Weekly Planner

I like being organized. I do so much better in life when I am following a plan. Sometimes this is a weakness. Most of the time, it makes things easier.

On Thursdays, I make my weekly planner. This might seem like a weird day to "start" a week, but it works for us. Often times, we don't know what the weekend holds for us until Thursday (or Friday, yikes!) anyways. Plus, the grocery ads come out on Wednesday, so this means I've had enough time to digest the deals and go through my process.

So here's the process:

First, you have to understand how we buy food in our house. We have this great canned goods storage rack that allows us to have multiples of everything in a very organized and easy to access location. We also try to keep (2) of all of our pantry staples on hand (ie: crackers, cereal, pastas, etc.) so we don't really run out.

We only buy meat on sale - then we vacuum seal it, date it and put it in our freezer. Each week, we only buy fresh produce items that are on sale as well. This forces variety and saves you money at the same time!

When I sit down to make my meal plan for the week, I start with a list of the meat in the freezer (with the oldest dates first). Then I pull up the latest grocery ads and write down the produce available. And thus, a menu is born.

I don't spend a ton of time on the menu. I don't choose specific recipes at this point, unless I know of one I've been wanting to try off the top of my head. There are two goals to this "menu" - 1. so I know what meat to defrost in the fridge the night before and 2. so I know that our produce won't end up in the compost (I hate wasting food like that!)

Some form of this weekly planner has lived on my fridge for over a year now. It's taken me a while to figure out what method works the best for me. The chores don't change a lot, unless we have a really busy week or are going out of town, etc. You can download a blank PDF or a Word template for free.

I love grocery shopping and having a tidy home, and I love feeling like I have a plan. If anything, this weekly planning exercise has taught me how to be flexible over anything else. Life gets hectic sometimes, and the most important thing in my life right now is who I spend it with. Sometimes that means dinner plans change, the floors don't get swept, and my nightly menu gets pushed to the back burner.

And that's ok.