Feeding Your Kids for a Happy, Healthy Holiday 

The school holidays and the silly season is upon us, which means more children’s parties, freedom and time with our little ones. We can become more relaxed and allow our children to indulge a little, however, the choices your family makes are still important. It’s also a great time to reinforce the importance of balance and maintaining an overall healthy diet. 

Here are five things to keep in mind to maintain healthy eating habits during the break. 

Healthy snacking Young children need snacks between meals to fuel their active, growing bodies, especially when they’re most active during summer. Snacks can be a great, fun way to get extra nutrients into children’s diet that they may otherwise miss out on. For example, children who shun vegetables or whole grains at mealtimes may be more likely to accept them as part of a snack. 

Get children involved To make healthy eating more fun, let your young ones make their own choices between different fruits, vegetables and snacks when shopping. Encourage your children to help prepare snacks and foods over the break. Getting your child involved at a young age will help them build healthy eating habits for life. 

Good gut, good health Gut health impacts our overall health and it’s important to establish this early on for our children. Encouraging a diet rich in fruits, vegetables and whole grains is a great place to start. Including a wide variety of these foods in your child’s diet over the holidays will increase the diversity of their gut bacteria, which in turn can help to improve the health of their gut. You can also try adding some probiotic foods such as yoghurt or even Whole Kids Probiotic Bites to their diet to introduce healthy gut bacteria in a more fun way. 

Water, water and more water Our children are generally more active during the summer and are often outside in the sun where drinking water is the last thing on their mind. Make sure they remain hydrated during the holidays by encouraging them to drink water before, after and during any physical activity. To make things more interesting, you can try adding fruit such as berries or slices of orange to water for some variety and flavour. 

Make healthy eating fun There’s a common misconception that healthy food is boring and it’s important that we teach our children from an early age that it can be fun too! Try chopping up fruit and vegetables into different shapes or get children involved in cooking and preparing food. You can even try Whole Kids Organic Whole Grain Puffs which comes in playful animal shapes to make vegetables more fun than ever! 

Skye Swaney, dietitian & nutritionist and mother of two young children. Skye has partnered with Whole Kids to celebrate their launch into Woolworths with new, exclusive products. Featuring organic options that are free from preservatives, additives and colour, Whole Kids are the healthier alternative to give parents peace of mind during the summer holidays! To learn more, please visit www.wholekids.com.au