White bread bologna sandwich. Cookie. Apple.

White bread peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Cookie. Banana.

Fang Liang/Staff (ENLARGE)

'Get them involved in choosing their own lunches,' says Lisa Cronic of Decatur, here dividing dessert for her children Asa (left) and Terryl (right) and family friend Chloe Duval.

RELATED STORIES: Recipes for your kids: Think outside the lunchbox  Check these sites for school-lunch ideas  Are your kids bored with school lunches?

Sometimes a bag of chips.

That, in a nutshell, was the dietary equivalent of the school lunches my mother put together as she rushed four kids to the bus stop every day.

Usually, the sandwich was trashed or stashed in my locker to become a future science experiment, and the cookie and fruit were supplemented by vending machine junk. (Swiss rolls, anyone?)

Times have not changed much. The Environmental Protection Agency reports that middle school cafeterias are responsible for 40,000 pounds of waste a year to landfills — and 70 percent of that is discarded food.

Donna Jaffe of Marietta changed her lunch making practices years ago, when she discovered that her boys didn't want to eat what she had packed.

So she got them involved in the process. "I decided not to stress," she says. "If they want to pack last night's cold spaghetti and tomato sauce, that's OK. A bagel and cream cheese sandwich was fine too.

"If you are doing all the right [healthy] things for breakfast and dinner, it's not such a big deal."

Lisa Cronic of Decatur agrees. She likes to make lunches her children don't want to trade at lunchtime.

"Get them involved in choosing their own lunches," she says. Cronic enlists the help of her 5-year-old son, Asa, who loves cheese. They try out samples at the Whole Foods counter, then select a few favorites. She also looks for creative ways to pack a lunch for her 9-year-old daughter, Terryl. A favorite is homemade mini-tacos stuffed with chicken and cheese. She heats them in the morning in the microwave, then double-wraps them in foil and packs them in an insulated lunchbox.

Apples are cut into wedges and given a squirt of lemon so they don't turn brown. She also bakes mini-muffins and banana bread and throws them in the freezer to pull out later for lunches. They're thawed by the time the lunch bell rings.

She knows her kids are picky eaters, and she doesn't stray too far from what she knows they'll eat.

Most experts agree: Don't introduce your child to exotic foods in the lunchbox; it's almost a guaranteed toss. But you can make the foods your child does like more appealing. There is a reason kids gravitate to those pre-packaged Lunchables — they look cool.

"A healthy lunch is one that kids will eat," said Cristina Caro, a registered dietitian and program coordinator for Healthy Lifestyles at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. "Packing lunch is a delicate balance between what's good for them and what they're willing to eat."

Dietitian's tips
• Cut a sandwich into three or four pieces.

• Try some variety in the fruit. If your child will eat only apples, get Granny Smiths, Golden Delicious and McIntosh for variety.

• Think color and texture — fruits and vegetables that are bright, like baby carrots, and things that are chewy, like dried fruits.

• Also consider your child's lunchtime. Some schools have lunch scheduled as early as 10:45 a.m. Your child might not be hungry for a big lunch then, Caro says.

• Pack healthy finger foods as a quick snack or light lunch. "Even older kids like to eat with their hands," Caro said.

Pat McQuarrie's children are grown, but the Peachtree City mom says it was "a challenge to send lunches, as they did not like the school lunch. I found that younger children liked to 'dip,' so I created 'inside out' sandwiches."

Start with a crispy breadstick, then build out in any way that sounds good to them. For example: thin-sliced cheese wrapped around the breadstick, then lunchmeat (ham, turkey etc.), then lettuce. Wrap this snugly in plastic. Send a small container of their favorite salad dressing, like ranch or honey mustard.

She suggests a variation of the inside-out sandwich, with mozzarella, then salami, and the dipping sauce could be marinara.

Milk, juice or water?
These days, there are multiple milk choices for kids, from "snow cone" vanilla, to chocolate and strawberry. Flavored milks are OK, because they do provide calcium and vitamins A and D, but parents should be aware of their high sugar content, Caro said.

Best-case scenario: Children should drink skim or 1 percent milk.

Look for 100 percent juice; about 4-6 ounces is OK, Caro says. And plain water is always a good choice.