menu planning Archives | Heavenly Homemakers

Big Family Food and Fun: June 11-17, 2023

June 19, 2023 by Laura 3 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Only 1.5 weeks until our big move. Here’s a look at what we ate this week as we clean out freezers and pantries and try to survive!

Food We’re Working With

I’ve put in a couple of Walmart pickup orders for fruits and veggies (we are going through fruit like crazy!). Otherwise, we are working our way through our freezers and pantry in an effort to use up food before we move. You can compare these pictures to last week’s shelves to see how we’re doing. This shelf doesn’t look like it’s emptying out much, but we used quite a bit from our stores this week.

You can tell a big difference in our freezers compared to last week!

I don’t have time to bake that turkey, so he’s likely going to make the move to Lincoln with us. ;)

And now on to the meals we ate last week!

Our Big Family Food and Fun

I had a Breakfast Casserole in the freezer, which was GREAT to have on Sunday for lunch. I slid it into the oven frozen, turned on the oven to 225, and let it bake while we were at church. It was done the minute we walked in the door and we ate it with fruit. SO EASY. I highly recommend putting some of these in your freezer!

Kelsey (Justus’ wife) had come to help us over the weekend and brought frozen Sloppy Joe meat with her. I warmed it for our Sunday evening meal and served it with green beans and watermelon. What would I do without my wonderful daughters-in-law? :)

Monday I had to take BabyBoy#11 in for a medical procedure, so I appreciated having lots of ready-made foods to pull out and serve for breakfast. I set out last week’s Mudballs and Pumpkin Muffins then warmed up leftover Breakfast Casserole to go with those. (Our air fryer warms food up so nicely!) Everyone ate well as Baby and I headed out.

Our fella was a trooper through his morning. I was glad he fell asleep on our way home to take a well-deserved nap! :)

Knowing I’d be gone all morning, I had mixed up Chicken Salad and put it in the fridge before I left. We made quick sandwiches when I got home and ate them with carrots, tomatoes, and watermelon.

For the record, chicken salad sandwiches taste better when cut into triangles. :) Also, this little girl LOVES peanut butter on her carrots. If you struggle to get your kids to eat carrots with other dips, try peanut butter. It works for Kiya!

After lunch, we played outside before naptime. Anna chose her own outfit today: shorts and a swim cover-up. Oh, and moccasins. :)

All three little girls crawled into the wagon, so I took them for a short ride. Then it was naptime – one of my favorite parts of the day after a long morning!

For dinner that night I baked a Meatloaf that I’d made a few weeks ago and frozen. Brayden and Kiya scrubbed potatoes so I could make these amazing Mashed Potatoes, plus I stir-fried some veggies and warmed up leftover corn and beans. Justus and Kelsey came from Lincoln for a church event so they joined us for dinner.

For breakfast on Tuesday I made scrambled egg sandwiches and served them with canned peaches.

I cooked three pounds of hamburger one night, seasoned it like this, then we put together tostadas with some shells someone had given us. I made this Cream Cheese Salsa Dip as a topping option.

This week at the YU campus is a camp called Soul Quest. Malachi is there as a camper for his final year with this amazing group of friends. (Malachi is second from the right.)

On the Wednesday of Soul Quest, they send out their hundreds of campers and staff out into our community for service projects. OUR FAMILY was blessed to receive one of these groups this year! They sent 26 high schoolers and adults over and we handed them all paint brushes!

It was a great, but full, morning. Thankfully, earlier I’d put lunch in the crock pot so it was ready to serve our family as soon as the crew left. This casserole doesn’t look pretty, but it truly was tasty! What do I call it? I have no idea. “Clean out the Fridge Casserole?” Yes, that’s it. I used last night’s taco meat stirred into frozen hashbrowns with the leftover Cream Cheese Salsa Dip, shredded cheese, sour cream, and salt. I cooked it on low all morning and it was delicious with steamed green beans on the side.

I left that afternoon to work for several hours while sitters came to stay with our kids (and Matt kept painting the house). Elias picked up pizza on his way home, using the gift cash we decided to enjoy for our Wednesday pizza night until after we’ve settled into our new home.

We sent the kids outside to eat their pizza because the sitters also did some cleaning while they were here. We always hope to keep the floor clean for at least five minutes after our sitters have worked so hard. :)

I went all out the next morning by getting out cereal and oatmeal packets for breakfast. ;)

In an effort to clean out our freezers, I pulled out this super discounted pork roasts I’d gotten marked down for $1.49/pound.

I put them in my large electric roaster, seasoned them, and poured barbecue sauce over the top. Then I slow cooked them all day to shred and freeze in meal-sized portions.

All day these pork roasts smelled AMAZING!! That evening, I shredded all the meat and scooped up some for us to eat for dinner before bagging up the rest for the fridge and freezer. This made five meal-sized portions for us.

I had two pounds of strawberries so I sliced them and made this Cheesecake Parfait to eat with them.

For lunch on Thursday I made grilled cheese and tomato soup – a funny meal on a 90 degree day but a great way to use up soup from the pantry!

Elias was home on his lunch break from work so he grabbed some grilled cheese to take back to work with him, plus chips and guac.

Friday we had a family of eight coming to help us get our house ready to sell. So in preparation, I had thawed two of these big packages of chicken legs. (Remember how I got these for around $0.75/pound?!?!) What a great way to feed 17 people!

I dumped on some sauce and put these in the fridge to marinate all day while we worked.

Meanwhile, Eva (Asa’s wife) came to help us all morning and early afternoon. We took all the littles to the library for the morning so Matt could paint. For lunch we invited our friend Tori to join us and headed to the backyard. We had a lot of sticks we wanted to burn up in our firepit so we thawed the hotdogs we had left in our freezer for the kids to enjoy. We grown-ups enjoyed the pork roast I had cooked the day before.

Our other friends arrived after lunch and they were a powerhouse, working so hard on our house with us all afternoon. I got the chicken on the smoker and we pulled out some easy side dishes. It tasted so good after working in the heat all day!

We were marveling at our two tribes of kids filling up the kitchen and spilling into the living room. :) We are so thankful for our precious friendship with this family.

Matt and I are feeling pretty worn out (but also very grateful). But this might explain why I said “yes” the next morning when Keith and Anna requested butter for breakfast. Nothing else. Just butter. Here’s a slice of butter, and here’s another slice of butter…

So this is where I’m at right now. Thank goodness I do have plenty of butter in our freezer! :) :) :) I did manage to pull off some Father’s Day treats today, which I’ll share about next week. Hope your week is off to a great start!

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Tips and Tools to Make Menu Planning EASY

January 26, 2021 by Laura 1 Comment

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

It really is possible to make menu planning easy, even if it’s a task you’ve never enjoyed. Here are my best tips and recommended resources to help. :)

Tips and Tools to Make Menu Planning EASY

Let’s just dive right in, shall we? Here are some of the tips I’ve found that are really helpful for simple menu planning. After I share these, then I will present you with some really great tools. :)

When it comes to figuring out food for your family…

1. Decide to have a good attitude about menu planning.

If you’ve always hated figuring out what to feed your family every day, keeping a good attitude about it can be tough. Even if you don’t mind or even actually enjoy menu planning, the daily grind of it can sometimes get old and tiresome. But the truth is that we all need to eat every day; therefore we do need some sort of plan so that we don’t become stressed out over food.

It’s possible you hate menu planning because you don’t plan your menus. (Eh?) What I mean is, if you don’t decide on a simple meal plan before it is mealtime, you’ll find yourself trying to figure out food for your family at the point in which they are all hungry, you are too hungry to think of good ideas, and you’re trying to make plans AND make food in the middle of ALL THE HUNGER.

This is no fun. It does not work. And it gives our brains the message that meal planning is hard and awful.

Take a deep breath. Pray. Choose joy over stress and angst. Menu planning can become easier. Learn what works for you (lots of ideas below), and decide to believe the truth that YOU CAN DO THIS.

2. Recognize that there are many ways to plan – so figure out what works for you!

Some people make a menu plan for an entire month. Some for each weeknight. Some for every single meal and snack of the day. Some subscribe to a menu planning subscription. Some make a plan each morning to carry out through the day. Some write down all the specifics on meal planners. Some make plans on a marker board. Some don’t write anything down at all.

These are only some of the methods and options – which proves that there are many ways to plan and that no one way fits the needs and preferences of every person or family.

If I was a once-a-month menu planner (which I am not, but if I was), and I told you “you should do it just like I do it!!” and then you tried it and it didn’t work for you, you might decide that menu planning isn’t for you. But the truth is that while once-a-month menu planning (and all the other methods) works for some, it doesn’t work for everyone. Menu planning is definitely not a one-size-fits-all thing. Toy with ideas, use resources that are available – and there are many! – and find a method that works for you.

3. Keep it simple.

Unless you really love gourmet cooking and creating elaborate meal plans, there is no reason to make menu planning and cooking for a family more difficult than it needs to be.

Discover simple recipes that you know your family will enjoy and that will not take long to prepare. Keep them in your back pocket (literally, if it helps; see below for details!). Jot down meal choices in a notebook, in your daily planner or calendar, or on pretty printable menu planning pages to keep on your fridge.

Think about and decide on your main dish, then consider simple fruit and veggie side dishes to round out your meal with nourishment.

We’ve all gotta eat. But we do not all gotta spend hours every day to make this happen!

Now I’m going to show you some wonderful tools that can make menu planning much easier.

Tools to Make Menu Planning Easier

We’re going to look at some tools that:

Show you how to budget when grocery shopping
Provide kid-friendly menu and snack planning ideas
Give you hundreds of recipes that are both easy and healthy
Walk you through how to get started with menu planning
Offer printables and planners to make the job easier
Teach you about basic nutrition, weight loss options, and special dietary needs
Help you get organized, actually, easily :)

I have somewhere around 60 resources to tell you about, but first, take a look at one of my new favorite menu planning tools!

The Easiest Recipes, in a Flipbook!

A few weeks ago, I took the recipes from my High Five Recipes eCookbook (recipes that all call for only 5 or fewer real-food ingredients!) and I turned them into a super handy Recipe FlipBook. Man, I am loving this – and this is what I was referring to when I said, “Keep simple recipes in your back pocket!”

I formatted each recipe to fit onto a color-coded 4×6 card – then I sent them all to Walgreens to be printed. Just a few dollars later, I had all 86 recipes printed onto cards. I punched a hole through them, put a ring in the corner to hold them together, and tada! A High Five Recipes Flipbook!

This little tool is really handy (and fun!) because I can just grab it and start flipping through it for easy meal or snack ideas. Each section is color-coded to make it easier to go directly to the section I need: Breakfast Ideas, Main Dish Ideas, or Snacks and Treats Ideas.

The cards make it easy to see at a quick glance which few ingredients I’d need if I chose that recipe. Annnnnd since all of the recipes call for just 5 or fewer basic ingredients, I likely have most of the ingredients on hand and I know that the recipes will all go together quickly too!

I just added this new resource to my shop, so be sure to check it out!

And look what else!

We just added our brand new 52-Week Simple Meals Planning Packets Collection 2!

Sometimes you just need someone to make the plan and tell you what to get at the grocery store, you know? We’ve been offering our Simple Meals Subscriptions here for several years to help with this – and they are awesome and well-loved! This collection includes 52-weeks worth of these Simple Meals planning packets – categorized in Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall sections to make your job even easier. They tell you what to make, what to buy at the store, and how to make the food in the easiest ways possible.

If you prefer the entire collection of 52-weeks worth of menu plans, you can grab those here!

How to get these fun resources for FREE!

For two days only (January 26-27) they’ve brought back the Healthy Meal Planning Bundle I love so much. Many of you took advantage of this offer in August. But if you missed it, you can get it again if you hurry!

It includes 60 amazing resources to help you easily plan meals for your family. And then after you purchase, email me your receipt and I’ll send you the High Five Recipes Flipbook file (worth $15) and 52-Week Simple Meals Planning Packets Collection 2 (worth $52) for FREE!!

Get your Healthy Meal Planning Bundle here before midnight, January 27.
Email me your receipt and I’ll send you the High Five Recipes Flipbook and 52-Week Simple Meals Planning Packets Collection 2! (These are both digital so you’ll get them right away!)

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Dear Everyone Who Hates Meal Planning…

August 25, 2019 by Laura 6 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Just in case you missed this back in May, we wanted to offer an exclusive deal to bless you as we all begin a busy new school year…

1/2-price Simple Meals Subscription!!

As if getting an entire year’s worth of Simple Meals planning packets for half-off is not enough to convince you that now is the time to grab on, allow me to share more reasons you need a Simple Meals subscription.

Dear Everyone who hates menu planning (or simply doesn’t have time for it anymore),

In all my years of being a homemaker and talking to other homemakers (25 years, thanks for asking), I have learned that VERY FEW of us actually like meal planning. I’m one of the weird ones who actually enjoys it. But most of you? Disgusted. Completely annoyed. Hate every minute of it. ABSOLUTELY OVER IT.

Dear friends. This post is for you. (And maybe for those who do enjoy meal planning but still sometimes forget to thaw the chicken.)

In an effort to be fun (!!!yeah right!!!) and not at all discouraging (???sob???), I decided to do some math and point out what I believe makes most people so very frustrated about meal planning. Are you ready? You’d better sit down for this.

Not even including the thoughts we must think about what we will feed our families for breakfasts and lunches every day, if we all run a household for 50 years, and we multiply those years by the 365 days we must figure out what to put on the table for dinner each night – the total, painful number of meal planning days is (gasp, sob):

18,250

Meals. That we have to plan. In our life. Not counting breakfast.

Oh, but should we count breakfast and lunch too, just for fun? (Laura’s idea of fun is weird and not actually fun.)

54,750

Total meals. That must come out of our heads, through our hard-working hands, and onto our bountiful tables.

Now listen. I know we all realize that we are a blessed group of people and that whining about meal planning is ridiculous and petty. After all, are we not thankful for the families we get to feed and for the food we have in abundance in which to feed them?! Yes. We are. We are very, very thankful.

But we also have to remember to buy toilet paper and make it to the appointments and sign the documents and get to all the places on time. So while we are grateful for our lives, we also recognize the truth that trying to think of what food to prepare and feed our families each day is a…

VERY BIG JOB, AMEN.

There now. I have now given us all permission to feel what we feel about food. It sure tastes good, and we sure are thankful for it. But it doesn’t appear on the table without someone thinking ahead about it, buying it, preparing it, cleaning up after it, and then doing it all again for 18,250 tomorrows.

But we do it because:

We love our families.
We want our families to be healthy.
And eating isn’t something that we can’t avoid.

Other jobs that we don’t like we can just ignore, you know? (I’m looking at you – baseboards that need to be dusted.) But figuring out what to feed our families every day – we have to do it whether we like it or not.

So here is my number one, very best suggestion for you…

If you hate meal planning, do this:

Figure out what you will make for dinner each night IN THE MORNING.

Do not, I repeat, DO NOT wait until dinner time to plan dinner. At that time, you are hungry and tired. Your family is hungry and tired. The food is probably still frozen. And ain’t nobody happy.

If you are in the habit of waiting until it’s almost time to eat to figure out what you are going to eat – you are going to run into frustration almost every time. Or, you’re likely to fall back on unhealthy and expensive habits like grabbing take-out or ordering pizza. Those fun options should be reserved for our extra busy days or special occasions – not for the five days a week you failed to plan ahead, again.

And so, in the morning before work or school or before moving forward with whatever it is that keeps you busy each day – figure out what you are going to make for dinner. Then, put that thing in the crock pot, in the fridge, or on a list. Your entire day will go more smoothly, knowing that your evening meal is figured out and can be executed quickly at dinner time.

Now’s the part where I tell you something even better.

If you truly hate meal planning, or if you are too busy to think about what to make for dinner each night, why not reference the very wonderful and beautiful Simple Meals plans we make every single week and send to your inbox every single week? Please, please take advantage of this!!!

We do all the thinking and planning for you!! We offer specific yet flexible meal suggestions, we give you all the recipe links, we prepare your grocery list, and we put it right in your lap. Here, take a peek:

Download a free Simple Meals Plan here to see what it looks like!

Just think. You could have that in your hands every week, and then all of your meal planning tears will stop. ;)

This is not just me trying to sell you something. This truly is me trying to help your life become easier. Because I get it!! Meal planning can be stressful and difficult. Why should every single one of us invent the wheel (or in this case meal) every single night?

What if, instead, just one of us makes the plan, and everyone else gets to look at it and use it? Doesn’t that just make sense and sound fabulous!?!

It’s only $1.00 per week. $0.50/week all year long!

That makes this a no-brainer, because think of the time and money you’ll save figuring out every dinner of the week!

Get all the details here.

Your first entire year will cost only $0.50/week! Ready to join? Can’t wait to save your family time!

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This 1/2 price offer expires September 4. Your subscription will automatically renew in one year at full price (still inexpensive!!), and you can cancel for next year if you choose by simply emailing me!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Want an update on how my new organizational binder is (or is not) helping me?

June 1, 2016 by Laura 10 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

A few weeks ago, I started doing this radical thing called “write stuff down so I don’t forget” in a never-heard-of-before item called an “organizational binder.”

I know. I’m one of the first to do it. This type of thing has never been done before. No one has ever heard of it. Planners? Calendars? What even are these?

Sarcastic much, Laura?

You know what? You people who have been doing this list thing since you learned to write words? You just laugh all you want. I’ve always been a “write-it-down” rebel. I’ve never wanted to be tied down to any list. Lists stress me out – as if writing it down means that I’ve failed if for some reason I can’t cross it off at the end of the day. There were too many days I’d leave too many items unfinished and un-crossed off. Boo.

So instead I just kept my 40,000 item to-do list trapped in my head, swirling around, all day long. This is the main reason I’d stare blankly at my children when they’d ask about having friends over on Friday. In order to answer, the file cabinet in my brain had to pull out several drawers, and then the brain papers scattered, which means I provided several different facial expressions before I’d finally answer the can I have friends over on Friday question with put them in the pantry when you’re finished answer.

What? My kids are used to it.

But enough is enough, so finally a few weeks ago I began to get better about writing down the absolutes of my schedule. I printed all my favorite organization pages from the Homemaking Bundle and put them together in a cute binder. I didn’t want to hate my lists, so I did this instead:

If it has a day attached to it (such as Hannah’s reception, 2:00 Saturday, April 30) I write that down on the specific day. I’d already been doing some of that, because even I have understood the importance of writing those kinds of details on a calendar.
If it doesn’t have a day attached to it but is only an I hope to get this done sometime before Malachi graduates in 2023, I write it on a general list. After all, if I wrote it on Monday and didn’t accomplish it on Monday, then I’d be mad at my list and we’d be right back where we started.

You never knew I was so high maintenance did you?

How’s my new organizational binder treating me, you ask?

Splendid, I’d say. (Channeling my inner Mary Poppins there. Or was it Bert? Whatever. I’ll add look up who used the word splendid on my never ending to-do list. Oh, no, wait. I remember. It was Mr. Banks. Okay, moving on.)

As I begin each day, I write down the must-do’s and the hope-to-do’s in my binder – in separate sections. As they come to me, I jot down meal ideas on the meal planning page. As I think of recipes I want to try to invent and posts I want to write, I write them on a different list.

Now if my kids say, “Can I have friends over on Friday?” I look on the calendar and say, “Yes. We’re free.” This isn’t nearly as much fun as telling them to put their friends in the pantry, but it is more efficient.

Here’s the truth about my organizational binder that I finally recognize and why I can stop being a “write-it-down” rebel:

My planner doesn’t own me.

I own my planner.

So what if I write down an idea based on a plan I have for the day or the week, but other needs arise and I don’t get it all done? Who even cares? I only need to do what I do. Not getting all of it done isn’t a symptom of failure – it’s a reality of life.

Words on paper mean nothing (unless it’s the Bible or like a marriage certificate or something, but you know what I mean). But the simple act of writing down all the to-do’s and getting them out of my swirling head has truly been helpful. I shall continue this revolutionary idea of writing lists in planners.

Maybe you all should try it sometime. No pressure.

Are you a writer-downer? Or do you tell your kids to put their friends in the pantry?

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Get Your Real Food Menu Planning Package for $8 – Today Only!

January 14, 2015 by Laura Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Here’s your friendly reminder that today is the final day to get our Real Food Menu Planning Package for just $8!

Be inspired, be guided, and have fun!! Oh, and save loads of money too. Menu planning saves our family hundreds of dollars every year!

Real Food Menu Planning Resource Package
$8

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My Favorite Menu Planning Resources – and How I Feed All These Teenagers Without Going Broke

January 8, 2015 by Laura 6 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

As the old saying goes: Where there is no plan, there is no casserole.

I think that’s in the Bible somewhere. Or maybe I just made it up twelve seconds ago. How about this one: A frozen chicken will remain frozen if left in a frozen environment. I definitely made that one up.

All this proverbial insight to say: Menu plans are really nice. They help you save money. They help you eat healthier. You should make meal plans.

For all of you (and I know there are some) who find that meal planning hurts instead of helps you – I say keep doing what you’re doing to put healthy meals on the table. No need to fix what isn’t broken.

For everyone else, I’m determined to do all I can to encourage whatever it takes for you to prepare simple, healthy meals that don’t break the bank. Menu planning can be a big help, but it can also be overwhelming if you haven’t found your menu planning comfort zone.

Before I say more though, first let me share this: You should read the post Cooking Healthy Meals When the Menu Plan Fails. Even with the best of intentions, there are times my frozen chicken is still frozen at dinner time. It happens. No need to freak out, feel like a failure, or call for take-out. These ideas have saved me many times when my plans didn’t fall into place perfectly. (Hello, Life. You sure are busy.)

I want to help set us up for menu planning success as best I can. I don’t actually like the word success because we seem to think that the opposite of success is fail – and that isn’t true (see paragraph above, in which I use the word fail, but wish I didn’t and there’s nothing I can do about it now). So let’s go with menu planning empowerment, how does that sound?

By the way, what I’m about to share will not only give you insight into how I prepare healthy meals for my family every day, it will also help you understand how it is possible for me to feed a houseful of teenage boys (and often their friends) without having to sell my furniture as a way to afford it. Planning ahead saves us hundreds of dollars every year. I can’t not plan. I can’t fall back on take-out. Keeping food costs down is very important when there’s already a comma in the grocery budget dollar amount. (They eat so much foooooooood. But love them, they’re worth it, and all that.)

Empowering You to Plan Healthy Menus

1. One of my favorite ways to be inspired and gain ideas is to look at recipes. I look at cookbooks and on Pinterest, but mostly, I scroll through my dropdown menu of the hundreds (maybe thousands?) of recipes right here on my website. They are categorized, alphabetized, and even though I’m the one that put them there, I still come across recipes I forgot existed. It’s fun!

Doing this offers variety to our menu and gets my food planning creativity flowing. I typically pick seven recipes in each meal category and plug them into my menu for the week. There is flexibility, of course. There is always flexibility. My menu plan doesn’t own me, it simply acts as a guide.

Below is a screen shot of the dropdown menu on my website when I’m holding my cursor over the word RECIPES in my header. Do that, then click on any page you need. You’ll see lovely lists of real food recipes to pick from. Let your family help choose recipes to try if you like!

2. I’ve written and shared hundreds (maybe thousands?) of menu plans here through the years. They are all in my archives, found at this Menu Planning Archives link. These are fun to look through for inspiration because they are complete menu plans, full of ideas for ways to pair side dishes with main dishes.

3. Our Heavenly Homemaker’s Recipes – Search by Ingredients feature is a really fun way to plan meals based on the ingredients you have in your home. If I’m at a lost as to what to plan, I simply type in a few key ingredients I want to use (such as beef, cheese, tomatoes), then scroll through the recipes that pop up for me. You’ll see this special search box at the top right of my side bar. Use it! It’s fun and helpful!

4. I’ve put together three very thorough menu planning resources through the years: 40 Real Food Menu Plans; 1-2-3 Meal Planning; and Build Your Menu Planning Notebook. The first two share all my best tips and strategies for planning meals, plus they include tons of meal plan ideas. The thinking is already done for you!

The Notebook? Oh my goodness. That’s how I put it all together. Not only is it mega helpful, it’s cute and fun and made to order. Yours probably won’t look like mine because your menu planning needs and design preferences are likely different from mine. That’s the beauty. You print and put yours together the way it will work best for you. :)

To bless your menu planning efforts this New Year, we’ve packaged up our three menu planning resources and knocked them down to half price. Now’s the time to get into a good menu planning routine! Save yourself some time and money, letting these resources guide you.

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Build Your Menu Planning Notebook

November 17, 2014 by Laura 7 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

If you could find the perfect combination of cute, practical, helpful, easy, and affordable – would you finally be convinced that menu planning isn’t such a drag after all? If someone could hold your hand and walk you through everything you need to do to plan healthy meals for your family – would you jump on board and enjoy the ride? If you found a menu planning system that was just right for you, instead of a one-size-fits-all mess that leaves you frustrated – would you say, “sign me up.”

It’s here! You are going to love the Build Your Menu Planning Packet. Your fun is just about to begin, and just wait till you see the extra special spin we’ve put on this so that you can bless others too!

The Build Your Menu Planning Packet is a resource that will not only simplify your grocery shopping and meal planning organization – it will make the job easy and enjoyable. This packet is full of 124 pages of printables, offering you guidance (and cuteness!) in everything from stocking your pantry, to planning simple menus, to freezer cooking, to having company – and everything else in between.

Here’s a tiny peek into the planning categories this packet includes:

In each of the categories you see above, you’ll get to pick and choose from your favorites, printing and putting together a notebook that’s just right for you. Don’t like some of the styles? Skip it and print the ones you do like! Need your notebook to be heavy on Freezer Cooking Planners but don’t need the Lunch Box Planners? Okeedokee. The planners you like and need are the ones that make it into your notebook.

Here’s a list of each section of the Build Your Menu Planning Notebook Packet:

Basic Ingredients to Keep On Hand Lists

From chicken to beef in your freezer, to cans of tuna and salmon in your pantry – knowing what meats you like to keep on hand for meal preparation is very helpful. The same goes for baking supplies, dry goods, and all other ingredients you use regularly in your kitchen. Within each category on the worksheet, fill in each ingredient you find beneficial to have available in your kitchen in order to efficiently put together basic meals.

Once filled in, use this page as a guide for grocery list making, as well as for a general guideline to help you keep your kitchen well stocked.

Fruit and Vegetable Inspiration at a Glance

We all need many servings of fruits and vegetables each day. Challenge yourself to include more of these nutrient packed goodies in your diet. Use the Fruit and Vegetable Inspiration at a Glance sheet to offer you fresh ideas and to open your mind to variety. Be sure to fill in the blanks with more of your favorite produce items.

Menu Favorites Cheat Sheets

These worksheets are super handy for keeping a running list of all your favorite recipes and meals. They are organized by category so that when you plan your meals, all you have to do is glance through your Cheat Sheets for inspiration and ideas.

Menu Planners

This section is loaded with a wide variety of menu planning pages to help you schedule meals for each week. Choose your favorites, mix and match, print and enjoy!

Grocery Checklists

Choose and print your favorite Grocery List worksheets. Tear them out of your notebook one at a time as you plan your menus and make lists of items to purchase at the store or online.

Online Shopping Lists

If you purchase groceries online from sources like Amazon or Vitacost, it’s helpful to have a running list so that you remember what to order once you make it to the computer.

Freezer Cooking Planners

You might find that making meals ahead of time and storing them in the freezer for a quick meal will save you lots of time and money!

“What’s in the Freezer” sheets

Have a freezer full of meat, fruits, vegetables, and prepared foods? Make lists of what’s in your freezer and attach it to the front of your freezer for an easy reference so that you don’t have to dig around to see what’s hiding behind the frozen chicken.

Planning Ahead for Company Worksheets

Hosting guests? These worksheets will help you plan your menus and prepare meals efficiently so you can enjoy your company.

Baking Day Planners

Need to get some baking done so that you’ll have easy-to-grab snacks and breakfast foods for your family? Use these worksheets to help you plan.

Lunch Packing Planners

If you need to pack lunches for school and/or work, creating a plan will help you do this more efficiently. Fill out any of these worksheets to help you and your family prepare healthy lunches to go.

Cover Pages

Find one that fits you. Print it and slip it behind the clear protector on the front of your binder.

When I built my personal Menu Planning Notebook, I printed 52 Weekly Menu Planners so I’d have one for each week of the year. Some of the planners work well for the way I plan, so that’s what I printed. I chose my favorite designs – the ones that really jumped out at me.

After I had my Weekly Planners in place, I picked my favorites from all the other planning choices: Freezer Cooking, Baking Day, Getting Ready for Company…

My notebook is all put together now, and working on it seriously makes me giddy. Pretty pages, just waiting to be filled in to help me with organization as I work to feed my family? I love it!

Now the even better news.

Anytime you buy an eBook or downloadable packet like this, you get to use it for yourself, and that’s it.

Here you go! Let the Menu Planning Notebook building begin!

Build Your Menu Planning Collection

$9.95

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Planning Next Week’s Menu? Here’s Some Guidance, Plus Fun Free Printables!

September 19, 2014 by Laura 9 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

I always spend time over the weekend planning our meals for the upcoming week. I write down most of the specifics from main dish, to fruits and veggies. But I almost never stick with the menu plan completely. In fact, just last week there was a day I fed my family grapes even though I had planned to feed them blueberries. I bet you didn’t know I had that kind of crazy in me. Oh honey, you have no idea.

Once, I forgot to thaw chicken, so we had tuna. I was going to make Fruit Pizza on Monday, but in fact, I didn’t make it happen until…wait for it….

Tuesday.

So hi. Let’s all learn to have some sort of plan so we save money and time. But unless serving Wednesday’s Pasta Salad Bar on Saturday totally messes with you, ditch the idea that you have to follow your menu plan perfectly. It really is okay to pull out leftovers on Thursday if you don’t feel like making the planned Taco Corn Fritters. I have done this and lived to tell about it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Are you hitting the restart button with us this fall? If so, you might want to try your hand at planning some simple, real food menus. You’ll find that it will help you stay on track with putting nourishing food on the table more often.

Want some ideas?

I post my menu plan every single week. Look through all my menu planning archives here.

Want menu planning resources in your hands?

Grab our 40 Real Food Menu Plans Downloadable Packet here. You might also like the mix and match approach of our 1-2-3 Menu Planning eBook. (That one is actually still free if you subscribe to our daily newsletter. I wasn’t planning to offer it for free this many weeks, but I haven’t had time to take it down, so hurry, grab it up!)

Additional articles you may find helpful:

How to Stretch a Meal When Extra Company Comes
Need a last minute meal idea? Try these Black Bean Chicken Tacos
Cooking Healthy Meals When the Menu Plan Fails
Want to Eat Right? Plan Ahead!

Have ingredients you’re not sure how to use?

Use our handy “Search By Ingredient” Tool on the sidebar. You type in the ingredients you want to use, our search box will pull up recipes from our site that might work for you. It’s fun to see what comes up!

Be inspired with our new, free, downloadable Fall Menu Planners:

A piece of scratch paper, a document on the computer, a dry erase board – those all work just fine for writing down your menu plan. But if you want something a little more cheerful and fun, we’re excited to offer you three new printable menu planners that are perfect for this fall!

Take as many as you want, or if you want to just print once and reuse? Print a planner onto cardstock and laminate it. You can attach a magnet, place it on your fridge, then use a dry erase marker so you can clean it off at the end of the week and use it again next week!

Click on the links or images below to download.

Download Fall Butterflies Menu Planner

Download Good Eatin’ Fall Menu Planner

Download Fun Fall Menu Planner

Do you typically plan your menus? What works best for you as you make plans?

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Final Day: Get 1-2-3 Menu Planning eBook FREE With Oh, For Real Purchase

August 22, 2014 by Laura 2 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Don’t forget! If you purchase our Oh, For Real printed cookbook, you’ll also receive our new 1-2-3 Menu Planning eBook for FREE!

Buy this….

Get this free…

Just want 1-2-3 Meal Planning? Grab it for just $5.

1-2-3 Menu Planning
$5.00

Saturday, August 23 is the final day for this freebie offer – so act now! Let these helpful resources make your real food cooking life easier!!!!! Get all the details of this offer here.

Oh, For Real: Real Food, Real Family, Real Easy with 1-2-3 Menu Planning free bonus
$25.95

Cost for a book shipped to Canada is $34.05. If you are from Canada or another country outside the U.S., please email me before purchasing. Thanks!

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1-2-3 Meal Planning: Hundreds of Real Food, Real Simple Ideas

August 17, 2014 by Laura 9 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

I am very excited to introduce a brand new resource we recently finished for you! 1-2-3 Meal Planning not only walks you through a super simple menu planning system, it contains over 250 real food, real simple menu ideas.

Overwhelmed trying to put healthy meals on the table each day? Burned out on all your old stand-by meals? Want to be better at serving fruits and vegetables? Have limited time to cook? Well – this eBook is just what you need.

Ideas, ideas, ideas. This book is full of them. From fall to winter, spring to summer – these easy, seasonal meal ideas will make you hungry and inspire you. Best of all, this resource will take the frustration out of thinking so hard about what food to make.

100’s of recipes in the book are auto-linked, which means you can click directly on the link and gain immediate access to the recipe right here on my website. You can buy this eBook right now and access it right away for just $5.

1-2-3 Menu Planning
$5.00

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!