 5 pockets/folders. One for each child. Every day I cleaned out their take home folders. Anything that couldn’t be recycled right away was put in a folder in one of the pockets. The top pocket was for general school/PTA/field trips, then one for reading/writing, math, science/social, art, extracurricular activities. Once a month or so I cleaned out the pockets. It stopped me from having piles of paper on my kitchen counters.
Name bubbles. Skip the packs and order specific sizes. I most use the tiny round ones, the small rectangles, and the medium rectangles. You’ll pay a bit more up front but you get a lot more. I haven’t bought labels in 4 years and we still have plenty.
Post by countthestars on Aug 14, 2019 9:39:06 GMT -5
The Etsy seller is MeYDecals - I've found that my more recent pack doesn't stick as well as my original pack, but I'm still happy with them for the price. I like that you can order a pack but get two designs.
For lunches, someone here suggested making and freezing a week's worth of pb&j sandwiches. DD likes the same thing every day so that will help a lot. I am also going to have her start packing her lunch the night before. I stock up on applesauce pouches, fruit (I'll cut that up and bag it beforehand), crackers, granola bars, other easy stuff that she can choose and pack herself. We'll see how this goes!
We're using Mabel's Labels. I got them on sale and would never pay full price because otherwise I find them quite pricey. We've used them on daycare stuff and they've held their own.
DS is just starting JK this fall so no lunch tips yet.
My tip is that in our household, kids start packing their own lunches every night when they start kindergarten. Having lunchboxes with compartments (we have yumbox paninos) helps with this. We require a protein in the large spot, a fruit and a veggie in the medium spots, and whatever they want in the treat spot.
We're using Mabel's Labels. I got them on sale and would never pay full price because otherwise I find them quite pricey. We've used them on daycare stuff and they've held their own.
DS is just starting JK this fall so no lunch tips yet.
We're using Mabel's Labels. I got them on sale and would never pay full price because otherwise I find them quite pricey. We've used them on daycare stuff and they've held their own.
DS is just starting JK this fall so no lunch tips yet.
What does this mean? Junior kindergarten?
Yes! Where I am kids start JK the year they turn 4, then do SK (senior) the year they turn 5.
My tip is that in our household, kids start packing their own lunches every night when they start kindergarten. Having lunchboxes with compartments (we have yumbox paninos) helps with this. We require a protein in the large spot, a fruit and a veggie in the medium spots, and whatever they want in the treat spot.
I need to do this. Do you precut all of the fruits and vegetables beforehand? I'm trying to figure out how to make this work, because I hate packing her lunch.
For lunches I always have 2 protein options (one main and one secondary), fruit, and veggie. Typical lunches for us: - sandwich or wrap (ham, turkey, or sunbutter) with hummus and veggies, pickle, and fruit - protein pasta salad with shrimp and fruit - protein pasta Mac and “cheese” (we are dairy free so it’s a butternut squash purée) with tuna and chopped broccoli and fruit - pepperoni, DF cheese, and crackers/pretzels with yogurt or HB egg, veggie, and fruit - egg, chickpea, or tuna salad with crackers or as a sandwich, yogurt or HB egg, veggie, and fruit Things I keep on hand for lunches (outside of fresh fruit, veggies, and protein) are canned fruit in juice, frozen peas, frozen Lima beans, canned green beans, frozen shrimp, canned tuna, sunbutter, HB eggs, yogurt, and hummus. I have two compartment sistema containers that I prep 3 days worth of fruit and veggies. I keep some small jelly jars of hummus and yogurt in the fridge. I’ll pack the cold main dish the night before and if I do something hot I heat it up in the AM and put in the thermos. His favorite snack after school is either ants on a log or yogurt with fruit and Cheerios. I usually make those ahead of time when doing lunches so I don’t have to do it at the time.
My tip is that in our household, kids start packing their own lunches every night when they start kindergarten. Having lunchboxes with compartments (we have yumbox paninos) helps with this. We require a protein in the large spot, a fruit and a veggie in the medium spots, and whatever they want in the treat spot.
I need to do this. Do you precut all of the fruits and vegetables beforehand? I'm trying to figure out how to make this work, because I hate packing her lunch.
No. We start around age 5 with knife skills, so when my DS wanted to take carrots in first grade, he could peel and chop his own. If it's something like melon, we chop the whole thing at one time anyway so in that case, yes, we've already chopped it for them into large chunks and they take the container out of the fridge and just need to cut a slice into bites to fit it in their lunches.
Fruits: Typically for the fruit they'll take fresh berries in summer and in winter, they'll take fruit that I buy frozen and pre-chopped. They put it in their lunch boxes frozen and it's thawed by the next day's lunchtime. Or they'll take applesauce. They can mostly wash their own fruit although my DD is short and can't totally reach the sink that well, I help her as needed.
Veggies: I buy frozen peas in bags, and transfer them to a one-liter seltzer bottle that we keep in the freezer. That way they can just shake out the amount of peas they need. I found that with the bag of peas, the kids had a hard time not spilling everywhere. Or they'll take carrots -- see above, or honestly, lately I've been buying baby carrots.
Veggies has been the harder sell for them but we just make them pack it anyway. One loves peas, one is meh on peas. One loves carrots and one is meh on carrots. We need more lunch veggie ideas desperately.
My tip is that in our household, kids start packing their own lunches every night when they start kindergarten. Having lunchboxes with compartments (we have yumbox paninos) helps with this. We require a protein in the large spot, a fruit and a veggie in the medium spots, and whatever they want in the treat spot.
What kind of protein did your kids include in kindergarten? And did you pre-prep fruits and vegetable? ETA: I see you answered my second question above.
I'd like to have DD1 help make her lunch more often, but it seems like I'd need to do a lot of prepping and rearranging things (e.g., making sure to keep things she needs on the bottom shelves of the fridge), which I'm not sure is worth it.
My tip is that in our household, kids start packing their own lunches every night when they start kindergarten. Having lunchboxes with compartments (we have yumbox paninos) helps with this. We require a protein in the large spot, a fruit and a veggie in the medium spots, and whatever they want in the treat spot.
What kind of protein did your kids include in kindergarten? And did you pre-prep fruits and vegetable? ETA: I see you answered my second question above.
I'd like to have DD1 help make her lunch more often, but it seems like I'd need to do a lot of prepping and rearranging things (e.g., making sure to keep things she needs on the bottom shelves of the fridge), which I'm not sure is worth it.
These are the proteins that my kids have consistently packed:
- PB&J or just PB sandwich. Our school isn't nut free so I know this wouldn't work at all schools. - Cheese and crackers - Pistachios and crackers - Chicken nuggets -- they take them out of the freezer and put them right into the lunchbox; we keep the lunch in the fridge overnight; nuggets are thawed by lunchtime. - On a rare day, two hardboiled eggs.
That's pretty much it. My kids are both like me -- they can eat the same thing day after day for months and months, then suddenly not want to touch it again for a year.
Re your comment about it being "worth it," obviously each person's calculus is different. I get a lot of satisfaction about my kids learning independent life skills at early but age-appropriate ages (as long as it doesn't stress them out or worry them). And honestly, DH and i don't want to pack their lunches at night; evening hours seem crazy enough for us and we both pack our own lunches already. So for us it's worth it. That said, if the kids were in a lot of after-school activities, I think things would be different. DS had an activity one night a week last week and I packed for him on those nights b/c he came home so tired.
My tip is that in our household, kids start packing their own lunches every night when they start kindergarten. Having lunchboxes with compartments (we have yumbox paninos) helps with this. We require a protein in the large spot, a fruit and a veggie in the medium spots, and whatever they want in the treat spot.
What kind of protein did your kids include in kindergarten? And did you pre-prep fruits and vegetable? ETA: I see you answered my second question above.
I'd like to have DD1 help make her lunch more often, but it seems like I'd need to do a lot of prepping and rearranging things (e.g., making sure to keep things she needs on the bottom shelves of the fridge), which I'm not sure is worth it.
My daughter is in full time daycare and we pack her breakfast and lunch every day.
Proteins she eats: sunbutter (and jelly), honey bbq chicken (from Purdue - lol), meatballs, quinoa. Barilla also sells a pasta made with protein so we do that with butter or tomato sauce.
Greek yogurt, eggs, nuts, edamame and lunchmeat are also good protein choices. Wish my kid ate ‘em.
For lunches, someone here suggested making and freezing a week's worth of pb&j sandwiches. DD likes the same thing every day so that will help a lot. I am also going to have her start packing her lunch the night before. I stock up on applesauce pouches, fruit (I'll cut that up and bag it beforehand), crackers, granola bars, other easy stuff that she can choose and pack herself. We'll see how this goes!
JUST IN CASE you haven't already considered this, you probably can't use real peanut butter in your PB&J
I cannot speak to how well Sun Butter freezes. just throwing that out there for anyone reading.
I need to do this. Do you precut all of the fruits and vegetables beforehand? I'm trying to figure out how to make this work, because I hate packing her lunch.
No. We start around age 5 with knife skills, so when my DS wanted to take carrots in first grade, he could peel and chop his own. If it's something like melon, we chop the whole thing at one time anyway so in that case, yes, we've already chopped it for them into large chunks and they take the container out of the fridge and just need to cut a slice into bites to fit it in their lunches.
Fruits: Typically for the fruit they'll take fresh berries in summer and in winter, they'll take fruit that I buy frozen and pre-chopped. They put it in their lunch boxes frozen and it's thawed by the next day's lunchtime. Or they'll take applesauce. They can mostly wash their own fruit although my DD is short and can't totally reach the sink that well, I help her as needed.
Veggies: I buy frozen peas in bags, and transfer them to a one-liter seltzer bottle that we keep in the freezer. That way they can just shake out the amount of peas they need. I found that with the bag of peas, the kids had a hard time not spilling everywhere. Or they'll take carrots -- see above, or honestly, lately I've been buying baby carrots.
Veggies has been the harder sell for them but we just make them pack it anyway. One loves peas, one is meh on peas. One loves carrots and one is meh on carrots. We need more lunch veggie ideas desperately.
For veggies, I usually pack my daughter either green beans (fresh, or previously steamed frozen), baby carrots, cucumbers or peppers. But I have to cut the cucumbers and peppers, and cutting a bunch at once isn't always feasible because they don't keep. She also loves berries, and I usually cut the stems off the strawberries, which, again, don't really keep long. I could probably convince her to eat around the stems, but there's still the washing. My DD is nowhere near being able to reach our sink. Even the fridge is a challenge, but maybe with a step stool if I kept everything on the bottom. I desperately want to turn lunch making over to her, but it almost still seems like more trouble than it's worth.
I wish we were allowed to send Sunbutter/Wowbutter/other nut butter alternatives. We're allowed to use it to bake with but we cannot send a sandwich. DS's school is banning it because they can't confirm it's not peanut butter just by looking at it, and it may be triggering for some kids.
For labeling I’ve never needed anything but sharpies and masking tape. Works for basically everything.
For lunch DD buys 2-3 days a week and brings the other days. I generally just make her lunch while she eats breakfast. It’s easiest for us that way. I do a protein, veggie, fruit, and treat. She’s generally starving at lunch and eats more than she does during the summer so I pack lots of options.
What kind of protein did your kids include in kindergarten? And did you pre-prep fruits and vegetable? ETA: I see you answered my second question above.
I'd like to have DD1 help make her lunch more often, but it seems like I'd need to do a lot of prepping and rearranging things (e.g., making sure to keep things she needs on the bottom shelves of the fridge), which I'm not sure is worth it.
These are the proteins that my kids have consistently packed:
- PB&J or just PB sandwich. Our school isn't nut free so I know this wouldn't work at all schools. - Cheese and crackers - Pistachios and crackers - Chicken nuggets -- they take them out of the freezer and put them right into the lunchbox; we keep the lunch in the fridge overnight; nuggets are thawed by lunchtime. - On a rare day, two hardboiled eggs.
That's pretty much it. My kids are both like me -- they can eat the same thing day after day for months and months, then suddenly not want to touch it again for a year.
Re your comment about it being "worth it," obviously each person's calculus is different. I get a lot of satisfaction about my kids learning independent life skills at early but age-appropriate ages (as long as it doesn't stress them out or worry them). And honestly, DH and i don't want to pack their lunches at night; evening hours seem crazy enough for us and we both pack our own lunches already. So for us it's worth it. That said, if the kids were in a lot of after-school activities, I think things would be different. DS had an activity one night a week last week and I packed for him on those nights b/c he came home so tired.
Thanks for the suggestions! She goes to after care and goes to bed early, so our evenings are a bit rushed, but I was moreso thinking of having to rearrange my kitchen - a lot of things are stored in places where she can't safely reach them, and it seems like gathering all the stuff is most of the effort. But I could still have her help - it's probably good practice even if it doesn't save me any time.
Post by thebreakfastclub on Aug 14, 2019 18:41:15 GMT -5
My elementary school is not nut free either. My son's favorite lunch is a sandwich thin with pizza sauce and cheese, a knock off of the pizza lunchable. I prep fruit on Sunday for lunches and put in containers the night before.
Post by bookqueen15 on Aug 14, 2019 21:14:50 GMT -5
My daughter's elementary school is also not nut free, I think they have a nut free table though. We're only 3 days into packing lunch in kindergarten, but we're also going the route of a main protein option, fruit, veggie, and small treat. She likes raw carrots and broccoli with ranch to dip them in, the fruit varies as she likes all kinds, and her main protein has been PBJ or a cheese sandwich. Tomorrow I am just doing a small hummus cup and tortilla chips and also packing her a greek yogurt pouch, along with the veggies and ranch plus a fruit. Her small treat this week has been mini chocolate chips and yogurt raisins. I am using a Bentgo kids container for her which is working well, I think she's eating more than she did at camps over the summer because once she opens it all her food is ready for her to eat, versus opening multiple items.
Her school strongly discouraged us from having our kindergartners buy lunch the first week, but going forward I will probably have her buy lunch twice a week. My 18 month old just started full time daycare so I am also packing lunch and 2 snacks for him everyday! I am using some inexpensive labels I bought from Amazon for everything.
We use kiddotags just because they were having a good sale when we needed to buy some and I’ve been impressed at how well they’ve held up. They stay on things that go through the dishwasher constantly. They are a little less long lasting on things that go though the wash, but they are also able to be peeled off without a mark which has worked well for hand me downs.
For homemade lunches, I’m all about the bento boxes. I originally got them for environmental reasons and I worried they’d take more time to pack, but they save me so much time! We have Bentgo and have extra trays so we can usually just do a quick wash on the cover and not worry about having clean trays everyday (and the extra trays have their own so we can pre-pack and store multiple lunches).
No. We start around age 5 with knife skills, so when my DS wanted to take carrots in first grade, he could peel and chop his own. If it's something like melon, we chop the whole thing at one time anyway so in that case, yes, we've already chopped it for them into large chunks and they take the container out of the fridge and just need to cut a slice into bites to fit it in their lunches.
Fruits: Typically for the fruit they'll take fresh berries in summer and in winter, they'll take fruit that I buy frozen and pre-chopped. They put it in their lunch boxes frozen and it's thawed by the next day's lunchtime. Or they'll take applesauce. They can mostly wash their own fruit although my DD is short and can't totally reach the sink that well, I help her as needed.
Veggies: I buy frozen peas in bags, and transfer them to a one-liter seltzer bottle that we keep in the freezer. That way they can just shake out the amount of peas they need. I found that with the bag of peas, the kids had a hard time not spilling everywhere. Or they'll take carrots -- see above, or honestly, lately I've been buying baby carrots.
Veggies has been the harder sell for them but we just make them pack it anyway. One loves peas, one is meh on peas. One loves carrots and one is meh on carrots. We need more lunch veggie ideas desperately.
For veggies, I usually pack my daughter either green beans (fresh, or previously steamed frozen), baby carrots, cucumbers or peppers. But I have to cut the cucumbers and peppers, and cutting a bunch at once isn't always feasible because they don't keep. She also loves berries, and I usually cut the stems off the strawberries, which, again, don't really keep long. I could probably convince her to eat around the stems, but there's still the washing. My DD is nowhere near being able to reach our sink. Even the fridge is a challenge, but maybe with a step stool if I kept everything on the bottom. I desperately want to turn lunch making over to her, but it almost still seems like more trouble than it's worth.
I’ve always found that teaching is harder than doing, but it’s certainly worth it. Giving up control is also hard for me, but the independence gained is priceless. I’ve seen a huge difference in my kids interactions with other kids their ages because I’ve fostered (age appropriate) independence from early on. All this to say, it might be hard to get into the swing of it but once you make the change and put the onus on your kid, I think it will naturally become easier while also giving her autonomy.