It’s one of THE hardest things for me to stick with. It’s not fun or exciting and you can’t really SEE any progress. The only reason I do it is for my sanity and budget!
There’s gotta be over 2 million pins about meal planning so if my way doesn’t work for ya, don’t give up! Try another way, alter one or many until it works for your family.
I *try* to plan 2 weeks out because that’s the pay day schedule hubby was on. Sometimes it’s 1 week and others are 3 if I am feeling it!
I use my planner to check how ridiculous our schedule is, and honestly every week is pretty ridiculous. Some days are just too busy to have anything besides a slow cook meal that requires nothing to be done the 2 hours before we need to eat. Sometimes we are all eating at different times and it needs to be something that will stay warm for hours.
I feel like meal planning can be so hard because there are too many options! So to eleviate that, I try to stick to a RYTHM more than a schedule. We don’t eat the exact same thing every week but we have a theme kind of, for each day.
Monday we have something with chicken because there are SO many fast, inexpensive options and Monday needs to be easy.
Tuesday we typically have tacos or some kind, or nachos, enchiladas etc.
Wednesday we do something pasta based because it’s easy and I feel like Wednesday is my most likely day to bail and get take out!
Thursday is a toss up! Sometimes it’s soup and sandwiches or soup and salad or loaded potatoes with leftovers. Baked potatoes are affordable, quick and easy in the instant pot and the perfect boat to carry leftovers into something new.
Friday is almost always Pizza. In the summer months we have been cooking them on the pellet grill, that’s my favorite! I’m going to try and remember to make our own dough like my friend Brettan does! Girl makes it every Friday and it seems pretty simple!
Weekends we do more elaborate meals, stuff that needs more attention. Trying new recipes, hopefully getting these big kids to make dinner start to finish too. We tend to eat together more on the weekends, instead of in spurts while running out the door.
I have started keeping my meal plans from previous weeks because there will be a time, soon, when I don’t have the energy or willingness to do it!
I also have a page in my planner, broken down by category, of most of the meals we eat. I use that when nothing sounds good or I need to fill in gaps.
But my biggest tip is JUST DO IT!
I hate myself on days it’s 4 and I have to walk out the door at 5:15 and there was nothing done to make feeding these people easier.
How do you meal plan? Use the grocery flyer? Do once a month cooking and call it good? Everyone fend for themselves?
