Ever since my husband and I became parents, we knew we wanted to provide our children with wholesome foods. Our preference has always leaned towards natural and organic foods so it wasn't long after our first-born began to snack on solids that we discovered Barbara's Cereals. We also found ourselves stocking our pantry with their fig bars and Snackimals cookies. Using high quality ingredients, Barbara's has been creating wholesome snacks and cereals that have no refined sugar or hydrogenated oils for more than 40 years. 

Our family recently had a chance to sample two varieties of Barbara's Organic Snackimals Cereals: Vanilla Blast and Cinnamon Crunch. Of the two flavours, vanilla was the clear winner. We even offered a box to the neighbour's kids down the street and they picked vanilla over cinnamon, too. To be honest, I'm not surprised. I personally have to be in the mood for cinnamon. Our family doesn't use cinnamon often and so I think my kids don't have much of an appetite for it. In fact, they would only have the vanilla cereal for breakfast. The stuff was gone before I had a chance to sample it myself!

What I tried instead was adding the cinnamon Snackimals cereal to a snack tray and left it out on the table after school. I noticed my son nibbling on some of it and had one of those "a-ha" moments. Forget about offering the cinnamon variety at breakfast and just keep it on hand for snacks. They are 'Snack'imals, after all! 

What better way to ring in the spring season than with a party to celebrate the earth! With Earth Day coming up on April 22, EnviroKidz invites you to throw a Celebrate-the-Earth party to make learning about animals and the planet fun and delicious for kids. Why not try making some tasty Chocolate Garden Cups featured above? Or try these easy no-bake Koala Crisp™ Mini Cupcakes using the recipe below.

Earth Month has nearly come to an end but in our home, the conversation regarding sustainability, habitat conservation and the environment continues year-round. Last year, our family learned about local city critters as part of an educational, hands-on series of workshops at Toronto Botanical Garden. We discovered that the falcon is the fastest animal on earth at the Great Birds of Prey workshop. We tasted different kinds of honey and watched worker bees and drones during The Buzz on Bees session. And we planted our own milkweed seeds and released a butterfly into the wild during the Monarchs on the Move workshop. While it isn't always feasible to provide these types of hands-on experiences to our children on a regular basis, we sometimes rely on documentaries on Netflix or take the kids to the theatre to see films such as Jane Goodall's Wild Chimpanzees, Disneynature's Chimpanzee or Flight of the Buttlerflies currently playing at the Ontario Science Centre. Of course, reading books from the library is also a great way to learn more about animals and nature.

Another way to instill the importance of wildlife conservation and environmental sustainability is involving our children in the decision-making process while grocery shopping. At age eight and five, both our daughter and our son have the capacity to understand that the ways in which we lead our lives can impact the world around us. More often than not, we encourage our children to enjoy local, seasonal foods and to opt for whole grain, organic and/or natural snacks and cereals. It has been several years, in fact, that our family has enjoyed a variety of snack bars and cereals made by one of our favourite brands - Nature's Path.

NEW EnviroKidz Cereals!

Recently, Nature’s Path EnviroKidz launched two new whole grain corn puff cereals: chocolate flavoured Choco Chimps Cereal and cinnamon flavoured Jungle Munch Cereal. We received a lovely gift basket to sample these new flavours and were delighted to learn that EnviroKidz Choco Chimps Cereal supports The Jane Goodall Institute and that their Jungle Munch Cereal supports Fauna & Flora International. The fact that they’re certified organic, non-GMO, gluten-free, whole grain, and made without toxic pesticides, artificial flavours and colours was nothing new to us. All these factors made it an easy purchase decision for us so many years ago. The kids already liked Gorilla Munch so I knew Choco Chimps would be a hit. Jungle Munch was their least favourite because they don't care much for cinnamon. They enjoyed it more when they mixed it with some of the plain corn puffs, though.