Meal Planning Update

So, the beginning of November, I blogged about my first attempt at meal planning for the entire month and I promised an update. It has been going SO well and has truly blessed our family! Of the goals I had for the process, I feel like we've met them all!

• Save money on groceries - CHECK (Stayed within budget for November!
• Save on stress of meal prep each day - DOUBLE CHECK!!! (I've so appreciated this one personally)
• Save money on eating out - CHECK
• Trying more of the new recipes I accumulate - CHECK
• Making more of the recipes we love - CHECK
• Saving on trips to the store - This was not on my original list, but I've really liked this one as I really dislike grocery shopping

You may wonder how I try new recipes and make more recipes that we love. Well, we're doing both! I probably do about half new recipes each month and the other half are from our tried and trues. I'm helping myself in this process by taking the suggestion of a friend who has a recipe book that she keeps for just the recipes her family has approved of. I'm not completely done compiling my favorites book, but I've at least started and it's been very helpful! It's been fun to talk about with Luke too. I told him we were making this favorite book and now he tells me which foods we eat that we should put in the book:) SO cute!

I've had some people ask about my "process" for making my meal plan. First of all, let me say that this is a very young process, if you can even call it a process...but here's an overview:

I print a blank calendar of the month to start fresh. Then, I get an idea of what recipes we'd like to have on the meal plan for the month (this is where I draw from new recipes I want to try and from the favorites book). Next, I compare our family calendar (of things we have going on) to the blank calendar.

Our family calendar printed from Google

I figure out which nights I have more or less time to make dinner, then I plug in the foods with prep time that works well. (Obviously our schedule changes through out the month, but it gives us somewhere to start and then we're flexible as the month goes.) I also try to consider which recipes have ingredients that are perishable that I may already have on hand and when they expire (i.e. I had some half-and-half left from a recipe in November that expired next week, so I plan to make a pasta with half-and-half this week so I can use what I have left.) Again, obviously this does not work perfectly, but it does lessen my trips to the store and the food I waste, which I feel good about.

Our completed December meal plan

I would love to tell you that this is the end of the process and that all of the meals magically appear each evening warm on our table, but, trust me, this process takes some prep work...Brent joked last night as I had recipes/recipe books strewn about on the floor trying to decide which to make and when that I looked like I was studying for an exam:) But, in my opinion, it's worth it in so many ways!

So, after the meal plan is established, I make a HUGE grocery list of everything I need for the recipes. This month, it was a page and a half long hand written with two columns! Once I compare the list to what I have on hand, it gets a bit smaller:) This next part is just a sign of my obsessive compulsive tendencies, but then I type the list so it is organized by areas of WalMart. This helps me as I'm shopping to be sure I don't forget anything. (P.S. Brent thinks my list is great!)

I'm sure you're thinking by now that this process must take me forever! Honestly, I did all of my meal planning last night, grocery list and all, in just a couple hours. Then today, I compared my grocery list to the WalMart shopping list on pocketyourdollars.com (I learned about this site from a community ed class this fall from the lady that started it...she has a very inspiring story). I mainly use printable coupons since I don't get the newspaper to get all of the coupon inserts (which are also referenced on the site above). I saved about $15 on our grocery trip today (about 4% of our total bill). I think that's pretty good, since I don't invest much time into the coupon aspect.

At the end of all the work above, the grocery shopping still has to be done....my least favorite part:( I have to admit though, the grocery shopping is far less annoying because I know I've done the prep work to make it easier, and I know that I will not have to come back to do a huge trip like this again for another month! Good incentive:) I was VERY blessed this month to have Brent along for the trip...thankfully, because we had two carts full (including large paper products like paper towels, TP, etc). Yep, we're one of those families with two carts:) I am also incredibly blessed to have a very patient son who has always enjoyed grocery shopping (truly, he used to get excited to go when he was a toddler:)).

The end product is a VERY full kitchen! For those of you that have been at our house, you know we don't have a lot of cupboard space and I do not have a pantry, but I make use of every cubic inch, as you can see below:)

Our snack basket full of some of our favorites: granola bars and pop tarts

Our make-shift mini-pantry, with above snack basket

Our one and only food cupboard (other than the mini-pantry above)

Our filled fridge

Our filled freezer

I'm sure you have some questions, like don't I have to go to the store through out the month for some items? Sure do, but the trips are much faster and much cheaper. I'm anticipating that this month I'll need to make another trip just for items I need for Christmas since I'll be bringing food places and hosting. I also utilize Kwik Trip for milk, potatoes, and bananas that they sell cheap. You may also be asking how much we stick to the schedule? We stick to it pretty well, but, as I mentioned above, we adjust as needed. Last month there was only one meal from the entire month that we didn't make and it was more of a fall back meal anyway (stuff we usually have on hand). I also plan in days for left overs and grab-and-go meals like Smart Ones or sandwiches when we are on a tight schedule. Last month I only planned one evening for us to pick up dinner, which was because we had to be somewhere very quickly after work and wouldn't even have time at home. I have one day like that in December that I'm anticipating too. But, we have certainly saved A LOT on eating out!

I think that about covers it for now....this got longer than I expected and Luke is asking that I get done too:)

Happy Meal Planning!