self-serve snack bin for kids

snack bin!

hey y'all.  so, i wanted to share with you one of the things that i recently implemented that has so far been a big hit.  my friends and i were chatting about our kids' eating preferences and snacks and stuff, and we were talking about how now that our kids are a little older, they are becoming more opinionated about what they choose to eat, and even a little picky.  i have always been a supporter of offering the kids healthy food and letting them decide if and how much to eat without any pressure.  if they choose not to eat what i make, then they have to wait until the next meal.  it has never impacted their sleep, and i am not afraid that they are going to starve.  will they be hungry?  likely.  and they will probably eat their next meal and ask for more.

but recently z has become even more choosey about what he wants to eat.  no cheese, off and on with different fruits, doesn't like to eat meat very often, and of course mostly just wants to eat carbs.  so in an effort to add more protein and veggies into (mostly his) the diet, i put together a snack bin for the kids.  actually, i had seen this on pinterest many times and thought it was a good idea, but my friend said she did that with her 3 year old and it was a big success, and that she was going to do it again.  so after she filled a drawer in her fridge with a bunch of snacks, i went to the store and basically copied what she put together.

i filled a rectangular rubber maid container with a myriad of different snacks.  then i put it in the fridge and told the kids that they have a special bin full of snacks in the fridge just for them.  and then i laid down some ground rules; they have to eat all the snacks that are in the box before i refill it with new snacks.  hopefully that will help to avoid the kids (mostly z) weeding through and only eating the snacks he likes he best and none of the others.  and they cannot eat any of these snacks too close to dinner.  we will see how this goes.  but they were super excited about it the first day, and it has still been a big hit 4 days later.

because i wanted to add more snacking veggies to their daily intake, i made snack packs mostly with a fruit and veggie.  but really, all of the snacks that i filled the bin up with are foods that i am fine with them eating.  i love the idea of this system because they can develop some independence by choosing when and what kinds of food to snack on (obviously out of the snacks pre-chosen by me muah hahahaha).  and hopefully they will start to eat some more veggies and protein as snacks throughout the day.

so in the bin this time, i added some baggies with carrots and grapes, and some baggies of whole grain crackers and dried apple chips, and then i took some little containers and added one with hummus, cucumber slices and baby carrots, one with cheese and walnuts, and another with cucumber slices and raspberries.  then i added some applesauce containers, some yogurts, and some kind pressed fruit bars.  the last bin full of snacks was pretty similar, except i had Lara Bars instead of pressed fruit.  

so that's it for now.  hopefully this system stays in place for awhile.  have any of you put a system like this together for your kids?  how did it work?