meal plan

Call me neurotic.  Call me a planner.  Call me a spaz.  But I like to think that I am very productive when I have a weekly meal plan for us.  This little thing came to life when I was sick of eating whatever we had on hand (i.e. steamed broccoli and scrambled eggs don't go great together and they get old after awhile), tired of making multiple trips to the grocery store throughout the week and not wanting to make healthy recipes that take an hour before you can even tell what the end product will be. 

Introduce: the meal plan.

I know this is nothing mind blowing nor is it anything new, people have been doing this forever.  But it's new to me.  So, I drew up a google document (spreadsheet) and now (attempt to) plan out each week of meals. I usually do this on Saturday or Sunday so that I can go to the grocery store and make sure I have everything I need for the coming week.  It's cost effective.  The meals I choose are quick and easy to make.  I feel like I have a grasp on what's going into our bodies every night.  And we have a healthy meal each night of the week.  Win-win-win. 

So I'm here to tell you that if you're tired of getting home after a long day of work, don't know what to cook, want something healthy and you're almost ready to admit defeat...you should totally do a meal plan.  You'll feel like you have some control over meal time, you're using your money in an effective way and you're giving your body (and your family's bodies) the respect they deserve by providing healthy meals.

Here are some of my favorite sites to discover meal ideas each week:
1. Plain Chicken
2. Cooking Light
3. Skinny Taste
4. Allrecipes
5. Rachael Ray Magazine
6. Pinterest  
7. How Sweet It Is

Also, when I type the name of a dish I'm making in Google documents I add the link to the recipe so I'm able to access the recipe and not spend another 10 minutes hunting it down in my browser history.