Looking for Easy Lunch Ideas for My 1 1/2 & 2 1/2 Year Old Children.

i know you said they don't like sandwiches - but have you tried cutting them with cookie cutters? They make the sandwiches into fun shapes - the kids can help too!

Other ideas are pita bread, using crackers instead of breatt (a bit of PB and a slice of apple on a whole wheat craker is yummy!).

soup is also a great idea.. and if you dont like canned (too much salt, etc) make some homemade with fresh bread the night before for dinner and save the rest for lunch the next day! same with many other meals (i do this a lot with chicken - since it can be shredded into salads, mixed with microwaved rice, etc)

Sandwiches get summarily disassembled in our house. We do cheese cubes, crackers and grapes a lot.

Try rolling up lunchmeat or tuna on crackers.Kids like fun food and food that has a lot of color. Try cheddar cheese and perhaps pepperoni with grapes, cut in half, carrot sticks with dip, hotdog rounds.

Hi K.-
You could do bologna or any other deli meat (cut into fun shapes?) cheese(american or string cheese sticks)or yogurt tubes/cups and crackers or toast instead of a sandwich. You could also do breakfast items for lunch. Waffles, pancakes, cereal w/ milk, bagel and cream cheese, egg and cheese on a biscuit/toast/english muffin, macaroni and cheese (Annie's makes an "easy mac" version if you're not into Kraft), chicken nuggets (Perdue makes them without any fillers or MSG), peanut butter and fluff or peanut butter and banana sandwich, hot dogs (cut lengthwise to prevent risk of choking). I am just listing items my son will eat. You could also try pasta in tomato sauce or butter sauce-maybe fun shapes will entice them. Good luck!

Do they like soup? With the winter coming up soups are always good. They might need a little help. Have you seen the cambell's tomato soup commercial? With all the different ways to eat it. You could make grill cheese sandwiches and slice it so that they can dip it into the soup. What about macaroni-and-cheese with broccoli or peas, my son loves that. Maybe check out a kid friendly cookbook and see what ideas they have.
Good luck.

cracker stackers? crackers, cheese, pepperoni, ham slices, cukes, bananas, anything small that fits on a cracker.

peanut butter & cheese & crackers

string cheese. pickles. rolled ham & cheese, cucumbers and ranch dressing, hard boiled egg, sandwiches cut out with cookie cutters (gets rid of crust, and kids can pick their own shapes)

grapes, watermelon, any kind of fruit slices.

puddings

good luck :)

Sometimes for a "treat" I make homemade lunchables...I put cheese, crackers, pepperoni (we eat the turkey kind) or any other meat, grapes/strawberries/apples whatever is in season and some raisins...etc.

Quesadillas are actually easy! No! I'm serious...i know they involve a frying pan but one will feed both your children ..two tortillas, inside could be cheese, shredded chicken, ham and cheese, sliced veggies....the cheese is the important ingrediant though because it melts the two sides together, a little bit of oil in the frying pan and make it like you would a grilled cheese sandwhich. Cut it up into 8 thin slices, I think i made rice, beans and cheese when my kids were little, now my daughter takes half a ham and Amer cheese to school for lunch. the left overs heat up well in a toaster oven!
J.

I know how tough it can be to get your child to eat. My 2.5yr old is picky at times so I try to give him what he wants in a healthy way. I have definitly seen that chicken nuggets and grilled cheese sandwiches are his favorite. So with that i give him veggies, a sm. salad or even cracker or chips. I guess it all goes down to giving them something they enjoy that is also healthy for them and not so much work for you.

have you tried dipping foods, my daughter was a big dipper, still is, or rolled meats without the bread. yogurt is a great lunch companion with a fruit. breakfast foods for lunch for example pancakes, french toast or waffles with fruit on them. another trick I tried with my daughter was cutting the sandwiches into shapes with cookie cutters and that worked great. hope you find these suggestions helpful, good luck, Julie K is right Quesadilla are great and really easy, you can even add a little veggies and they might not even notice, I used to add peas or spinach and my daughter never caught me and now she only likes mine. Judy

My daughter was a very picky eater. I just discoverd a bunch of stuff that my daughter likes.
Turns out that she is big on veggies and I ask myself why. Well they are small she can pick up with her fingers and the colors are rich. So I start looking for food that is the same.
I would say do the same.
I also desovered that things that are too hard they won't eat(too much effort) so try softer food. Anything I could smush in my fingers she would eat. She just had to see it was easy to eat.
Hope this was helpful.