Last night Logan slept all night through!!! He has slept for about 6 hours at a time before this but last night he went to bed at 8PM and I had to wake him at 6AM this morning to feed him. I'm hoping he does the same thing tonight! That was the first full night of sleep I have gotten in at least 6 months; the last 3 months of being preggers and the previous 3 months of him waking up every 3 hours to eat.
Our family has such a hectic schedule! We wake up at 6am and we are all at daycare and work by 8am; I usually take my lunch hour to go feed Logan; I leave work at 5PM and the kids and I make it home around 6PM; then I feed Logan. Logan will usually eat one more time to get his belly full before he goes to bed at 8PM; Lexa goes to bed at 9PM. Lance and I go to bed at 10:30 or earlier depending how tired we are. The hardest part of our schedule is getting dinner in there somewhere. I can usually get caught up on laundry and cleaning on the weekend, but getting everyone a good dinner is the biggest challenge of my entire day. Anyone have similar problems? Does anyone have any suggestions? We eat a lot of leftovers because when I do cook, I cook enough to feed an army!
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6 years ago
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So glad Baby Logan is sleeping now! :) He is such a little cutie! He looks so much like Lexa in the picture in his carseat. And your land looks so pretty in the snow! :)
I don't know if these will help, but here's what I try to do. We buy almost all our meat at Sam's. Then once we're home I break up the meat into dinner-size amounts and freeze them. When I put the meat in a freezer bag, I lay it out (i.e. chicken legs) or smoosh it out (like hamburger) into a single thin layer. It defrosts easiest that way (I am notorious for forgetting to take meat out in the morning, and a thin layer of hamburger meat will dethaw in about 45 minutes in cold water). I know your weekends are already busy, but everything I've read about cooking for the week says to cook a bunch on the weekends and freeze it for later in the week. Casseroles almost always freeze well, as do things like chili and soup (Ziploc makes these cool 4-cup size containers with screw top lids that can go in the freezer that are good for liquid items). Something I just did earlier last week is cook one or two whole chickens (if you have a pot big enough) in a stock pot with some onion, celery, carrots, and salt and pepper with water to cover. Then shred the chicken off the bones and store the chicken in freezer bags so you have cooked chicken in dinner portions to add to soups, stews, or casseroles. You can also strain out the water and save it to use as chicken stock. Don't know if Lexa likes seafood, but shrimp cooks really quickly and you can get it already cooked. It's easy to throw it in with some pasta and a jar of sauce, either tomato or alfredo. Sam's also has those ready to eat type meals that are easy to make (like shrimp and pasta with sauce) and they're fast because you cook them on the stovetop (not like the big lasagnas that, while yummy, take forever to cook in the oven). Of course they're also in the regular grocery stores too, just not as large sizes. Canned veggies are always easiest for sides, but sometimes you get tired of that. Frozen veggies are easy too. I like to thaw them in the microwave and then saute them in a little olive oil or butter in a skillet and it takes that funny frozeny taste off them. Frozen broccoli with a little parmesan cheese and butter is really good! Sorry my response is so long, but I love love love to cook! I hope some of this helps! :)
Glad to see you blogging again!
I agree with chickie-do above (Melanie--hi, nice to meet you via blogging); even when your family is 'older' (i.e. teenagers), it's hard to get a traditional meal in when you're a full-time worker, errand-runner, housekeeper, dry-cleaner, etc...I also shop at Sam's, especially for things like chicken breast (break it up into 4-6 pieces, depending on the size) and then freeze. We eat a lot of baked chicken (sometimes with breading, sometimes in a basalmic vinigrette marinade, etc.).
I like some of Sam's frozen casseroles, but I tend to shy away from serving too many of those. They have some awesome frozen veggies--stir fry and broccoli florets that I really like.
And then there's the cooking huge meals over the weekend. Right now, since it's cold out, I'll cook a big crockpot of chili and then freeze some of that to use throughout the week. And also spaghetti works well to freeze and eat later on (it only takes a few minutes to boil up some noodles!). Also, pot roasts and pork ribs (I have a really good recipe for ribs to cook in the crockpot--very easy to set up and then you just let it sit on low for 6 hours or however long you want--Blu and Mitchell love it).
In the summer, we grill out A LOT. Hamburgers, hot dogs, shish-kabobs, etc.
Hope this helps some!
Thanks girls! I really appreciate it! Being a working mommy, I have enough inherent guilt already, not being consistent with the homecooking only adds to it! I am going to start this weekend and cook for next week.
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