My girls have mostly moved away from snacks during the day — I’ve found that they eat so much more food at mealtimes when they aren’t munching throughout the day — but occasionally I still put together a food prep tray for their shelves.  One of my Instagram friends shared a photo of a grape cutter that her daughter uses, and I immediately added it to my shopping cart!

I put a small colander with a pre-portioned amount of grapes (still on the stem) in the fridge, then set up a tray with a bowl, the grape cutter, a small plate, and a small fork.

When L discovered the tray almost immediately [as I knew she would…], I showed her how to take the colander filled with grapes to the sink to rinse them.

Then she put the grapes into the small bowl and sat down with her work.  She plucked one grape off the stem [great for fine motor skills!] and placed it into the grape cutter.  While the cutter is designed to be used by pushing down on the green plunger, L found it much easier to turn it upside down and push the whole thing down on the table — she has little hands, after all.

After she had cut a bunch of the grapes, she just couldn’t wait to taste them!

When she was finished, L took the tray to the sink and washed each of her dishes.

While I rarely have this out on the shelf during the day now, I often invite L to cut some grapes up for her and N’s lunches, so we still use this food prep work at mealtimes.