Y’all I am 36 weeks and I cannot stop obsessively cooking food to stock our deep freeze. My husband thinks I’ve lost my mind! In my defense, we eat much more than the average family because we are avid weight lifters. We also eat nearly exclusively at home and don’t intend to eat out postpartum.
Is this…. nesting? I haven’t felt like cleaning at all or doing any house projects so I guess this is how it is manifesting for me hahaha. I’ve just not heard about anyone else having it show up like this!
So far I’ve made: 10 servings of chili, 30 servings of chicken and rice soup, 12 servings of butternut squash soup, 50 lactation ball bites, 2 9x13s of dressing and 60 sourdough rolls
I’m still planning to make: 2 trays of enchiladas, a shepard pie, 15ish servings of cabbage soup and 50 more lactation balls. While also having 2 roasts frozen and ready to cook with the potatoes and carrots chopped
Anyone relate to this? Have I gone too far?
As long as it freezes well, you haven't gone too far! I actually liked having stuff in the freezer once I went back to work, it was nice to occasionally not have to think about feeding ourselves.
Ok this is comforting! That is part of my thinking too. It’ll be hard enough breastfeeding so why add cooking to that mix?
And if you go back to work you've got getting home later and washing pump parts and packing your stuff up and maybe running around to do daycare drop offs. I think your future self will thank you!
In my family, this is a very common way of nesting.
I did this! From 27-35w I prepped two or three freezer meals each week. We couldn't work on the nursery at all in that time due to plumbing repairs nor had space to unpack and sort through all the baby stuff, so I frantically turned to meal prep in an effort to feel at least somewhat prepared to bring a newborn home.
Checking my old list, I made: 15 dinners, four side dishes, 13 individual lunch portions, 25 individual breakfasts, several loaves of quick breads, and several dozen random snacks (cookies, mini pot pies, etc).
We ended up with a pretty paltry mealtrain showing (I think two people signed up?) so I'm super glad we did this. They were awesome for the first two weeks. I eased back into cooking after that because I love to do it, but we continued to use them, especially when my husband went back to work at 4wpp. Our otherwise easy baby sometimes had rough evenings with gas pain between 5-10w and freezer meals those nights were a Godsend.
Any favorite freezer recipes that you could share?? I’m running out of ideas :)
My dinner list: meatloaf, chicken fajitas, mac and cheese, bolognese sauce, greek meatballs, sweet potato chili, cilantro lime chicken, sausage gnocchi sheet tray, Italian wedding soup, chicken soup, verde tortilla soup, baked pasta, tuna cakes. (A mix of "heat and eat" and dump-and-go crockpot/sheet tray meals, some served alongside pasta or mixed greens or something).
Individual portions: breakfast sandwiches, breakfast tacos, burritos, fried rice, pizza crusts, ham and cheese scones, shakshuka sauce, mini chicken pot pie, egg bites
My advice would be to definitely have some nutrient rich but individually portioned snacks that you can grab and eat. These were great when I'd wake up hungry in the night (breastfeeding makes you ravenous) and just wanted something to tide me over until morning. Breakfast options were also a huge hit; I was always starving when I first woke up those first few weeks and it was really nice to have a hearty breakfast in five minutes while wrangling the baby.
Yes! I can totally relate. I posted about this a few weeks ago and no one mentioned this as one of their nesting behaviors. I feel seen.
AH so glad someone else is doing this! It is the thing I worry about the most postpartum! Solidarity for “doomsday” prepping that freezer
It is nesting, nesting is preparing the house for the baby and this is part of making sure you’re fed to take care of it. Nothing wrong with that! I did this with my daughter and so wished we had more freezer space so I could do more.