My Menu Planner

I have several goals for my near future.  Goals, that if I follow through with, will create a less chaotic home. 

We are the busiest sort of family there is.  Our mornings and afternoons could be described as a whirlwind.  This week, Tucker has baseball practice every day after school from 3 to 4:30.  Then, I have to pick him up.....feed everyone and finish homework in a very short amount of time....and then get Carter to basketball practice at 5:30 on Monday and Thursday and Sawyer to basketball on Tuesday and Friday.  Tucker has a hair cut appointment on Tuesday at 5:00.  Tucker has to work a volunteer shift as a Student Government Representative at 7:00 on Tuesday at our county basketball tournament.  Tucker has youth meeting at our church on Wednesday night at 6:00.  I have to cook a meal for our church hospitality room for the county basketball tournament on Thursday night.  Besides these things, I still work as a kindergarten teacher, attend church, and try to go jogging several times a week. And that is just the committments I know about so far. 

Squeezing in time to cook a healthy meal and keeping a clean house is sometimes hard to do. 

To maintain sanity, I have some goals set. 

1.  I am trying to "declutter" our house, one little section at a time.  My house is not nasty or junky.....but we do have little trinkets sitting around and the junk in the drawers needs removing and the extra stuff in the closets need weeding out.  With less clutter, the house will be easier to keep clean.

2. We are still working on paying off debt this year. 

3. I am setting up a weekly menu so that our dinner planning goes more smoothly.  I know that if I have a plan for what we will eat for the week, that I can shop for everything on the weekend, and have all the ingredients ready.  I will be able to cut out those almost daily trips to the local grocery store to get the things we are out of and the items we need to cook dinner, thereby saving me precious afternoon minutes.

Tonight, I created my menu planner to help with goal number 3. 

My menu planner is simple and was created from stuff that I had lying around the house.  You could create a much more elaborate one if you wanted to invest a little money at the craft department.  I think it turned out just fine and will serve the purpose perfectly.

Here is how I created the weekly menu planner.....

Step 1.....Gather the supplies.

I used a couple of coordinating, 12 x 12 sheets of scrapbook paper, some button magnets, some colorful rocks, and a yellow file folder.  They had all been crammed into a cabinet that hasn't seen the light of day in years .  Hopefully, this cabinet will be 'decluttered' soon.

Step 2......Make the labels with some paper and glue them on.  Cut a corner off of a file folder and glue it on to use as a pouch for the 'menu option' slips of paper.  You could also use one of those library pouches that go inside books.  You can get those at office supply stores or teacher stores.

Step 3......Hot glue the sticky notes on.

Step 4 .......  Attach the magnets to the rocks with hot glue.  You could also use beads, buttons, or those little flat shiny rocks that you use in aquariums. Or...you could keep it really simple, and just use the magnets.

Step 5...... Cut some paper into strips.

Step 6......... Write all the foods you frequently cook onto the slips of paper.

Step 7 ........ Put the slips of paper into the little pouch. Place a menu item under each little magnetic rock next to each day.

I hope this little weekly menu planner will remove just a teensy bit of chaos from our lives.