Meal Plan: February 2013

Finally, back into the swing of things with monthly meal planning and prep.

*huge sigh of relief*

The holidays threw our family for a loop and it has been helter-skelter trying to get back into a routine. I have been absolutely lost without a meal plan to go off of. 

On a positive note, hubby now understands WHY I started doing meal planning in the first place! What a mess at 5:30 pm trying to figure out what to make with random ingredients in our house while acting out children have us bouncing off red line. 

Eesh! No more, no how, no thank you!

So, in all of it's grand splendor, I present to you our February 2013 (dinner) meal plan!

I (also) plan on getting some of these recipes loaded up in the next few weeks so that will make my wonderful plan more applicable to my readers. Things to come, things to come... (adding to I-really-need-to-do list)

Meal Plan: November 2012

Goal #1 Completed: Dinner menu created for the month of November.

Goal #2 Half Completed: First two weeks of November shopping done in one day with a trip to Costco and one to Safeway.

This time I was sneaky about creating the menu and got hubby to help choose some meals for the month. I waited until he was comfortably posted up in bed with his laptop and then brought in every single cookbook and recipe card I own. Plopped them right down in the middle of the bed and told him if he didn't want fish and vegetarian meals all month he better go through and pick out some man-meals. And it worked! Two hours of time after the kids went to bed on Halloween and I had not only a month of meals decided on but I also had a shopping list created for the first two weeks of November! Woohoo victory lap for me!

In my overly-proud excitement I, of course, had to text my sister the awesome news. She then proceeded to advise me that I now needed to organize her life since I had mine under control. Ha! When does one ever have life under control? Being the awesome little sister that I am, I took photos of my menu and shopping list and sent them to her. See, I finally learned how to share. Only took a quarter of a century, no big deal...

I also learned how to share documents on Blogger. You too can see and print the awesomeness that is my November Menu! (Mini preview below)

While hubby may laugh at me and my ecstatic mood, I am uber proud of myself for completing the meal plan for the month and having a set grocery list before going to the store. Baby A and I dropped Miss K off to school and proceeded to spend two (just two!) hours getting everything we needed for the next two weeks! Oh, and I also remembered to eat before we went grocery shopping so I didn't feel the need to bring the whole store home.

Mom, What's For Dinner??

Somedays I swear Miss K just lives for asking what we're having for dinner; it must be that extra line on my nametag, On-Demand Personal Chef. And, as per usual kid-style, she always tends to ask at most impeccably inopportune moments. Like when I'm elbow deep in an explosive poop-diaper.

While I'm pretty sure I am not the only mom who just dreads this question, I don't remember it being a topic addressed in the Parenting 101 handbook. I seemed to have skipped the Mad-Dash Through Cupboards And Fridge to Haphazardly Throw Something Together section. Maybe I fell asleep before I got there?

To that end, I knew I had to come up with something that would make our evenings run smoother. Especially the evening were Daddy has school late and it's just me and the girls. I've heard mention in passing Meal Planning and took some time to look into what it entails.

Meal Planning is just what is sounds like (go figure, right?): planning meals. Ahead of time. See, that whole "ahead of time" part is the lifesaver. You'd think I would have figured that out before! You choose what period of time you want to create a menu for and then create a shopping list to go with your menu. Pre-planning ensures the ingredients are actually on hand when you need them. Such a novel and simple concept!

For the last two weeks, I created a weekly menu and each Sunday night I made sure the ingredients necessary were either in the cupboards or on Monday's shopping list. While it took extra time out of my omg-the-weekend-is-over veg session, sitting down and creating menus and shopping lists wasn't as dangerous to my mental health as I thought it might be. Score!

And voila, success! My life between 4pm and 6pm changed from a nightmare  of cranky, hungry children and adults to almost blissful dinners. I knew what was needed for dinner, when to start preparations, what to make and I could plan accordingly. Such a small change made a huge impact on our nights. And, not surprisingly, on our budget as well.

Now that I've made it through the first two weeks, I can do anything! Goals for November: Meal plan the whole month in one shot. Make two trips to the stores all month!

*Fingers crossed*