First of all, I present as a gift, my rule of thumb for time management after welcoming a new baby into your home.
Rule of Thumb:
Baby is 0-3 months old = you will get nothing done aside from feeding and diapering baby. Your family will survive on Cheerios, peanut butter sandwiches, ramen noodles, and popcorn. It’s fine. Order pizza as often as possible 😉 it’s good for moral.
Baby is 3-6 months old: you can accomplish 1-2 other tasks per day besides caring for the baby. This could be dinner, some cleaning, or laundry, but not all 3. If you have a toddler, he/she will watch much TV regardless of which task you choose. I recommend “Little Baby Bum”…
Baby is 6 plus months old: on good days you can accomplish 3-4 tasks. On bad days—zero.
If you have Twins: basically double the length of each stage— maybe triple depending on how many other children you have and what their ages are.
Twins 0-6 months: feeding the twins is all you will accomplish.
When your twins have survived for 6 months, you will suddenly one day lift your head, take a breath, and realize that the outside world is still going on. You will probably be able to add one non-baby task per day at this point if your twins are formula fed and can hold their own bottles.
Now that you have realistic expectations, I’ll tell you the next most important thing.
The first key to being consistent at getting meals on the table is your attitude. You need to recognize how important a part of your Mom job it is. For years, I thought I had the best attitude about being a mother. I “knew how important” it was to be a mom. My day-to-day thought process did not reflect this, though. Day in and day out, I viewed the work I did in my home as never ending drudgery, and I rushed through it hoping to have time to get to “something important” and time to do the “fun things I wanted to do.”
I am embarrassed to tell you how many years it took me to realize the truth that would set me free from daily frustration and misery. I realized that feeding my family, clothing my family, and keeping our home clean WERE the important things I needed to do each day. These chores were not the necessary evils of motherhood. These chores were the most important daily service I could render to my husband and children and, by extension, the best service I could render to God. Once I figured this out, I still needed to change my attitude so that I could rejoice in those daily tasks. Reading this little pamphlet called Rejoicing in Repetition changed my attitude. It is worth every penny!!
Now that your expectations and attitude are squared away, I’ll tell you my favorite way to get dinner done for the family. I’ve tried all the ideas: 30 minute meals, freezer meals, make ahead meals, crock-pot meals. My favorite for ease of preparation and freshness of the food is doing a prep day once a week.
I started with a plan where someone else did the thinking for me: Five Dinners in One Hour. I began with the $2 trial plan. She gives you recipes, a grocery list, and instructions for how to do all the prep work for 5 dinners in about an hour on one day. Her meals are pretty traditional meat and potatoes type meals, but with lots of good veggies, and she had several meatless meals, which is very nice.
It was life changing for me even though my pep takes more like 2 hours since I’m prepping meals for 11 people.
Fair Warning: kitchen must be clean and groceries bought. The prep time doesn’t count shopping or cleaning the kitchen. So I usually shop and clean on Friday and then prep on Saturday.
Seriously, this method is so much quicker and fresher tasting than making freezer meals (been there, tried that). Even on the weeks that I don’t do full prep, just taking time to wash and chop all the veggies makes getting food on the table 100% easier.
Another planning and preparation method I love is Mystie Winkler’s Simplified Dinner plan. Family meals are a big deal, and if you want to learn how to make your meal preparation and planning go more smoothly and take as little brain space as possible, then this Simplified Dinner ebook is the thing you need.
You can do this, Momma! God gave you this baby (babies) and He will give you the Grace and energy and wisdom to accomplish this mission.
❤️ Glowworm
Recap:
1. Get your Expectations Real!
2. Read Rejoicing in Repetition
3. Check out Five Dinners in One Hour
4. Check out Simplified Dinner
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Marvelous Pigs in Satin 
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