Avoiding "Oh crap, what's for dinner?!"

If you're like most of us out there, you've probably experienced it before: you're driving home from work, or at the end of a busy day -- a day that was longer than you expected -- and you'll have just enough time once you get home to make dinner and eat before you have to leave again to make it to small group... except, oh crap, what's for dinner?!

I used to experience that "moment" on a semi-regular basis. And the "moments" afterwards, where I realized I didn't have ALL the ingredients for ANY of my quickest dinners, and that I also didn't have time to stop at the grocery store during the crazy hours (I DETEST the grocery store from 4:30-6:30pm). So then I'd get home and fly through my cupboards to see if there was anything that would work... only to end up eating ramen, cereal, or some random something that I thankfully happened to have stuck away in the back of the freezer.

After we got married, I experienced a new "moment" -- Josh asking me what there was that he could eat for lunches and snacks. Since we're still in that newlywed phase, which includes learning about the other person's living habits, he wasn't used to my "kind" of shopping (hey, there IS a cultural difference), and didn't want to eat something I was planning on using for a dinner at some point. It was a valid point, especially since he's home/in the neighborhood a good portion of the day because of his internship.

So, in an effort to organize things a bit more, get rid of some evening/dinnertime stress, and make sure Josh didn't starve, I created the following dinner planning menu:

I know a lot of people probably are going, "Well, duh..." but it was a fairly life-style altering decision for me to start planning out our meals in advance. I've been doing it for a few months now and I LOVE that I don't ever really have to think about dinner. I just get home and look at this list which is conveniently up on the fridge. Now, this isn't to say that we ABSOLUTELY FOLLOW THE LIST AT ALL TIMES PERIOD. Because that's silly. But it is really helpful to have the guide, and usually 6 out of 7 days a week we make what's written (and Josh really likes the lunch/snacks sections, too).

You might think this is a huge task to do each week, but I can't tell you how much it's helped my sanity (and satisfied the Teach For America part of me that likes to know what's coming... backwards planning, people!). I just sit down sometime during the week or on Saturday morning and plan out a menu based on our weekly commitments, writing in the quicker meals on the days we have less time to make/eat dinner, letting myself go with a little bit more intensive or fancy meals on the days we have an evening at home. Our trips to the grocery store have gotten more focused (less impulse "But we might need it!" buying), and it has also really helped us cut back on the "Uh, let's just go out to dinner" nights, which "cheap" as the places you go may be, add up REALLY quickly. Now, we eat out less, enjoy our meals in more, save money, and I, at least, am generally happier around meal time!

P.S. If you'd like a PDF version of this (it prints out 2 per page), just let me know =)