*whew* It's been a long day! My little girl had her four-month well visit today, which meant two more shots and she is not handling it well. Grandma got home a few minutes ago and has been entertaining the baby so I just now have had a chance to sit down and write.
Needless to say, it's really hard to take time to think about yourself when you have a baby to take care of, especially if that baby is sick or just generally needy (like my precious angel.) The best way to make sure you are taken care of is to plan ahead.
1. When you go grocery shopping, don't fall victim to the allure of "convenience" foods. You won't have a lot of time for meal prep, but there are better ways to get around that than picking up a value pack of Cheez-Its and DoubleStuf Oreos to satisfy your midnight hunger. (Which you will have if you are up every two hours to feed your baby, and if you don't get up during the night, you can just keep that to yourself, thanks!) Instead, pick up no-fuss snacks like veggies, fruits, and nuts. I normally have a banana and a handful of almonds around 1 am and that keeps me going until the morning.
2. Make meals in bulk if you can. If you are baking some Paleo muffins in the morning, make extra and freeze them. If there are two of you, double the recipe so you can have dinner and then lunch for the next day. One of my favorite tricks is to mix a whole batch of chicken salad (or you could use tuna) for the week and then eat it a different way every day for lunch. (On a bun, in a wrap, with crackers, on a bed of mixed greens, etc.)
3. Get familiar with your slow cooker. Most recipes have four or fewer ingredients and most of the time, you can take chicken breasts straight out of the freezer without thawing ahead of time. A slow cooker is great with tip #2 as well. I have a 7-quart slow cooker and double recipes whenever I can to get an extra meal out of it. I have a ton of easy crock-pot recipes pinned on my Food Board, but here are a couple of my favorites:
Crock-Pot Chicken with Carrots and Sweet Potatoes
Honey-Sauced Chicken
4. My number one tip for eating healthy, regardless of how many munchkins you have running around or requiring your attention at any given moment: SURROUND YOURSELF WITH GOOD FOOD! If you only keep fresh, whole, healthy foods in your fridge and pantry, that is what you will eat. Same goes for junk. If that's all you have, that's all you will eat. Make that choice before you get to the checkout line and you will be good to go. ;)
Sorry it's so late, but for what it's worth, this concludes the three-part "Staying Healthy with an Infant" series. :-D
Really enjoyed this entry, especially because i am reading it while feeling very content and full after a dinner of white beans (bought in bulk) and onions that cooked all day in the slow cooker (took no effort to throw in this morning), topped with turkey bacon and homemade blue corn corn bread (with cornmeal and flour also bought in bulk)...fed a family of 6 for about .75 cents a person.
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