I wrote about how we meal plan back in 2013, and though many things in our life have changed since then (two new babies, new house, now COVID), the bones of our meal planning process remain the same. There are a few tweaks and changes that have fine-tuned this weekly rhythm over the years, though, so I thought it was time for an update! If you’re new to the idea of meal planning, it might feel really intimidating or complicated. Maybe you’re worried it will take your whole Saturday. I get it! Even though I’ve been meal planning for years, there’s still a part of me that resists sitting down and doing it each week. But, this simple process saves me SO much time, energy, and money that it is completely worth it!! In contrast, on the weeks where we fly by the seat of our pants (maybe if we’ve been traveling the weekend before), I’m basically pulling my hair out by Tuesday. If that’s you every week, I think you’ll love this post! Let’s go! When I meal plan: Though I’m not perfect at it, I try to sit down and plan our meals for the week on Friday evening, after the kids are in bed. With COVID, I aim to go to the grocery store pretty much first thing Saturday morning, so making our grocery list the night before ensures I’m not scrambling in the morning. For me, planning our meals on the weekend, and as early in the weekend as possible, is crucial. As mentioned above, once the week starts churning it’s hard for me to find time to do it AND go shopping, which really throws off our whole rhythm. And if for some reason I wait until Sunday to do it, it adds to the

Happy Friday, friends! I’m thrilled to share a tour of my recipe binder with you today! Getting it organized a few weeks ago was a huge step forward in my 2020 goal of streamlining meal planning. It’s made meal planning and cooking simpler, easier, and more joyful – what more could a gal want?! If you’ve been considering making a recipe binder of your own, I think you’ll love today’s tour! As promised, I filmed a video of myself flipping through every page, explaining what I included and giving you a little commentary on each recipe. It’s about 20 minutes long, and it might be incredibly boring or just what you’re looking for – ha! A time-stamped guide::28 | Meal planning archive1:05 | Grocery shopping list1:34 | Non-recipe cheat sheet2:18 | Main dish16:44 | Sides18:28 | Desserts19:55 | Breakfasts Supplies needed for your recipe binder:— A 3-ring binder! Mine is 1″, nothing fancy, but I’m considering upgrading to 1.5″ or 2″ because it’s currently bursting at the seams.— Tabs to divide your binder into sections. I kept mine simple and have sections for main dish, sides, dessert, breakfast, and my meal planning archive. I might divide them into more specific categories in the future, but for now, this is working well!— Page protecters. These make it easy to slip in magazine clippings or recipe cards. Of course, you can also just three-hole-punch most things, but it’s nice to be able to wipe off splatters :) I actually got my page protectors for free from my neighborhood Facebook group, so it’s worth asking around! What I put in my recipe binder:— At the front, I keep extra copies of my custom Publix grocery list, organized by aisle at my local store. This has been SO helpful for staying organized and moving

My 2020 goal of streamlining meal planning is ticking along nicely. It’s satisfying to feel like I’m making real progress on something when so much feels out of my control – AND it’s something that’s making my daily life better right now! Progress has taken all different forms, but today I wanted to share one simple hack that’s been so helpful for us with meal planning. June school photos!!! Emphasis on simple. We hung a magnetic dry erase board on the side of our fridge and use it to track inventory of our freezer stash. Now, I can easily see what we have on hand without rifling through our cold storage. This is helpful for both deciding on our meals for the week – what’s in the freezer that we can base a meal on? – and for assembling a grocery list – what do we already have that we don’t need to buy? You could certainly do this with a pad of paper, but the dry erase board is a neat solution. To note: we don’t include EVERYTHING in our freezer on the list – mostly just ingredients that are relevant for meal planning. For example, you won’t see frozen cookie dough on the list above, but rest assured we are always well-stocked :) That’s it! A simple meal-planning hack that’s helped us plan more efficiently and waste less food. I’d love to hear: what meal-planning hacks do you swear by? Also, a question: with my recipe binder pretty much complete, I’m curious if a video flip-through would be of interest? I could give you some commentary on my favorite recipes? I’m not really much of a video person, but thought this could be fun. Let me know what you think! P.S. If our dry erase board is sold

It seems kind of funny to follow up such a momentous post as sharing the meaning of our son’s name with dinner ideas, but that’s Em for Marvelous for you! :) If you think about it, a post about quick and easy meals actually makes perfect sense a few weeks after we welcomed a baby — quick and easy is the name of the game right now! With that, I wanted to share a few of our favorite meals in this genre to continue our mini “ten favorites” series… From Pinch of Yum 1. Grilled chicken caesar salad wraps. We grill chicken breasts on the grill, then chop and mix them with pre-washed lettuce (or lettuce from our garden in-season!), croutons, and store-bought caesar dressing. Everything gets stuffed in a flatbread or tortilla, depending on what we have on hand. 2. Lemon roasted chicken and vegetables. The recipe calls for salmon but we sub in chicken. You basically just toss everything onto a sheet pan and call it a day! We’ll sometimes pair with rice. 3. Buffalo chicken pizza. Pizza dough from Publix, jarred pizza sauce, shredded mozzarella, frozen buffalo chicken nuggets, a little chopped red onion, a drizzle of blue cheese dressing after it comes out of the oven… yum! 4. Grilled chicken, sweet potatoes, and a vegetable. The chicken goes on the grill with salt and pepper and we cook the sweet potatoes in the microwave and eat them plain. For a vegetable, we’ll most often saute broccoli or green beans with a squeeze of lemon or grill zucchini. This meal has the benefit of being quite healthy and cheap, too! 5. Chicken fajitas. Do you see a theme with grilled chicken? :) The grilled chicken gets chopped into strips, then everyone assembles their own fajitas with tortillas,