Are you in a meal rut? Do you need inspiration to plan your monthly meals? Planning ahead for your weekly meals can remove so much stress and anxiety from your life. As moms, we already have so much going on in our heads. Not having to think about what to cook every morning is a must. Meal planning is something I started doing years ago.
I am not a go-with-the-flow kinda girl! I’m a total control freak! I need to know exactly what is going to happen and when. If I don’t, my anxiety goes through the roof! My husband, on the other hand, is the total opposite. Over the years I’ve had to adjust to his spur-of-the-moment ways. It hasn’t been easy, and I still find it quite difficult sometimes. But with 4 kids now, I had no choice but to learn how to bend and adapt.
But, don’t get me wrong, I still try and find as many things as I can to control and maintain order lol! Meal planning is one of those things. Personally, waking up every morning trying to figure out what to cook for lunch and dinner causes me an immense amount of stress. I’ve found, that the weeks that I don’t do my meal planning, I’m really edgy. Even though, with my carefree husband, the meals sometimes don’t go as planned, at least knowing what to make is fantastic.
I don’t plan anything for weekends because we’ll usually have friends or family over, or go out. But from Monday to Friday, I’m meal planning! Sometimes I get in such a food rut and feel like I’m always making the same thing. I’ve found that making a list of all the meals you can possibly think of, and separating them by main ingredient and meal type…ex: lunch or dinner, chicken, pork, beef, pasta, seafood…can be a great tool when filling up your meal planner. You can then easily select different food groups for the week. If you’re able to do it for the whole month at once, even better!
Meal planning also comes in handy when it’s time to go to the grocery store. Knowing what you’ll need for the week will prevent useless trips back when you’ve forgotten something. Or on the other hand, you can meal plan around items that are on sale that week. Either way, as a mom, I find meal planning a necessity.
I’ve created a printable 4 week meal plan for lunch and dinner that you can draw inspiration from. Along with a template that you can fill out for yourself with your family’s favorite meals. You’ll also find a grocery list template to jot down all the ingredients needed.
Here’s a month’s worth of meal ideas, along with a PDF template you can print out and plan out your own meals
I hope you find these templates useful and that they help you create smoother weeks with less stress! Thanks for stopping by!
Elisa
