Freezer Baking Day

I wrestled with a bit of disappointment that I wasn't able to participate in real time with my favored bloggers - FishMama and MoneySavingMom - as they took the blogging world by storm and loaded up their respective freezers with lots of yummy food. The flu does place one in survival mode, after all.

But in the days since, I've been stashing things in my freezer a bit at a time. Perhaps it's a bit better I'm doing my cooking a little at a time anyways, seeing how I waddle around like a duck these days and my belly is sagging a bit low.

But then there was Monday.

After a six-hour stint of six-minute spaced contractions on Sunday (whoa, that's a lot of "S's"), an urgency to tackle my pre-baby to-do list swept over me. Since Baby Roo decided November 16th was not her idea of a good birth day, I marched into the kitchen and stormed my pantry.

Morenna was a real comrade-in-arms and occupied herself with dirtying up the kitchen... something normally off-limits but when you have a crazed mom on your hands, you can get away with anything.

Here's what she accomplished:

- Rolling leftover dough around in a fluffy pile of flour;
- Putting said flour all over her face, her clothes, her step-stool, and the floor;
- Dropping said leftover dough in my bowl of banana muffin batter, and then fishing it back out;
- Emptying my 5 lb bag of red potatoes on the kitchen floor;
- Transporting each of the said potatoes to the living room couch while counting them: "One... two... three... six...";
- Being generally good-natured and cute.

Here's what I accomplished:

- Made 5 lbs of freezer mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving dinner;
- Made 2 dozen pumpkin rolls for Thanksgiving dinner (I made these for Christmas last year and we loved them - so tasty!);
- Prepared a double recipe of Chicken-Asparagus Casserole (one for dinner and one for freezing);
- Chopped and bagged 5 lbs of asparagus for winter eating (got them at a terrific price!) not pictured;
- Individually froze and then packaged 2 lbs of bacon, not pictured;
- Prepared two stir-fry packets (one for dinner this week and one for freezing);
- Chopped 1 pineapple;
- Made 2 dozen banana crumb muffins

Whew. Was I ever pooped at the end of the day. And of course that would be the day my child refused a nap, which happens about once every 3 months. But although tired, I felt so good knowing the food in my fridge would not be going bad and that my post-baby food tally was growing.

To the casserole and the stir-fry packets I've also added: a chicken pot pie, 2 broccoli-cheese quiches, pizza dough, and three bags of spaghetti sauce. Those things, combined with the two Birdseye Steamfresh Meals for Two that I got cheaply at a good sale last week, brings my frozen meal allotment to a grand total of: 11.

But lest I tempt you to envy me... here's what was on my other counter:

Hmm, now if I could have just arranged labor to kick in before I had to address the dishes...