Now, balance all of these commitments while trying to provide healthy meals and snacks for your family.

Easy? Not at all. Busy parents today know this balancing act all too well and know that preparing healthy meals and snacks can be a challenge.

With children and adults struggling to eat the minimum requirements in the milk products and vegetables and fruit food groups of Canada's Food Guide to Healthy Eating, it is more important than ever to strive to provide nutritious take-along food instead of hitting the drive-thru window. Lunchables, mini chocolate bars, small bags of potato chips, pop and other "treats" are tempting to time-strapped parents but prepackaged, highly processed items are expensive calories low on nutrition but loaded with sodium, trans fats, refined starches and sugars.

Eating the recommended servings from the food groups is more likely to happen with food prepared at home and following Canada’s Food Guide has many benefits.

People who get the recommended servings in their meals and snacks perform better at school, work and play; have healthier weights; eat more essential nutrients; lower their risk of chronic disease such as heart disease, stroke, cancer, type 2 diabetes, and osteoporosis; and have better emotional health, energy, appetite cont.rol, and immune systems.

So how do parents provide nutritious meals and snacks, especially while merging back into the fast lane of the school season? Here are a few tips:

1. Get your children involved: Instead of becoming a short-order cook, encourage your kids to give you a hand in the kitchen. Discuss how to make healthy food choices and why this is important to their health, growth, energy level and fitness. Let them make, wrap and pack their own sandwiches. Most kids take pride in their personal sandwich creations and you'll be starting them off to making good food decisions for later life.
2. Make snacks count: Little stomachs need smaller portions but need to be filled more often. Stay away from processed snack foods; instead create your own in reusable containers with small compartments. Kids generally prefer raw veggies to cooked, and they love to dip and dunk. Pack pod-peas, carrots, celery, broccoli, cauliflower or cherry tomatoes with a homemade cream cheese and spinach dip.
3. Have healthy options available: Limit the juice and pop. Instead, put a single-serving -sized milk in the freezer over night. It'll thaw out by lunch and it will help keep other foods cool and fresh. Don't keep a lot of junk food around in the house. If you have healthy choices available (fruit, veggies, yogurt, cheese, whole grain breads) then no matter what your child decides to bring for lunch it will be a good choice