now that i’m back to work, my time is SUPER limited.

my first week back i still managed to cook every night–with the exception of one night where there was a mishap with the slow cooker meal courtesy of the husband. i’m getting pretty good at getting the slow cooker meals prepped during the weekend and on during the week so that when we get home, we have a nice, hot, home cooked meal waiting for us.

a couple of people have been asking for recipes. some people have been asking how i do it. i’ll be posting the recipes in different posts but here’s my process:

every 2 weeks i come up with a meal plan for dinners. it includes monday – saturday because sunday’s are normally spent at my inlaws house. based upon the meals that i come up with, i develop a grocery shopping list. i go grocery shopping on saturday–normally with abc strapped to me as she naps (today she’ll be at home with the hubs).

after i do the shopping, i don’t put any groceries away that are for the meals. i sort my recipes based upon ingredients and then pull out my gallon freezer bags. **i used zipper bags this last go round and needless to say, they were not my favorite. i’ll be sticking with the standard ziplock bags from now on.** i write the meal that’s going in there.

the first thing i do is get the meats together. i normally approximate the meats as it’s virtually impossible to get everything perfect. after the meats go in, then i cut up a bunch of onions. pretty much all my recipes call for onions and i love them. i buy the pre-minced garlic to keep things simple. after i put in the garlic and onions into each bag that requires them, then i start building meals 1 by 1 based on what else is needed. and then i pop them in the freezer!

a couple of notes–i don’t freeze milk or dairy with the bags. i will add those once the bag is defrosted and ready to be cooked.

it normally takes me about 1.5-2.5 hours to get all the meals prepped including interruptions from the kids. my grocery bill is normally about $125 for the 2 weeks. i don’t think that’s too bad since these meals include dinner with enough leftovers for lunch the next day.

i’ll begin posting recipes and if you have any questions or recipes to share, please do!