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I love keeping myself organized in all parts of my life. Some areas I’m very successful at it and other areas I’m a total flop. Menu planning is one area that is a constant struggle. I love to cook and write about food, but normal day to day stuff gets in the way and I forget to make supper and sometimes just getting to the store is a challenge. I’ve searched all over, looked on pinterest, and talked to friends about how they handle menu planning. I tried a few methods, but nothing really seemed great, so I figured I should come up with my own monthly and weekly menu planners. These are exactly what I need and are so useful! Since I was struggling, I thought I would share this struggle and also my new free printables with you.
I love that this is a great way to plan your dinner recipes, stick to a diet plan, plan for healthy recipes, and more. I actually use both of these printables {I know, I’m a total organizing nerd}. I use the monthly planner to make sure we aren’t duplicating meals and to plan for holidays. They both have have built in shopping lists. Make sure to plan in a leftover night at least every other week. You will love having a night off!
I’ve planned that we will eat out once a week on Saturday night after church (we usually do anyway, so it was nice to just schedule it in). I planned easy leftover nights for the craziest days of the month, which happen to be Girl Scout nights. For the first few months, I sat down with my calendar and thought about why we eat out too much and planned those nights to be the easy nights whether it be leftover night or a slow cooker meal or a freezer meal. I wasn’t planning for life! And life got in the way too many times.
I hope these printables are helpful for you…let me know what you think! If you want menu planning help with suggestions and more detailed ideas, then check out my Home Organizational Manager series. It’s published the first of every month and I share suggestions for meals, holidays, and more.
{Download your favorite planner now…either the monthly menu planner or the weekly menu template. Or grab both!}
And if you are looking for more ways to cook healthy while staying on a budget, check out my post: Cooking Healthy on a Budget and menu planning on a budget for a lot more ideas.
This is great!
Thank you so much. This will be very handy.
Great idea to stay organize and evade the question from others of “What’s for dinner?”
This is great! It will be super helpful for when I return to work next month!!
Come follow along with me too at http://mitchalycia.blogspot.ca 🙂