Veronika recently loved helping make her own lunch so we tested out a few other fun ways to involve her with sandwich prep! For the first version, we made butterflies. Cut slices of bread in half so they form two triangles, then turn the points together to make them look like outstretched butterfly wings.

From here, the toppings are really entirely up to your child! We tried two versions: a savory and a sweet. For savory, I spread the “wings” with non-dairy cream cheese, and Veronika added slices of pickle. She ended up adoring the pickle and eating almost all of it straight off the wings, though!

For the sweet version, I spread the bread with peanut butter instead. This time she had raisins and banana slices for decorating, and even helped slice the banana with a butter knife.

This was a great chance for snacking, tasting, combining new tastes, plus squeezing in science since we could talk about the symmetry of the butterflies as we decorated and enjoyed.

A few days later, we turned to bigger animals for our sandwich play. First we used an assortment of cookie cutters to make animal shapes from slices of whole wheat bread. Veronika chose a cat, turkey, and owl.

She then helped spread non-dairy cream cheese on the animals, which was white “fur” on the cat, white “feathers” on the owl, etc., and a great way to talk about animals’ different coverings.

You can then add features like eyes or beaks with raisins and mini chocolate chips!

To be honest, Veronika never dined on these sandwiches, since it was more about sensory play, but she loved the experience!

Here’s a cute way for a toddler help make his or her lunch! Before assembling a sandwich, your child gets to “paint” their own toast.

To set up, I poured 2 tablespoons non-dairy milk into each of two small dishes, and added food coloring to each. Veronika chose blue and green.

Using clean cotton swabs (or a clean paintbrush, if you have one), we dipped in the milk mixture and then onto slices of bread. Veronika loved seeing colors appear! I encouraged her to make dots and swirls. Meanwhile, I showed her how we could also draw more detailed pictures, like a smiley face.

Or a letter V for Veronika!

Once the design is to your child’s liking, toast the bread for 1 to 2 minutes in the toaster and the image will set. Prepare your tot’s sandwich of choice, and set out this happy lunch!

It’s easy to make homemade butter just by shaking heavy creamer, requiring nothing more than a little muscle power, and that is a neat way for kids to see where their food comes from. We wanted to put a vegan spin on this project so decided to try making butter from coconut cream!

Make sure to purchase full fat coconut milk for this activity, not the light alternative, which likely won’t work.

Scoop a little of the solid coconut fat from the can into a small jar (empty baby food jars were the perfect size for small hands) along with some of the liquid.

Then simply seal and shake! Obviously Veronika didn’t have the muscle to make the “butter” solo, as it required about 5 minutes total of shaking. We would pass the jar back and forth and shake it all the while, and her excitement mounted as she said she wanted to taste the butter.

After shaking, the fat and liquid will combine into a creamy, smooth consistency. It’s not exactly butter of course, but it did have a nice spreadable consistency. Veronika absolutely adored it on crackers!

While you probably don’t want to eat pure coconut cream every day, this was a fun treat to try out and she was so proud that she “made” her own snack.