Postpartum Meal Planning

Wednesday, May 1st, marked my last day of work at New Life Family Services. It was a difficult decision to make but in the end, I know I followed the Lord's leading in it. Thursday, May 2nd, marked my first day as a stay at home mom. I enjoyed many texts from dear momma friends congratulating me on my "new job." :-) While I can't say that I'm entirely overjoyed as being a stay at home mom has not been one of my life long dreams, I do have a peace about following the Lord's leading not to continue in my full time role and I'm trusting in his provision going forward. 

The days ahead I both look forward to and dread as I am a very driven person and I struggle with not seeing my accomplishments play out. I've already made quite the to do list for preparing for baby- who is due in 5 days, mind you. I look forward to her being here with such anticipation! There is no point in sitting at home without her to take care of so I'm starting the process now. Meal planning has begun and I've followed the advice of many blogger friends and begun making and freezing meals that will be easy to take out, thaw and reheat! While it's a little more work up front, and a lot more groceries than we've ever had in our house at any given time, I think it will be a huge benefit in the long run and hopefully result in a lot less "take-out" dinners. That's one of the goals! 

Below is one of my favorite meal ideas:

Crock Pot BBQ Chicken

Chop the following ingredients and divide them between 2 freezer bags. 

3 sweet potatoes

3 zucchini

2 onions

2 green bell peppers

1 red bell pepper

4-5 chicken breasts

In each bag also place sauce. You can either use your favorite BBQ sauce or make your own. This is what we did:

8 oz tomato paste

1 T Worcestershire sauce

2 T brown sugar

1 T mustard powder

1 garlic clove minced

1/4 t salt

All items go into freezer bag raw so this was very easy to do last night while watching a movie with the hubby who was working on making and freezing a few meat loafs! 

"Becky Home-ec-y"

Well i'm pleased to say that yesturday I made up not one, not two, but three recipes and they all turned out to be new favorite things!

The first (and I can't share the exact recipe with you because it's a secret and I'm going to be annoying and keep the secret this time:

Tuna Salad

This was an easy and quick little meal. It tastes delightful on a sandwich with fresh garden tomato slice and a thin slice of sharp cheddar cheese. John loved it! I also added some dill pickles into the mix this time instead of celery, and to make it a bit more on the healthy side used ranch instead of mayo-so much better. Maybe someday I'll share the complete recipe... if i remember to write it down! I'm more of a taste as i go kind of person!

The Second: Since I'd used nearly all the pickles for the salad, I thought I'd better replace them. We have cucumbers a plenty in the garden so I used just a few to try a recipe I saw on the net: it became my own recipe because i didn't have but 2 of the ingredients.  Here  is a pickle recipe that I will try next time and below is the finished product:

YUM! Just a bit on the salty side. Practice makes perfect.

Third [and current favorite]:

Homemade raw salsa. Love. I'm munching on it right now with these.

Depends on how much you want to make, but I used

6 fresh tomatoes
1/2 onion
1/2 tsp. cilantro ( or basil if you're impatient to try it!)
salt (to taste)
 1/2 tsp. sriracha chili sauce (but you may want to add less if you don' t like *spicy*

It was/is great and super easy! I think the fresh tomatoes really are the secret.