Healthy Breakfast Ideas By Mom That You Should Know

Are you a mom? Then health tops your mind for sure. You tend to multitask and manage time to ensure that you always serve healthy breakfast and other meals to your family. Breakfast is crucial for children, but often it gets rushed and compromised owing to the tight schedule of getting children dressed up for school and you being at work on time too. To help, the famous mom fashion influencer- Annie from The Foreman Five Breakfast brings you breakfast ideas by a mom that are healthy and ready in minutes. The kids will love them too!

Breakfast Ideas by Mom for Kids

Children are fond of routine and repetition; hence if you are serving something once or twice a week, they usually tend to enjoy and eat it, as shared by mom fashion influencer Annie who has great breakfast ideas by mom too for you. Let's explore them.

Breakfast ideas by mom 1: Snack Plate

Snack plates are great for breakfast. You can include cereal or crackers, protein like cheese, cottage cheese, egg, nut butter or fruit. It's easy, and at the same time, you can do variations too based on the likes of your child.

Breakfast ideas by mom 2: Smoothies

Annie, who has great recipe ideas and is a mom fashion influencer at foremanfive.com, suggests that smoothies are a great way to ensure your child eats vegetables, fruits, proteins and fats for breakfast. Here is one smoothie receipt to get you started:

·         1 cup of milk

·         ½ cup frozen banana

·         ½ cup of fruit

·         ¼ cup veggies of your choice

·         one tablespoon of nut butter

Blend all the above ingredients in ½ cup of yoghurt and ta-da! Yoghurt Smoothie!

Breakfast ideas by mom 3: Cereal

Eating healthy cereals in the morning turns out to be great for kids. You can team it up with yoghurt, milk, or smoothie. It's a breakfast idea by a mom that kids love for sure.

Breakfast ideas by mom 4: Overnight Oats

This recipe by mom fashion influencer –Annie with oats combined with yoghurt, fruit, and carbohydrates and made ahead is relatively healthy. Moreover, this breakfast idea by mom turns out to be thick and nice, making it easy for kids to eat.

Breakfast ideas by mom 5: Whole Grain Pancakes

Pancakes made from whole grain are tasty, healthy and plentiful, topped with nut butter, cream cheese, or Greek yoghurt.

Breakfast ideas by mom 6: Whole Grain Waffles

Mix whole grains, protein, and healthy fats to make waffles. That is a great breakfast idea for moms that kids will love. You keep it in your freezer and warm it up quickly in the toaster oven or microwave. Get in touch with Annie on foremanfive.com for healthy recipes and fashion tips, as she is an excellent fashion mom influencer.

Breakfast ideas by mom 7: Green peas sandwich

Green peas are packed with nutrients that support growth in children. They are full of fibre and protein. Make a yummy sandwich for kids for breakfast that has boiled and smashed peas mixed with cream and sauce. You can toast the sandwich to make it crunchier.

Breakfast ideas by mom 8: Eggs, Fruit, and a Whole Grain

Bake eggs and serve with fruit or vegetables or bread sticks—a super easy and healthy breakfast idea for mom.

Breakfast ideas by mom 9: Quesadillas

You need to warm cheese, snipped spinach, and beans in a tortilla and bam, and your breakfast is ready! You can also team it with sliced ham or scrambled eggs.

Breakfast ideas by mom 10: Sweet Potato Toast

Team up the toast with mashed roasted sweet potato or veggies and add little cinnamon on the top. Cut into cubes and let your kids enjoy.

Breakfast ideas by mom 11: Breakfast Cookies

Make some breakfast cookies! Team it up with protein from a glass of milk, a little cheese, or an egg.

Whether a child or adult, breakfast is the most important meal for the day, and these breakfast ideas for mom are a must-try! As the mom fashion influencer Annie who shares various breakfast recipes, says, 'when we sleep, we fast. Children need to break this fast with a healthy breakfast. It will fill them up with the required energy to face the day packed with a host of activities.

How to Make A Yummy French Toast Bake

Weekday breakfasts are quick and easy and I try to keep them healthy but the weekends call for small celebrations.  So that is when I like to make something a bit more yummy and maybe a bit more labor intensive.  This French Toast Bake was new for me and it didn't take too much time or effort.  However, it does have baking time so you need to start early or prep ahead of time especially if you have kids like mine that expect to eat almost immediately upon waking.

The first time I made this recipe I was taking it for a friends weekend away in the mountains.  It's great for serving a bit of a crowd and the cleanup couldn't be easier.  Typically when I'm doing breakfast for a group I do pancakes or waffles with eggs and bacon and it's a lot to manage and clean up.  After doing this French Toast Bake I determined this is the way to go from now on.  I prepped as much as I could before we left town and just assembled it the morning we wanted it.

Ingredients:

• 1 loaf of Texas Toast
• 8 eggs
• 2 cups milk
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter cold and cut into small squares

Directions: 

1. Spray a 9x13 pan with cooking spray and preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a large bowl, add the eggs, milk, heavy cream, sugar, 1/2 cup brown sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon. 
3. Chop the bread into 3/4 - 1 inch cubes and put it in the bowl with the egg mixture and toss well until all the liquid is absorbed.
4. In a food processor mix the flour, remaining brown sugar, cinnamon, and salt. 
5. Pulse the butter in the food processor for 5-10 seconds or until the butter and brown sugar mixture is crumbly.
6. Pour the bread and egg mixture into the pan, cover evenly with the brown sugar-butter topping and bake for 45-50 minutes or until the top is crispy and the center is no longer wet.

Peace Out Single Digits- Fun 70's Birthday Party Theme

Planning and throwing a party is one of my absolute favorite things to do.  But to be honest I was so stressed about this party.  Emily begged for months to host her first slumber party but we only had one little problem.  Our home was still under construction!  I tried to convince her of letting it go but she wouldn't let up.  I finally agreed but was so concerned about throwing this party.  The idea of a slumber party was daunting on its own, hello 13 tweens under my roof.  But hosting while under construction was another level.

Easy Thanksgiving Dessert- Orange Creamsicle Pie

I'm the queen of easy peasy when it comes to cooking and baking.  I love homemade (read semi-homemade) but I don't have the time or the energy for a super hard recipe.  I love this recipe because it only takes minutes to whip together; you could even make it the same day you need to serve it.  Just allow about 4 hours to set in the freezer.

I was looking for a dessert recipe for our Thanksgiving meal but I wanted it to have a slight twist from the traditional.  Since citrus is in season and I'm looking for any way to sneak in some extra vitamin C I wanted to create a recipe with mandarins.  I always get my citrus from Bee Sweet Citrus because they have year-round availabilty for oranges, mandarins and lemons.  They have speciality citrus varieties during the California domestic season.  Right now us locals can look forward to Meyer Lemons, Cara Cara Navels (hello gorgeous!), Blood Oranges, Star Ruby Grapefruit and Pummelos.  Another reason I love supporting Bee Sweet Citrus is because they are a family owned and operated grower, packer and shopper of citrus.  

Enjoy your sweet and delicious dessert and wishing everyone a blessed Thanksgiving!

Ingredients:

1. 2 blocks of cream cheese (16 oz each)
2. 1 C. plus 2 Tbsp. of granulated sugar
3. 1 C. of mandarin oranges, peeled
4. 1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
5. 1 C. Cool Whip
6. Graham Cracker Crust (ready made)

Instructions:

Add cream cheese, sugar, oranges and vanilla to a stand mixer and mix on low until all the ingredients are combined and smooth.  Gently fold in the Cool Whip.  Pour mixture into crust and freeze for at least 4 hours.  Top with a dollop of Cool Whip and a mandarin/orange.

Halloween Crafts & Treats

I'm a lover of all holidays and I'm always talking about how much I live for traditions.  To this day I remember traditions from my childhood and I just love creating new ones with my kids.  I hope they carry some of them on with their families.  One of our greatest traditions is making treats and enjoying them during a movie night.  Especially this time of year we love camping out in front of the tv and enjoying food and family.

A "charcuterie" board always make food that much more fun so I've been having fun creating different Halloween boards.  My first Halloween Treat Board consisted of mandarin pumpkins, candy corn & pumpkins, Halloween Oreo's, Moose Track Ice Cream, and Spooky Spider Popcorn.

Making the popcorn couldn't be any easier.  You can pop popcorn or you can do what I did and just buy Skinny Pop and then melt orange chocolate and drizzle on top.  I added Halloween sprinkles and set in the fridge for an hour.  In the meantime I made the spider plate for the popcorn which consists of cutting black pipe cleaners to the desired length and hot glueing to the bottom of a black paper plate.  Then 3/4 of the way down the pipe cleaner you bend at a 45 degree angle.  Lastly, hot glue googly eyes to the top of the plate. 

To make the mandarin pumpkins you peel a mandarin and then slice a very small piece of celery and insert in the top.  Plain ice cream isn't nearly as fun as ice cream with sprinkles so sprinkles were added to the top.  I put it all together on a board and let the fun begin!

Boo Brunch-Halloween Party

I celebrate every holiday with a brunch or breakfast.  Sometimes it's to kickoff the season and other times it's on the actual holiday.  I think every time I create a new holiday celebration I think it is my favorite one.  But this one is really high up there; takes the cake!!!!  

Most of our holiday celebrations are breakfast but this one was a brunch because I wanted to do more lunch food.  The menu included mummy quesadillas, spider donuts, ghosts chips, monster teeth and ice cream sandwiches, and ghost milk.  

Orange Creamsicle Pop Recipe

If you know me you know I love to create and keep things fun but I also only tackle the simple projects and recipes.  My life is way too chaotic to take on long and tedious stuff.  We have making popsicles on our Summer Bucket List every Summer and I was looking for a new flavor.  We've been loving fresh citrus from Bee Sweet Citrus and so I decided I wanted to make something incorporating our favorite mandarins.

This is a simple five ingredient recipe that takes little to no time.  You will need 2 mandarins, 1/2 cup of orange juice, 3 tablespoons sugar, 1 cup whipping cream and 1 tsp. vanilla.

Start by peeling mandarins and placing in a food processor or blender.  Add OJ and sugar; process for 20 seconds.

Then add vanilla and whipping cream and process for 60 seconds.  If the mixture is still runny process a little longer.

Pour into popsicle molds and place in freezer.  After a few hours add popsicle sticks and freeze overnight.  Remove from freezer and run under warm water for a few seconds and pull popsicles out of mold.  Place in plastic bag and freeze.

My favorite popsicle mold:

Serve and enjoy!  Long live Summer!

Creative and Fun Breakfast Ideas for Kids

Quarantine started feeling like groundhog day pretty early on.  So after a few weeks I decided I was going to have to get us all out of rut.  My whole life I've lived by the motto of "Get up, dress up and show up."  I lost that right away in quarantine and so I decided I was going to have to get back to that and start my days off right and actually get ready.  It helps me to feel so much better and have the energy to tackle the day.  Another way I broke the monotony was changing up breakfast.  During regular school we had oatmeal or cereal almost everyday because the mornings were so rushed.  One of the bright sides of quarantine was not having to be out of the house by 7:45 every morning.  Since I had a bit more leisure time I decided to add some fun into breakfast to help curb the groundhog blues.

The girls were thrilled with the change of menu and started praising me for the creative breakfasts.  And let's be real there wasn't anything too special or creative.  I just changed it up but still kept things simple.  Here are a few of the favorites:

Healthy and Creative Snack Ideas for Kids

My kids would live on snacks if I let them.  Is it just my kids that ask for a snack five minutes after a meal?!?!  Or is that normal little person behavior?  I get the feeling they think I live in the kitchen and it's okay for me to be their snack slave.  Someone also must have given them the idea that fruit snacks are a food group.  I'm trying to break that idea and keep snacks healthy and nutritious as often as I can but sometimes I have to trick them into choosing the healthy snacks.  One way I accomplish that is making their snacks fun and creative.  This usually ensures lots of smiles and clean plates!

Vitamin C is such an important part of their diet especially in these unsettling virus times.  A great snack are mandarins from Bee Sweet Citrus.  I just sliced some up to make some fun items.  First were little fish.  You need Bee Sweet mandarins, raisins, carrots, and candy eyes.  Slice the mandarins, top with 1 eye, and cut two pieces off of a baby carrot for tail.  Finally cut carrot in half lengthwise then cut the carrot into fourths.  Then cut a small notch in the middle of one of the pieces.  Place all together on a plate.  For another version of the orange fish I sliced mandarins and then in half again.  Layer to make fish scales, cut a slice of a carrot for the mouth, candy eyes for the eyes and mini marshmallows for the bubbles.

To make a mandarin sun slice a mandarin, top with two raisins, and then cut baby carrots into fourths lengthwise and place around mandarin.

Lastly I made a butterfly with grapes, mandarins, carrots and black decorative icing.  Cut mandarin into slices and then cut two slices in half again to make wings.  Place next to five grapes and use icing to make eyes.  Lastly, I cut two very thin slices of carrots for the antenna.

My girls were so excited to see this afternoon snack spread and it only took me a few minutes.  Luckily I also had everything on hand (yes I always have candy eyes and black icing).

If you're ever in a rut here are a few other snack ideas that were a huge hit in our house:

4th of July Breakfast- Firecracker Pancakes

I live for a holiday breakfast and coming up with new ideas every year.  The theme for this 4th of July breakfast was firecrackers.  I made firecracker pancakes and also a DIY firecracker craft.  I also served red, white and blue parfaits.  Red and blue milk topped everything off.

Splash Into Summer Party

Our kids finished the craziest school year and survived the roller coaster!!!  There were days I didn't think we would make it but my girls are so positive and resilient.  Surviving the mayhem of distance learning deserved a party!!!  We celebrated with our neighbors and had the absolute best day celebrating and kicking off Summer.

Hosting an Outdoor Easter Brunch

We host Easter nearly every year at our home and I just love hosting a party.  Due to the pandemic we obviously couldn't host our extended family but I wasn't going to bypass the festivities because it was just our immediate family.  I decided to create an outdoor Easter Brunch so that we could get outside to enjoy the beautiful weather but more importantly so that we could share in our neighborhood celebrations!

Easter Bunny Brunch

There isn't a holiday that goes by that I don't do a special breakfast.  The surprise element is long gone but there isn't any less excitement from the girls and now Jack wants in on the fun.  I keep everything simple and affordable so it doesn't take a lot of time or money. I use many things over and over in order to accomplish that.  Most of the time I use our colorful RePlay tableware but I had these supplies left over from a party so I decided to use them.  I made the garland years ago from paint sample cards and the only other decor was some fresh tulips and our letter board.

Fun Easter Week Traditions & Activities

Traditions mean so much to me; they remind me of my childhood and bring such joy to my heart.  I hope that my children will continue these one day and fondly think of their childhood memories.  We take any excuse to celebrate, craft or create and here are some of our traditions:
1. Decorate Easter cookies 2. Easter Picnic and/or Lunch 3. Easter Crafts 4. Dying Easter Eggs

How to Throw an Easter Lunch with Bunny Sandwiches

I take holidays very seriously; I'll take any reason to celebrate!  This year especially called for extra fun and festivities (thank you Corona) so leading up to Easter we had lots of fun moments including this Easter lunch.  I love doing stuff like this because it doesn't take much effort but it means so much to my girls.  I hope one day they look back at all these memories and want to continue these traditions with their children.

A Bright & Colorful St. Patty's Breakfast

St. Patrick's Day has become one of my favorite holidays because who doesn't love bright colors, rainbows, magic and a little luck?!?!  I always enjoy our holiday breakfasts but this one was extra fun to put together.  It was just the joy and light we needed in this crazy time.  We also got to enjoy it a bit more because we didn't have to race off to school (hello quarantine bonus).

How to Make Lucky Leprechaun Snack Mix

This St. Patty's Day treat was so simple and quick to make and added lots of fun to our holiday brunch.  It stores well in the fridge and can be enjoyed for many days.

Ingredients:

• Lucky Charms (2 Cups)
• Rice Chex (1 Cup)
• White Melting Chocolate (Two Squares)
• Pink Sprinkles

Directions:

Melt the chocolate in a bowl in the microwave in 30 second increments.  Dump in Lucky Charms and Chex and mix.  Top with sprinkles and lay on parchment paper.  Put in fridge to harden.  Once set crumble up and put in an airtight container.