How to Make Freezer Meals Before Giving Birth | Preparing for Baby

Learn how to make freezer meals. This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #NatureMadePrenatalDHA #CollectiveBias

With both of my pregnancies, I gave birth during the Winter. My favorite part was having each baby before Christmas – they were a fantastic present to our family. It’s vital to take care of yourself and the baby, while your pregnant, but you also have to think ahead to their arrival. It helped me to think of it as two parts: Taking care of yourself before the baby’s arrival and how to plan ahead for after the baby’s arrival. I’ve simplified both parts, with these helpful tips, to make it easy for every Mom.

Taking Care of Yourself While Pregnant: Healthy Mom, Healthy Baby

The foundation of your baby’s health starts when you’re pregnant. Taking care of yourself, from the inside out, will help keep you both healthy. The building blocks of pre-natal begins with Folic Acid. It’s an important B Vitamin for women of child-bearing age and pregnant Women. Folic Acid plays a critical role in the proper development of the baby’s nervous system.† It’s so important because adequate folic acid in healthful diets may reduce a woman’s risk of having a child with a neural tube defect.

While Folic Acid can be found in food, taking a pre-natal vitamin helps ensures you’re getting the proper amount. I take Nature Made Prenatal Multi + 200 mg DHA, it meets high quality standards and made from carefully selected ingredients under strict manufacturing processes. It’s recommended that Women start taking a pre-natal vitamin six months prior to being pregnant.

Nature Made Prenatal Multi + 200 mg DHA should be taken with food and comes in a easy-to-swallow softgel. By taking one per day, it provides clinically proven absorption of Folic Acid and Iron. It also provides essential vitamins and minerals (before and during pregnancy) including Folic Acid, Calcium, Iron, Magnesium, Iodine, Vitamin B12, and Vitamin D3†. Plus, the 200 mg DHA may help support fetal brain and eye development †.

I felt assured that Nature Made Prenatal Multi + 200 mg DHA is “free from” synthetic dyes, yeast and starch and artificial flavors. They’ve also made it Gluten Free. By taking care of myself, I knew I was taking care of the baby too.

On top of taking my daily pre-natal vitamin, I took care of myself in other ways as well. Keep these tips in mind while you’re pregnant:

Drink an adequate amount of water
Work out with gentle exercise
Eat healthy and natural foods
Get enough sleep
De-stress with meditation or a relaxing bath

Plan Ahead for The Baby’s Arrival: Making Freezer Meals

Since I had Winter babies, it was such a treat to have warm meals. When you’re a first-time Mom, it’s hard to understand how busy you’ll be when the baby is born. Between late-night feedings and doctor visits, you’re exhausted and pressed for time. The best thing any Mom can do is prepare before the baby arrives so you’re rewarded with more free time later. That free time allows for more sweet baby snuggles and making memories.

My favorite way to ensure a warm meal, when you’re busy with a newborn, is making DIY Freezer Meals. You’ll thank me later, when you’ve had a crazy day and you’re tired. There’s comfort knowing you’ve got a freezer full of dinner options!

There’s a lot of benefits to making freezer meals. You don’t have to think about dinner, it’s efficient, flexible and it’s a safety net when your day doesn’t go as planned. We had a freezer full of meals when my youngest was born and I was so thankful I put the time into creating them while pregnant.

What You’ll Need For Freezer Meals

Zipper Bags: Get all shapes and sizes to store raw meat, cooked meat, soups, sauces and raw vegetables.
Pint and Quart Food Storage Containers: They can be reused and stacked in the freezer. This is great if you’re tight on space.
Foil Pans: They also come in all shapes and sizes. They are useful because they keep you from having to use your glass and ceramic pans for freezing.
Aluminum Foil: Buy heavy duty. You can make custom shapes with it. Pro Tip: line a baking dish with your tin foil so you can easily remove a frozen casserole without creating a dirty dish. Saves time!
Permanent Markers: For labeling. You want to write the date that is was frozen and heating instructions. This about it: you can take a nap, when the baby sleeps, and your family can prepare the meal for you – brilliant.

Pack Meals With Success

Air is the enemy: it can cause freezer burn on your freezer meals. Force out all of the excess air when you pack your meals. Place the wrapping right against the food to eliminate any airspace.
Flash Freeze: When you flash freeze, you place uncovered food straight into the freezer to do a quick freeze of the surface in order to make it easier (and less messy) to pack and store. Things like grilled chicken, raw or cooked meatballs, rounds of cookie dough and hamburger patties all benefit from flash freezing. Just pop into the freezer for 30 minutes, remove and pop the food into it’s permanent storage container.
Make Wise Use of Space: If you have a small freezer, you can still create freezer meals. Just plan ahead on spacial arrangement. Zipper bags can be stored flat and that’s great for soups. Large casseroles can sit on the bottom. Label the bags clearly and keep the most recently frozen items toward the back and bottom, so you’re using the food on top first.

My Favorite Freezer Meals

Unbaked Casseroles
Grilled Chicken Breasts
Raw, Formed Hamburger Patties
Meatballs, Cooked or Raw
Browned hamburger, sausage and turkey
Soups and sauces
Non-acidic raw vegetables (corn, green beans and carrots)

† These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

Nature Made Prenatal Multi + 200 mg DHA can be found at Sam’s Club, in the vitamin section.

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