Do your kids come home from school ready for a snack? Mine sure do!
After a busy day their little bodies need to re-energize before heading outside to play or starting homework. Here are some of our favorite healthy after school snacks and drinks that keep kids happy and fueled until dinner!
Healthy After School Snacks:
- Ants on a log. Spread peanut butter or cream cheese on celery sticks and top with raisins. Kids love to help put it together.
- Homemade mini-muffins. They are easy to make in advance and freeze for a busy day. My kids love these pumpkin apple muffins from Weelicious.
- Crudité plate. Snack time is a great time to get kids to eat veggies since they are hungry enough to be more adventurous. When you pair them with dip and hand out appetizer plates veggies become much more fun.
- Coconut water popsicles. We added fruit to our Vita Coco Kids boxes and created delicious and healthy popsicles. A refreshing way to rehydrate without lots of extra sugar. Our favorite add-ins were bananas, mangoes and blueberries.
- DIY Frushi. This homemade fruit sushi from Kids Activities Blog is fun for kids to make and eat.
- Mini bagels with cream cheese. Add blueberries to the top to create a smiley face kids will love.
- Fruit smoothies. Smoothies just for breakfast! They also make a great healthy snack. Try our favorite blueberry kale version.
- Grape and pretzel butterflies. This is a fun snack to take on the go or give to little brothers or sisters while they are waiting at practice. Fill a snack size plastic bag with grapes and pretzels and twist a pipe cleaner around the middle into a butterfly.
- Fun shaped cheese crackers. Use this recipe from Mama Papa Bubba to make whole wheat cheese crackers in your kids’ favorite shape.
- Apple puzzles. This idea from a Mom with a Lesson Plan is so cool! Cut an apple into a puzzle shape for the kids to put together as they eat.
- Banana peanut butter “cupcakes”. Make healthy cupcakes using bananas with a peanut butter topping.
- Hummus and cut up pita bread. Hummus is one of my kids’ favorite foods. Serve it with fresh pitas cut into bit size pieces.
- Number and letter pretzels. What Do We Do All Day? turned snack time into learning time by making ABC and number shaped pretzels.
- Cheese and cracker stackers. Encourage kids to build and eat towers out of cheese and crackers. A fun and healthy way to unwind after school.
- Clementine chicks. Fun food doesn’t have to be full of sugar, these adorable clementine chicks from Kitchen Fun with My 3 Sons are so sweet!
I am not a fan of sugary kids’ drinks so in our house they are considered a special treat—more like a cupcake than something we need to have on a daily basis. That’s why I am thrilled to partner with Vita Coco Water. Their kids’ drinks are free of artificial colors, sweeteners, flavors and preservatives and low on sugar and calories—which makes them a great afterschool snack!
Vita Coco Water was named as Target’s Made to Matter brands for leading in being natural, organic and sustainable. They even have a new Pandora radio station, Vita Coco Kids Family Hits, that is perfect for kids to unwind to after school.
This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Viva Coco Kids via Burst Media. The opinions and text are all mine.