Some of us never learned basic meal planning before we had a family, so we struggle with this. I never really learned how to meal plan or budget before I started having my children and I struggle with this a lot.
When I started following Trim Healthy Mama I realized that basic meal planning is a one of the keys to success with this lifestyle. It’s difficult to change your mindset to break old habits and build new ones, one of the things that helped me most in this area was FlyLady.net. It seems repetitive and really silly … but honestly it’s about time management and priority setting.
I tend to collect cookbooks, yeah I know that seems a little weird when you are trying to lose weight but it is the single thing that speaks to my soul. I can spend hours upon hours browsing through cookbooks finding inspiration. It is also something that my husband and I enjoy doing together… He’s game to try just about anything.
When my children were still at home and I was busy working and getting them to boy scouts and other activities it was hard to know what I was cooking for dinner… I STILL have this problem. I can write out a basic meal plan and then ehhh I just don’t feel like eating what I planned or I find that I am missing an ingredient that is key to the recipe.
I purchased a version of MasterCook in 1997 or so and honestly I absolutely adored that program. My computer died and I didn’t have access to my files anymore and I was heartbroken.I searched and searched for a new copy, but they had stopped making it for a while.
My dad bought me Cook’n as well as a copy for himself and we started using it. Cook’n is a decent program the biggest issue that I had with it was the price they charge for the cookbooks that integrate with the program as well as it didn’t give me a way to search the recipes with what was in my pantry.
Recently another member of the Trim Healthy Mama Community posted a link to a new version of MasterCook... You can’t imagine how happy I was to see that post!! (I’ve been saving my pennies to buy the version I want) You can check out the version I’m asking/waiting for here (affiliate link)
I have struggled with paper meal plans for I couldn’t tell you how long. I’m good with using an organizer for our bills, appointments and even planning this blog, but meal planning, not so much.
Darcie over at Darcie’s Dishes writes weekly meal plans that coincide with the Trim Healthy Mama lifestyle (many members use hers as a guide)
Tina from Oil of Joy shared this post about meal planning with allergies.
Amanda at Counting All Joy has a whole series of posts on how she meal plans.
Michelle from Mixing with Michelle has once a month meal plans and lots of freezer options.
and so many others I can’t list them all.
I guess the point is that even if you struggle with basic meal planning like I do there are A LOT of resources out there… we just have to find the ones that work for us and our families.
This post does contain amazon and other affiliate links. Your cost does not change if you decide to purchase through one of my links, but I do receive a small commission which helps to fund my blogging activities.
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