Parenting Hacks

Check out these parenting hacks that can help when you really just need your life to be a little bit easier in the moment. Parenting can be draining and difficult at times, but sometimes we find tricks that make things bearable or even help get us to the point of thriving. Check out a few ideas below:

Kitchen Hacks

Act like dinosaurs when eating leafy greens. Roar with your kids and make eating veggies fun!
Make fruit pizza or other fun snacks that encourage eating more veggies/fruit.
Reuse the Kraft parmesan cheese shaker for salt. It’s much easier to measure from this container
Put together baking kits with pre-measured ingredients. You can have chocolate chip cookies, brownies, etc. half prepared when you want them.
Or you can always freeze cookie dough. Shape it into balls and freeze them together in a bag. Each time you want a cookie, pull out the dough, thaw and bake.
When making dinner casseroles or other freezable meals, make enough for two meals (whether that’s a regular 9×13 size for a small family, or doubled) and put them into the 5×7 or 6×8 Pyrex pans and pop one into the freezer, and one is dinner tonight. (write cooking instructions on the wrap)
Use baking bags or crockpot liners to line the casserole pan. Once it’s frozen you can pop it out of the pan and into a zip lock bag or foil. When you’re ready to cook or reheat, simply pop it back into the casserole pan and bake. You can use one or both layers for the oven or remove the foil for the microwave. This way your casserole pan is not stuck in the freezer and clean up is a breeze.

Chore Hacks

Charge your kids $1 if you end up nagging them to do their jobs. It will make you more cheerful to get paid if you do end up picking up the slack..
Have your kids “earn” what they wanted by helping around the house. Why should mom be a drudge? Everyone should help.

Life Hacks

Mark off when kids take prescriptions right on the bottle so that you don’t forget. Keep a sharpie next to the bottle at all times. Or even tie it to a string attached to the bottle.
Rubber band around the hand soap pump so it dispenses the right amount and your kids aren’t wasting excess soap
Put tape on the wall below the toilet paper marking out how long a strip is needed.

What are your favorite parenting hacks? What little tricks help you to stay calm and be a better parent?