You pack a lunch with fresh fruit and veggies, only to find the carrot sticks untouched at the end of the day. Dinner becomes a negotiation. Breakfast is rushed. And somehow your child decides that beige foods are the only acceptable food group for the week.

The truth is, feeding kids well isn’t always as simple as we’d like it to be. Between busy schedules, after-school activities, picky eating phases, and everyday life, many moms find themselves looking for practical ways to help support their child’s nutrition.

That’s where NOW^® Kids comes in

The Reality Behind the Lunchbox

Most parents know what a balanced meal should look like. The challenge is getting kids to eat it.

One week they love strawberries. The next week they refuse anything red. Vegetables get pushed aside, sandwiches come home half-eaten, and dinner can quickly turn into a negotiation over “just three more bites.”

No parent gets it right every single day, and that’s okay. Rather than chasing perfection, many moms focus on creating healthy habits over time. A daily multivitamin can be one part of that bigger picture, complementing nutritious meals and an active lifestyle while helping support growing kids.

Meet NOW^® Kids Kid Vits™

When it comes to supporting kids’ nutrition, convenience matters, but so does finding a product they’ll enjoy taking. That’s exactly what makes NOW^® Kids Kid Vits™ such a great fit for busy families.

Kid Vits™ Juicy Orange Chewable Tablets are formulated for children ages 4 and older and provide a comprehensive blend of essential vitamins and minerals to help support healthy growth, immune function, and overall wellness.* The easy-to-chew tablets feature a bright, citrusy orange flavor that many kids enjoy (lots of positive reviews!), making it simpler to establish a consistent daily routine. For parents looking to help fill nutritional gaps that can happen with picky eating or hectic schedules, it’s a practical addition to everyday life.

For children who prefer a different flavor profile, Kid Vits™ Berry Lemonade Chewable Tablets offer the same nutritional support in a sweet and tangy berry lemonade flavor. They contain key vitamins and minerals formulated for growing bodies and provide another delicious option for families looking to make daily supplementation easier and more enjoyable for kids.*

Kid Vits™ are sweetened with organic cane sugar and stevia with only 1g of sugar per serving, which is less than many other children’s multivitamin gummies on the market. They contain no artificial colors, flavors, or preservatives, and are made without common allergens.

While Kid Vits™ are the featured favorite, the NOW Kids supplement line extends well beyond multivitamins. Parents can also explore products like BerryDophilus™ probiotic chewables to support digestive health, Kid Cal™ Chewables for calcium support, Elderberry Liquid for immune support, and a variety of other supplements designed specifically with children’s wellness in mind.* Whether your family is focused on nutrition, digestive support, or healthy development, the NOW Kids lineup offers thoughtful options for every stage.

Simple Support for Jam-Packed Schedules

Let’s face it: life with kids is busy.

School mornings blur into workdays, afternoons are filled with pickups and practices, and evenings often revolve around homework, dinner, and getting everyone to bed at a reasonable hour. In the middle of all that, worrying whether your child ate enough vegetables today can feel overwhelming.

Many parents appreciate wellness solutions that don’t add complexity to an already packed schedule. Keeping a daily multivitamin on hand is one small, manageable step that can fit seamlessly into busy family life.

Your Wallet Will Appreciate This Part

Supporting your child’s health doesn’t have to mean straining your budget. As a family- and employee-owned company, NOW has always been committed to offering the highest-quality products at the best possible prices. Right now, both NOW^® Kids Kid Vits™ Juicy Orange Chewable Tablets and NOW^® Kids Kid Vits™ Berry Lemonade Chewable Tablets are  50% off, making it an excellent time to give them a try or stock up if they’re already part of your family’s routine.

The limited-time savings provide a great opportunity to experience the quality and convenience of NOW^® Kids Kid Vits™ while enjoying significant value. If you’ve been thinking about adding a daily multivitamin to help support your child’s nutrition, this sale makes the decision even easier.

Because Raising Healthy Kids Is a Marathon, Not a Sprint

Every healthy lunch packed, every outdoor adventure encouraged, every doctor’s appointment kept, and every bedtime story read contributes to the bigger picture of raising healthy, happy kids.

Nutrition is no different. It’s built over months and years, not measured by one skipped vegetable or one picky-eating phase.

For many moms, NOW Kids has become a simple way to support those long-term habits. Combined with balanced meals and healthy routines, it’s an easy addition that helps families feel confident they’re doing their best for growing children. Just like all NOW supplements, the NOW Kids line is exhaustively tested from raw ingredients to finished products, ensuring they are safe, effective and that what’s on the label is what’s inside the bottle.

And with the current 50% savings on both the Juicy Orange and Berry Lemonade varieties, there’s never been a better time to see why these chewable multivitamins are becoming a favorite among health-conscious families.

*These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. 

The post Real Life, Picky Eaters, and the Multivitamin Moms Are Talking About appeared first on AKAMom Magazine.

By Sandra Ann Harris – ECOlunchbox Founder

Lafayette, Calif. –  I was stunned recently while watching a re-run of Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution showing kids who were utterly unable to identify raw veggies. If our children don’t know what it’s called, how likely will they eat it?

Taking your family to a farmer’s market is a fun way for the whole family to learn the names of seasonal veggies, fruits, and even your local farmers!

Can your kid recognize a turnip? Can you distinguish broccoli from broccolini?

At ECOlunchbox, we’ve come up with a list of five fun ideas to help families enjoy an outing to their local farmer’s market while learning the names of seasonal veggies, fruits, and even our local farmers. (Yes, farmers have names, too!)

We believe that kids will eat better and have more fun at lunchtime (and snack time and dinnertime and breakfast…) if they get up-close and personal with their food chain while visiting their local farmer’s market.

Rainbow Colors

Color it nutritious! At ECOlunchbox, we’ve found that kids love to be sent on color-finding missions at the farmer’s market. Assign one child orange and green, and another child yellow and red.

Kids remember colors. Encourage your children to appreciate the nutrient value of foods by teaching them that colors mean healthy foods, or, in kid-language, “grow foods.” The brightest colors are found in produce that is in season, fresh, and eaten raw or lightly steamed.

With your farmer’s market bounty, create a “rainbow lunch“—festively arrange a tray full of colorful foods cut into bite-sized servings. This can also be an excellent way of introducing new foods and getting variety into the family diet. 

Dollars & Cents

Parents can involve their younger children in shopping by asking, “Can you put three zucchinis in the bag?” Or encourage their children to put fruits on a scale and follow up with, “Can you help me figure out how much these plums weigh?”

For older children, the dollars and cents of independently handling the bills and coins at your friendly local farmer’s market is a great way to build practical math skills.

Healthy Choices

Parents can give their children a budget, say $5, and ask the children to buy fruits and vegetables of their choice for their lunchbox. At ECOlunchbox, we’ve found that kids eat much better at lunchtime if they have a say in what’s packed in their lunchbox.

Kids love having the power to make choices about what they eat. What better place than the farmer’s market to give them that chance?

The Seasons of Foods

Strawberries in January? Kids will wonder why favorites like strawberries aren’t available year round at the farmer’s market.

Their questions will provide a great chance to talk with the farmers at your market about how food is grown and why it’s important to eat locally grown food that’s grown in season rather than import food from thousands of miles away.

Biodegradable Packaging

A fun farmer’s market question for parents to ask is: “What kind of packaging does an apple come in?” “What about an orange? A melon? A zucchini?” Fruits and vegetables come with built-in, biodegradable packaging—their skin!

A good follow-up question is to ask a child to think about the packaging used in pre-packaged lunchbox foods, such as chip bags, cheese sticks, individually sized yogurts, and juice boxes. “What is the packaging made from?” (Answer: plastic.) “Is the packaging biodegradable?” (Answer: no.)

At ECOlunchbox, we believe it makes good sense to pick healthy foods for lunchtime—and use healthy packaging to pack these goodies to school or work. Plastic packaging often contains BPA (bisphenol-A) and other unhealthy chemicals. Scientists have linked toxins in plastics to health problems like cancer, diabetes, and early puberty.

We recently completed a litterless lunch waste study showing that families packing lunch with conventional throw-aways generate 4,320 pieces of trash annually and spend more than $400 on disposables like plastic baggies, utensils, pre-packaged snacks, juice boxes, and more.

Interested in learning more about greening your lifestyle and having eco fun with your family? Please join our ECOlunchbox Facebook community or visit us online at ECOlunchboxes.com.

The post Where’s the watercress? The wax beans? Waldo the farmer? appeared first on AKAMom Magazine.

Many parents struggle with the never-ending task of wanting their kids to grow up strong and healthy, so we often encourage our children to eat their vegetables. As a daddy to six healthy children – two toddlers and four in their twenties – with one more on the way, I’ve learned a few tricks over the years that are sure to get your kids eating their veggies!

Lead by Example: One of the easiest things you can do when expanding your child’s palate to include vegetables is to lead by example. Eat vegetables often yourself, so your child can see it’s perfectly normal and that they are yummy too. Incorporating healthy servings of veggies into every meal is important, but including them at snack time is also key. Try to get a feel for which vegetables your child likes best and start there – then grow their palate over time.

Make Them Kid Friendly: There are plenty of ways you can make vegetables kid friendly. I suggest giving them a low-fat ranch dip for their snack-time veggies, encouraging them to make toothpick-veggie creations like dinosaurs and robots or making a dish like spinach dip that’s often perceived as tastier than a serving of steamed vegetables.

Start Young: It’s important to feed your child vegetables starting at a young age. There are plenty of blended baby food vegetable options, but don’t stop there. As your child begins to eat solid foods offer them vegetables often. Starting young will help establish the norm of eating healthy, and as your child grows up eating veggies it will become a part of their foundation and lifestyle.

Have a Garden: Creating a garden is a great way to get your child involved in growing and harvesting vegetables. It doesn’t have to be a big garden by any means; you could pick 2 or 3 veggies to grow on a small deck (if it gets consistent sunlight). If you’re lucky enough to have a yard, I highly encourage having a garden. You and your child, together, can water the garden daily and watch it grow. Your child will be excited when you finally get to harvest some of the food you’ve worked so hard to grow.

Encouraging your children to eat vegetables everyday is an important part of a healthy lifestyle. It might be tricky to jump in and create a habit out of it, but trust me – it’s worth it! 

Robert Nickell, aka Daddy Nickell, father of 6, offers his “5 cents” worth of advice to expectant and new parents.  Daddy Nickell is the founder of Daddyscrubs.com, delivery room duds and daddy gear for dads, and the Daddyscrubs.com blog where he covers topics about parenting and the latest baby and kids gear, all from a Dad’s perspective.

The post How to Get Your Kids to Eat Their Vegetables appeared first on AKAMom Magazine.