Motivating Mum Lauren Kolstad has lost an incredible 26kgs with Lose Baby Weight and shares her top tips for being organised.
Hello lovely mummies
Well I am absolutely loving the Pilates 28 Day Challenge workouts! What looks like simple exercises turn out to really get your core working and leave me feeling strong, long and lean! And 90secs feels like forever haha!
Today I thought I’d talk a bit about how I keep organised and stick to the plan as a working mumma. My husband works 5 and a half days per week and leaves for work before my son gets up and often doesn’t get home until bath time at night. This means that in addition to working 8hrs 4 days a week, I do a lot of this on my own on work nights – so I have to be organised and have easy to prepare nutritious meals ready to go.
Plan, Plan, Plan
I meal plan for every meal during the week, even snacks and smoothies. That way I can make sure that I have all the ingredients for all meals as I don’t have time to just duck to the shops. This is made so much easier following the 28 Day challenges, but I also do it in the ‘off’ challenge months. Because I have everything so planned out, I try and make sure I have an alternate meal for one dinner – this is for the days where I just don’t feel like what I have on the planned menu. Sometimes this means ingredients to make the alternate meal (two ingredient pizza is a great one) – sometimes it’s a meal from the freezer.
Freezer Meals
Make ahead some simple freezable meals or protein component of the meal. I use Sunday mornings as a cook up day at least once a fortnight. Good options include: Cheesy chicken meatloaf, zucchini slice, chicken patties, lamb rissoles, veggie lasagne, corn fritters, curry, goulash, soup – although there are many!
I portion up small so that they can be used as dinner for Mr 2.5 (we get home from childcare pickup with 15-20min for dinner prep) and I just steam some veggies to add to balance out the meal. Mr 2.5 size portions are also a great lunch size for me and I can easily get a few portions out for dinner size serves for hubby and I.
I also buy individual portions of frozen salmon as I find it much easier to have it ready to cook, than buying it early in the week (Saturday is my shopping day) and trying to make it last. We buy meat in bulk and portion it up ready to defrost overnight in the fridge.
Storing Fresh Food
Because I only shop once a week, I really need to make sure everything lasts! There’s a great article on storing fresh food here and I use a lot of these tips during my Sunday prep time.
Utilise the Night Before
After Mr 2.5 is in bed (about 7pm) I try and fit in some quick exercise – especially if I don’t fit it in during my lunch break or his day sleep. If hubby is home he usually cooks dinner while I’m exercising, or otherwise I cook it once I’m finished – this is why I love Lose Baby Weight as most meals are prepped and cooked within 30mins! I only exercise for 30min max so am done by 7.30, ready for dinner by 8pm. Clean up after dinner takes about 30-45mins, so that leaves ‘me’ time or time with hubby from about 9pm.
Before cleaning up from dinner, I put together my next days meals – Healthy Mummy Smoothie ingredients in a small container ready to mix in the morning, snacks portioned and ready to go (if I have time I actually try and portion out snacks on a Sunday during my cook up) and lunch. It really doesn’t take too long to do it at night – trust me! I used to say I had no time, but really its 10mins max and much easier to do it by myself at night than in the morning trying to get myself and Mr 2.5 ready for childcare/work. In the morning I grab it out of the fridge and put in a cooler bag ready to take to work and wizz my smoothie in the blender ready to drink on my way to work.
Being a working mum definitely has its challenges (don’t we all!), but I find the better prepared I am the less stressed I am and therefore more likely to stick with my meal plan and keep on track J So far I am 26kg and 103cm down from my bust, hips, waist and thighs and working towards getting to my goal weight of 80kg (or 30kg lost).
Cheers
Lauren xx
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