Stocking up...

I learned very quickly after the birth of our first son that cooking with a newborn is just not going to happen (or at least not every night or even most nights)! I honestly felt like a sleep-walking person for much of the first two weeks (maybe also had something to do with a 39 hour labor)... I was glad we had a few meals I'd prepared ahead of time, but sincerely wished we'd had more. Luckily we lived in a college town and there were plenty of places we could eat at when the freezer was depleted... This time however, I know that we have a limited number of places to eat (mostly fast food - burger/greasy type joints... unfortunately) and I wanted to be prepared. I may have overdone it a bit, but at least I know we won't be starving for the first month of our son's life!


I'm also quite glad I got an early start with making food as in the last week  I've been told to 'take it easy'. So much so that if I go shopping I should be using their wheelchair carts... Yeah haven't really done any shopping recently. Really the shopping advise was given on Sunday after my contractions were actually stopped at the hospital. (Having pre-term labor stopped is not fun-let's just say that!) So making tons of meals is not really what I consider 'taking it easy'. We want baby to make it to at least 37 weeks - but that is tomorrow, so it's looking great ;).

So I just have to share a break-down of what we have in stock for when baby will get here... (I'll be sharing some of these with you in the weeks after our child is born... since they're in the freezer I don't have any finished shots, so after I take them I can post the recipe!)

We have: 

• 2 pans of Black Bean Tortilla Casserole, 
• 3 pans of 4-cheese stuffed shells (like my 5-cheese shells, but using only parmesan instead of parmesan and asiago cheese.), 
• 2 pans of shredded pork enchiladas, 
• 2 bags of Teriyaki bowl-slow cooker, 
• 2 bags of Onion Cranberry Chicken, 
• 3 pans of Cordon bleu Casserole, 
• 4 dinners of sloppy joes, 
• 2 pans of Hamburger Enchiladas, and 
• 2 pans of Veggie Enchilada Lasagna. 

Hubby and I figured that these made a total of about 38 meals-yey for leftovers for lunch! (We'll have to add veggies and fruit to most of them and some require rice as well... but we have a rice cooker for that!) I plan on buying frozen vegetables as well as trying to incorporate fresh ones since after-all it is the middle of summer!

We also have some Chicken Fingers and some twice baked potatoes (both of which I made and froze before baking.) Plus I made some peanut butter and banana muffins, some apple muffins and some peanut butter oat balls for snacks - as I also learned after child #1 that I get RAVENOUSLY hungry while breastfeeding. Having something that is easy to just grab and that I can eat one-handed without much of a mess is a great snack to have while feeding the little one!

If you're pregnant or have been, what are some things you do to get ready for your baby to come?