Meal Prep for Busy Moms

Meal prepping is my saving grace to ease my stress as a busy mom during the week!

I always hated when 4 PM rolled around and I had NO clue what to eat and then when I'd figure out something I would be missing an ingredient. It was a bad cycle of unneeded stress on my part!

Meal prepping for me looks a bit different than what you would normally see!

You might be thinking of something like this below:

It looks beautiful and convenient to have on hand, but here are the reasons I have trouble with that:

1. I don't like reheated meat. (ewww)

2. This is honestly MORE work than I am willing to do.

3. My goals are not to compete in a bikini competition.

SOOO for those three reasons I bring you my SUPER easy way to ease stress and make sure you stay on track with healthy choices all week for you AND your family!

Step 1

On Monday morning or Sunday night I will browse through my cookbooks, Pinterest, recipe folder, or anything else I have to figure out what DINNER meals we will be eating for the next week.

Step 2

I will then WRITE out what we are having on my fridge magnet white board (Target dollar section find!) AND I will make a grocery list of everything I DON'T have for those ingredients as well as any staples we need for breakfast, lunch, and snacks.

Step 3

Go shopping on Monday to pick up any needed items! For a family of 4 I try to keep it to $100 per week. Sometimes it's less and sometimes it's more depending on what I need to get.  "You may also notice some "unclean" items on the table, but we live by the 80/20 rule around here! Balancing is what works for us. 

AND that is honestly ALL I do!

Keeping it simple keeps us on track and helps me stay SANE when dinner come everyday.  The trick is to find what works for YOU. 

For a little more info on this topic I also have this YouTube video I made for my Free 7 Day Clean Eating for Families group! 

If you would like me to be your Free Beachbody coach or you would like information about my support groups click  HERE. 

Overcoming the "Mom Guilt"

Mom guilt is usually something EVERY mom deals with at some point. 

I was talking to a new friend about adjusting from one kid to two and it really got me reminiscing about those days. My oldest, Lydia, never took a nap anymore when Claire came into our family so there really wasn’t anyway I could always just sleep when the baby slept as so many people advised. I was exhausted, emotional, and the mom guilt creeped in a lot this time around. Even though this is normal for most mom's, that doesn't mean it's not hard.

I felt guilty for having Lydia watch a movie so I could take a nap while Claire napped, I felt guilty that I couldn’t give my FULL attention to Lydia anymore, and I felt guilty every time I tried to get a full 30 minute workout in. I KNEW that it was just a phase, but I found myself feeling overwhelmed about how I was going to keep this up everyday.

Looking back, I now see that I should not have been feeling guilty for ANY of it. I had a busy husband with no family close by so I just did what I needed to do. The fact is, I NEEDED sleep, I couldn’t give 100% of my attention to Lydia anymore, AND exercise was necessary for me to get on my journey back to feeling good about myself again.

If there are any mom’s out there going through a challenging stage.. just know that you are NOT alone. I know you probably hate to hear this, but it really is just a phase of life. It seems like it will never end, but looking back you'll see how quickly time did actually pass. Don’t let yourself get caught up in thinking how you’re going to keep it up for the next days, weeks, or months to come. Focus on ONE day at a time and search for things to be grateful for everyday.



Do the VERY best you can and know that it IS ENOUGH.