Put Your Homemaking Binder Together – Menu Planning {series} 4

This entry is part 4 of 9 in the series Put Your Homemaking Binder Together

Put-Together-Home-BinderIntroductionI did a version of this series a year ago in tandem with a book review I had done on Renee Metzler’s books Total Home Makeover. You can read the review here.

I’ve since updated the series to be a simple primer on putting together your Homemaking Binder for a new and organized 2014.

I’ve added all the forms you’ll need to complete the series here in my free downloads section but if you’re ready to take it a step further and fully outfit your Homemaking Binder you can view my more feminine printables, checklists, forms, and ebooks at Well Kept Binders.

Grocery Bags with Food

 

So to help you regain some semblance of order in your home for 2014…

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Welcome back!

Hopefully you have picked an personalized a binder to house your Homemaking stuff and got a calendar section all set up and maybe you’re even using it.

You can use a weekly calendar in your planner section to keep track of weekly details. And if you’re having some trouble coming up with some good calendars for that section I have some new Calendar planners over at Well Kept Planners. Weekly and monthly all in a set for full binders and have sized.

I’ll get some new images up soon to show you the inside.

This week we’ll work on the Home Meal Planning Section of our Homemaking Binders .

Almost any busy mom will tell you that knowing what she has on hand to feed her family takes a load off an already overworked mind.

And knowing what meals she will prepare, well in advance, takes an even greater load.

It’s pretty stressful to have 5 pm roll around and not know what you are going to feed your family for dinner. Your children are hungry and starting to whine and of course you need nourishment and if your spouse works away from home it’s always a thoughtful gesture to offer something good to eat around the dinner table at the end of the day.

So Meal Planning to the rescue. Meal Planning is not a new invention nor is it something we savvy web moms thought up. Meal planning has been around at least since Victorian era.  And probably well before that but it was then that we started getting good records of home menus. Countless Recipe or Receipt books survive to this day with menu after menu of what to cook in season.

Menu planning is a simple idea that you can make as complex as you would like. But for simplicities sake we’ll just say to plan today what you will prepare for dinner for the next seven days.

This means thinking in advance about what you need to prepare these great meals. What day would be best for what dish? What items do you have on hand? What items do you need to pick up at the grocery store?

If you do keep a Menu Planning section in your Homemaking binder it does no good unless you keep the pages that will help you come dinner, and yes even breakfast time.

  • Family Favorite Meals: I’ve heard it said that most families eat about the same 18 or so meals in rotation. But chances are after a few sit down meals you may forget what your family loves best. So keep a list of Family Favorite Meals to turn to when needed.
  • Weekly Menu Planning Template: Much like your weekly calendar keep a list of what meals you will serve for dinner for the next seven days. It usually makes sense to plan these meals between your grocery shopping trips.
  • Monthly Menu Planning Templates: Like Monthly Menu Planning better? A month long template is easy to fill in with your family’s 18 favorite meals.
  • Grocery Shopping List: Make up a grocery shopping list particular to your home. To keep in your binder laminate it or put it in a protective plastic sleeve. This way you can use an erasable pen and re-use your template over and over and over…you get the idea.
  • Pantry Inventory List: It makes such a difference in your meal preparations if you know what you have on hand. Making your pantry inventory list is also a good time to go through you pantry and get rid of anything you are not using.

About Meal Planning

If you want to or need to start from scratch for weekly meal planning one of the easiest ways to start meal planning is to sign for a demo of a weekly meal planning service or purchase (or check out at the library) a book on menu planning.

Read this article on various Menu Planning Resources

 

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Series Navigation<< Put Your Homemaking Binder Together – Calendars and Schedules {series} 3Put Your Homemaking Binder Together – Bills and Budget {series) 5 >>

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