I’ve mentioned before {at least once or twice} about how hectic our life can get sometimes. We have two kids in school plus we both work full time jobs with hour+ commutes each way. Yep, hectic should really be our last name.  Most of the time, I feel like this

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Despite how busy we seem to get, one thing I try to do regularly is have dinner at home. Sure, we go out from time to time but I think it is important to teach our children good eating habits and, also, use dinner time as family time.

Each week starts with a menu plan. 

Then, most weeks, that menu gets changed because of unexpected appointments, working late or some other schedule change.

For those nights, I try to keep some quick cooking meals for the kids on hand. I want to be able to feed them a good dinner and know they are getting the nutrition they need too. Having these meals around also helps when one {or both} of my littles decides they don’t want to eat what I’ve fixed for dinner!

A lot of times, I’ll take H with me to the store so she can pick out our “emergency” meals for the week.

There is a Harris Teeter right in our neighborhood so it is where go most often. For my major shopping trips, I use their online shopping feature and just drive up to pick it up…hectic remember?! We do still make it into the store at least once per week though.

Our first stop in the store is always fruit. We buy fruit on every.single.trip. {not that I am complaining!}

H really likes the samples that are always available in the fruit section.

On a recent trip, I noticed a new option in the frozen food section: Kidfresh Frozen Meals (#KFHealthyKids). As a mom of picky eaters, I have been known to try and sneak vegetables into their food. Kidfresh has the exact same idea and includes vegetables in every meal.

You can see more of our shopping trip in my Google+ album.

I grabbed my phone and found a coupon from the Kidfresh Facebook page which saved me a dollar off of the meal {shopping tip: always check the facebook page of a new product because there might be coupons available!}.  You can get a coupon of your own by clicking here.

There are a lot of options too that H seemed excited about.

We picked up a few and headed for check out.

Little did I know that we’d be using one of our “emergency meals” the very next night thanks to an awful traffic mess putting me home much later than planned. I let H choose her meal from the freezer.

The directions are really simple so, with help, she cooked it in the microwave.

Once it was done, I helped her stir it and put it on the plate.

She really enjoyed the macaroni and cheese.

In fact, she ate the entire bowl!

I was happy that we got a meal at home that I knew offered more health benefits than if we had grabbed fast food on the way home from school.

Hooray for hidden veggies and hectic weeknight meal solutions!

Do you want to learn more about the healthy options for dinnertime that Kidfresh has to offer?  Visit the Kidfresh website, connect with Kidfresh on Twitter or visit the Kidfresh Facebook page.