Tuesday, January 22, 2013

More prep, less stress


A lot has changed since I last blogged here. This past fall I made the shift from freelance-at-home-writing to full-time-in-an-office writing.
 
Sadly, this change did not exempt me from making school lunches.

Boo.

I did, however, have to make some modifications to my routine.

When I worked from home, I would typically crawl out of bed at 7:30 am, rush around making lunches for the kids before racing down to the school, unshowered, barely getting them there before the late bell rang.

Now that I have to get to work on time, I rise at 6:30 am, rush around making lunches for the kids and race to work, barely making it there before the mandatory morning production meeting.

But now I am SHOWERED. See? It’s totally different.

Actually, there is another big difference: I do most of the prep work at night. I get the kids to set out the lunch bags and choose one or two things that they know they want in their lunches.  Then we pack anything that doesn’t need to be refrigerated. If fruit needs to be cut up and washed, we do that at night, too. Except for apples because they will turn brown and nobody will eat them. Thanks, oxidation. Thanks a lot.

I also gather up the reusable containers we will need for the next morning. Because being unable to locate the lids that match the containers? Kind of makes me rage-y in the a.m. And the p.m. (Seriously: Where do they go?!)

All of this organization means that the only thing that’s left to do in the morning is make a couple of sandwiches or heat up some soup for the thermoses, a role that my husband typically fills now. Which is completely awesome. Because skipping the morning shower is no longer an option.

*******


What was for lunch today?

-         Chicken noodle soup

-         Crackers and cheese

-         Apple sauce

-         Sliced pears

-         Pudding

6 comments:

  1. In theory one _could_ toss the apple slices in water w/ a little lemon juice to prevent the browning, but who wants to add that to the to-do list?

    Your current routine sounds a lot like mine. I can't go to bed at night without know exactly what's going in the lunch box. All the dry goods are already packed and the thermos is sitting out if I know it will be needed. I will not be able to sleep unless this is done, so thick I am in the morning.

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  2. I always have to pack the lunches the night before, such a disorganized ragebeast am I in the morning.

    I read somewhere once that if you reassemble the apple slices after you've cored them, and then wrap an elastic band around them, that the flesh won't turn brown because it's not exposed to the air. I tried it. It's damn near impossible to get the slices to stay secured by the band. And then, of course, you need to be able to find a rubber band at all. Piffle, I say.

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  3. I only recently started packing the night before and it is working really well for me and my DH (as he makes the lunches in the morning).

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  4. Oooh, finding the lids to the matching containers! I have to do it the night before. MUST HAVE LIDS MATCHED OR I WILL LOSE IT.

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  6. In September, we bought a giant bin filled with many sizes of lidded small bins. They have the giant bin as their home and yet THE GIANT BIN IS NOW EMPTY WHERE DID THEY ALL GO?

    The ONLY thing I do beforehand is to get Bill to slice up a ton of raw vegetables on Sunday night. That's as much forethought as I do, sadly. Mornings are horrible.

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