I resisted this for a long time, but it’s been a game changer for us. I made a Google sheet for meal planning. I came up with 5 categories that make sense for our typical weeks, 8 meals for each category. Then I mixed and matched the meals into 8 weekly meal plans of 5 meals per week. I’m only in my first “cycle”, but when it’s time to make my grocery order, I just pull up the plan for whatever week we are on, and order the groceries. I look at our calendar to figure out which category fits on which night that week, based on what we have going on, and cook accordingly. Once we go through the 8 weeks, we’ll just start over at week 1.
There is only so much time for so many things. Set your priorities and go from there. Try not to compare yourself to others. (I say this because I struggle with this. I see pictures of other people's neat and beautifully decorated homes, and mine often has clutter in various places. It's something that I want to work on, but it's low on my priority list at this time in my life.)
midwestmama , I still need to work on the comparison stuff. Even if I don't actively compare, I will still get pangs of why do they get X and I don't have X. Well I have ABC but not X. I need to reign it in. And I am not even really a jealous person, it just pops up occasionally.
I feel like I need a pat response to myself to say hey get it together but also if you want X, you can totally go for X just do it, but don't complain if you aren't actively doing it. I'm talking to myself in that previous sentence.
The most helpful thing I have ever done is stopped meal planning and enforcing meal times.
Our house rule is “eat when you’re hungry, stop when you’re full.”
Life changing!!! My kids are getting more independent in the kitchen (they’re 9 and 12) and they’re eating really well.
I still do a lot of food prep over the weekend so that we have a lot of “grab and go” foods in the fridge. But I’m not cooking a big dinner every night anymore and it’s been amazing!!
I keep a nice backstock of household items. Whenever I am grabbing the last of something, I buy 2 more.
I throw a load of laundry in every morning. I find it easter to do 1 load every day than spend a whole weekend doing laundry.
I run the dishwasher every night as long as it’s it least mostly full. It prevents dishes from piling up.
We practice the OHIO rule. We only handle it once. So if you’re taking a plate to the kitchen, it goes right in the dishwasher. Once you pick it up, you take it right to its final destination. Otherwise you spend more time doing one task.
I run the dishwasher every night as long as it’s it least mostly full. It prevents dishes from piling up.
Oh, yes! This school year, I started running ours every night. Sometimes it's not that full, but if I wait until the next night, I have to play tetris to get everything in. Why do that to myself? So, I am able to put more things we used to hand wash in there each night, the kids' lunch containers get cleaned sooner, etc... It's a game changer for me, and I'm mostly over the guilt (why do I feel guilty about this? Who knows?!)
I use subscribe and save for a lot of personal items like bar soap, body wash, toothpaste, vitamins, etc. I could shop around, or I can just have them show up when we need them.
I don't make fancy meals. Jarred sauce is fine and steam veggies from a bag. (GASP) Sometimes we have soup and grilled cheese.
I started doubling meals, one for dinner, one for the freezer.
I run the dishwasher every night as long as it’s it least mostly full. It prevents dishes from piling up.
Oh, yes! This school year, I started running ours every night. Sometimes it's not that full, but if I wait until the next night, I have to play tetris to get everything in. Why do that to myself? So, I am able to put more things we used to hand wash in there each night, the kids' lunch containers get cleaned sooner, etc... It's a game changer for me, and I'm mostly over the guilt (why do I feel guilty about this? Who knows?!)
We run it every night also — and the kids are responsible for emptying it in the AM before school.
sunday is meal prep day. I make ahead all of the school lunches (except the sandwiches) so then I just have to make a sandwich each day. I make it the night before while I am prepping dinner. I also make all of my breakfasts and lunches so they are ready to go.
While doing Sunday meal prep I make a full box of kodiak cakes. I freeze them so if S wants one for breakfast, I can throw it in the miocrowave for 30 seconds and it is ready.
I plan quick and easy weekday meals.
My gym bag is packed and ready to go by the door by the time I go to bed each night. My clothes are all laid out as well.
Limit S to one extra curricular activity at a time.
I resisted this for a long time, but it’s been a game changer for us. I made a Google sheet for meal planning. I came up with 5 categories that make sense for our typical weeks, 8 meals for each category. Then I mixed and matched the meals into 8 weekly meal plans of 5 meals per week. I’m only in my first “cycle”, but when it’s time to make my grocery order, I just pull up the plan for whatever week we are on, and order the groceries. I look at our calendar to figure out which category fits on which night that week, based on what we have going on, and cook accordingly. Once we go through the 8 weeks, we’ll just start over at week 1.
I resisted this for a long time, but it’s been a game changer for us. I made a Google sheet for meal planning. I came up with 5 categories that make sense for our typical weeks, 8 meals for each category. Then I mixed and matched the meals into 8 weekly meal plans of 5 meals per week. I’m only in my first “cycle”, but when it’s time to make my grocery order, I just pull up the plan for whatever week we are on, and order the groceries. I look at our calendar to figure out which category fits on which night that week, based on what we have going on, and cook accordingly. Once we go through the 8 weeks, we’ll just start over at week 1.
Any chance you could/want to share that?
Happy to share! The only thing is, I don't have recipes linked or anything like that. I just have the names of them, and then I know where to find them (some are in cookbooks, some are on websites, some are saved on my phone, etc...).
The sheet itself is nothing special, I just have a sheet with the following tabs:
1). My 5 meal formula: this is just where I came up with my 5 categories. I intentionally kept these pretty simple, as that's just where I am right now. I'm a good cook, I even like to cook, I just don't always have time or want to spend what time I do have cooking after work. The 5 categories I came up with were: Sunday dinner/lunch generator, grilled protein + side, bagged meal, easy recipe, salad + protein.
2). The summary schedule: I put the meal category down the side, and weeks 1-8 across the top. I copied and pasted the plan from each weekly tab, so I could have it all centralized to look at.
3-7). One tab for each category, then I came up with 8 recipe ideas for that category.
3). Sunday dinners/lunch generator: I try to make something on Sundays that has a lot of leftovers so that my H and I can get at least a few lunches out of it. I do a lot of one pot pastas with protein added, shredded chicken for tacos/bowls/whatever, casseroles, etc... We both try to eat relatively "healthy" and with balanced macros, so I try to use meals that meet our criteria.
4). Grilled protein plus side: I either buy pre-marinated meat (Trader Joe's is great for this), or marinate it myself and then freeze it. And I buy frozen sides, usually.
5). Bagged meal: I rely heavily on Trader Joe's for this, too, and add protein. I also like the Birds Eye Voila meals well enough (can add protein to these, too).
6). Easy recipe: I have some recipes that only take 15-20 mins to prepare, these are perfect for this category, and get assigned on nights when I have a little bit of time, but still very manageable.
7). Salad + protein: I either make a Skinny Taste salad recipe that we like, or I just do a bagged salad + rotisserie chicken from the grocery store.
8-16). Weekly tabs, 1-8. I put Meal 1-5 across the top of each tab, and laid out which meals fit into which week. I picked one meal from each category for each week from my category tabs, and I tried to spread out different types of meat, "genres" of food, etc... across the week, so we don't eat chicken 5 times in one week (although that might be a bad example bc we eat a lot of chicken). I put the ingredients for each meal under the recipe title so that I can look in one spot for grocery ordering.
If you want specific recipe ideas for each category, let me know and I'll link the ones that are online!
This sounds ridiculous but I had a few inches cut off my hair and it now takes slightly less time to dry. It’s in the getting ready where I often feel a time crunch, so while the difference is small, it’s noticeable.
Post by whattheheck on Nov 24, 2022 9:23:50 GMT -5
As soon as we are finished eating dinner and start to load the dishwasher I turn it on and set the delay. I don't have to remember to turn it on and I don't worry that I am going to find one more cup after it starts. I love the delay functions/