Happy New Year!! The Christmas Tree is down, decorations are put away, and now its time to tackle 2012 head on! The one thing that starts my week off right is a menu plan – without it, we are lost – we don’t eat right, it costs more money, and I feel stressed.  So, here is the plan for this week:

• Monday – BLT Sandwiches & Soup
• Tuesday – Grilled Honey Mustard Chicken, Rainbow Salad (see below for recipe) and Sweet Potato Fries
• Wednesday – Sloppy Joes, Macaroni & Cheese, Tossed Salad
• Thursday – Angel Hair Pasta with Meatballs, Salad
• Friday – High School Swim Meet so we will grab subs on the way

At Christmas I discovered this amazing Rainbow Salad thanks to my super talented sister-in-law of CeliacFamily.com. The flavors were so refreshing and I think it pairs nicely with just about anything.

I have had quite a few requests for the menu plan template that I use each week, so I have made a blank one you can print and fill in for your family (Download the blank menu planner as a PDF file).

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

Enough is enough! We have gone without a menu plan for too many weeks in a row and it is just not good!! The last few weeks have been as close to insane as it can get and I know that if I would have just taken the time to do a menu plan things would have been so much easier. Well, no use whining – let’s get it done!

• Monday – Baked pork chops with Red Hot Applesauce, egg noodles and steamed veggies
• Tuesday – Vegetable Soup and cheese quesadillas
• Wednesday – Lasagna, garlic bread and salad
• Thursday – Taco bar
• Friday – Scatter night so Mom’s not cooking – one has a swim meet, one has gymnastics, one is going to a friend’s house – yeah, it’s crazy like that

I have had quite a few requests for the menu plan template that I use each week, so I have made a blank one you can print and fill in for your family (Download the blank menu planner as a PDF file).

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

Happy Monday – or at least I think it is! Our weekend was so jam packed busy this weekend that I feel like I need a whole day to recover!

I have had quite a few requests for the menu plan template that I use each week, so this week I have made a blank one you can print and fill in for your family. Just scroll down – it’s below my menu for the week.

• Monday – Hubby is making meatloaf and we’ll add mashed potatoes and green bean casserole just to make it a total comfort food meal.
• Tuesday – Simple grilled chicken with steamed veggies and rice.
• Wednesday – I have had a request for homemade lasagna from my boys, so we will add a tossed salad and garlic bread and call it a night. What I may try is this Williams Sonoma slow cooker lasagna recipe so it can be ready as needed on our crazy sports night.
• Thursday – BLT sandwiches made in the sandwich maker and Tomato or Vegetable soup. I’m not sure why, but Thursdays are becoming soup and sandwich night around here.
• Friday – We are helping make dinner for my son’s JROTC unit before they leave for a competition so we will most likely just eat with them. I know it is pasta of some sort, but I’m not sure what.

Now you can download my weekly menu planner for free as a PDF – download free menu planner.

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

Oh, do you feel that crisp Fall air?? We did a little golfing on Saturday and I actually had to wear a light jacket and I was still chilly!

The past few weeks we have had a slow cooker meal at least once a week and for some reason they have just not been a hit! So, no slow cooker meals this week. Just long standing favorites, because my ego needs a boost. That being said, if you have a FAIL-PROOF slow cooker recipe you’d like to share with me, leave it in the comments, because I like the convenience of slow cooker meals.

On our menu this week:

• Monday – classic baked macaroni and cheese plus a tossed salad
• Tuesday – Honey mustard marinated chicken breasts grilled, one of the Zatarain’s rice mixes, and steamed veggies
• Wednesday – we had chili yesterday so we will use the leftovers to top baked potatoes or if there is any leftover mac and cheese my son will probably want to make his own chili mac concoction
• Thursday – soup and grilled cheese since I think it is just the kids and me that night
• Friday – I have to coach gymnastics at the same time my daughter has practice and my son will be at the High School football game – I’m thinking Chik-Fil-A or something similar on the way home

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

If ever there was a week I needed to plan, this is it!! Wow! We have 3 crazy sports nights, my Dad is having surgery and I need to fit some time to work and to workout into that whole plan. Luckily, I did take the time to plan and while it will be a little rushed, dinner will be under control.

Recipes & notes:

• Monday – Taco night – I just realized I don’t have any hard taco shells, but that’s okay. The family can either make their tacos on tortillas or make a taco salad over Frito’s corn chips. 
• Tuesday – Chicken and egg noodles in the slow cooker – my Dad is having surgery so I will be at the hospital most of the day. Cooking dinner in the slow cooker allows me to make it early when I have time and the kids will love it.
• Wednesday – Sometimes there is no other option than to go out. When I looked at the timing of the evening and the staggered sports schedules and needing to go back to the hospital I decided the kids would consider it a treat to get Subway or Chik-Fil-A.
• Thursday – Stuffed Cabbage – A few weeks ago when my husband made Stuffed Cabbage we were able to make a second tray and freeze it right away. That tray of Stuffed Cabbage will come in handy this week! I’ll serve it up with garlic toast and everyone will be happy.
• Friday – Depending on the mood and whol is around we will either do pizza, breakfast for dinner or enjoy leftovers from the week.

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

It’s official! We survived the wackiest weather week ever! Last week we kicked off the week with violent thunderstorms on Sunday, followed by the strongest Earthquake in recent history (and we are only 30 miles from the epicenter) on Tuesday plus two days of random aftershocks, another round of violent thunderstorms on Thursday and then Hurricane Irene over the weekend. Seriously, Mother Nature! And our reward for surviving her little temper tantrum – 5 days of gorgeous sunny weather. I’ll take it.

Because we expected the worst from Hurricane Irene over the weekend, we did quite a bit of stocking up in the days prior which means I really don’t have to go grocery shopping this week! Yeah, me!! I think I need to buy three things – chicken breasts, chicken broth and celery. Sweet! So, here is the menu for the week:

Recipes:

• Monday – Slow Cooker Beef Bourguignon from A Year of Slow Cooking – I forgot to add that I will serve it over mashed potatoes
• Tuesday – Easy and Delicious Chicken Noodles from the back of the Pennsylvania Dutch Egg Noodles package
• Wednesday – Easy Crockpot Potato Soup
• Thursday – Bean and Beef Enchilada Casserole

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

So, my plan worked!! If you stopped by last week you read that my family had a late summer revolt against my planning and organization. Fine, I said. No menu, no chore chart, no organization. And when dinner time rolled around and I was asked what was for dinner, I just shrugged my shoulders and said I don’t know! Well, at least part of the family was thrown off by this lack of planning almost immediately and the rest were happy to see this week’s plan show up on the refrigerator last night. We’ll call that a little victory for MOM!

The kids go back to school this week and my gymnast’s fall schedule starts tonight. My swimmer doesn’t resume practices until September 1 and I’m not sure when my son’s JROTC Raider practices resume. At least I get to ease back in to the craziness.

On the menu this week:

I’ve made a few changes to the menu this week. For one, I added breakfast. What I learned last year was that with three kids going to three different schools was I was getting out three different types of breakfasts and that meant a lot of extra work. This year I have breakfasts pre-planned and if they don’t like what is on the menu they can pour a bowl of cereal for themselves.  I also outlined lunch box and snack ideas to help with getting lunches packed and taking care of the “after school I’m going to die if I don’t eat before practice ” issue.

In case you missed it, I shared some of my tried and true, time tested techniques for making the school year routine less hectic in yesterday’s post. Go check it out and share some of your tips too!

Here’s to an organized week for all of us! What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

Really the title of this post should be – No Menu Plan Monday. It seems my family has had enough of my planning and organizing all summer and they are “sick of it.” They made a point of letting me know this yesterday. FINE. I get it.

This is the last full week the kids are home before school starts – if we are going to have a totally unstructured week, this is the week to have it. Two of the three kids have no sports practices at all this week and the third just has practice Monday and Tuesday. We may even decide to take a quick two or three day getaway as a family. Who knows? After all, this is the week with no plan.

As much as it pains me to say I don’t have a plan this week – well, I don’t. Until next week, please feel free to use my previous week’s menu plans and chore charts for inspiration or head over to Laura’s for hundreds of menu plan ideas from awesome Moms from all over the world. And you can be sure I will have my Menu for the following week ready to rock and roll!

Stay tuned this week for a recipe or two, time saving strategies for the first week of school and beyond, and a few reviews of products I think you are going to really like.

Another season of summer swim team has come to a close and that means we are only a few weeks away from a new school year. It also means we may take a last minute family vacation (because we somehow always wait until the last minute to plan these things) sometime in the next two weeks. If that is going to be the case, the last thing I want is a refrigerator full of food that won’t get eaten, so my plan is to cook from what we already have this week.

There are two dinners that require recipes:

• Quick and Easy Glazed Pork Tenderloin with Pineapple
• Spaghetti Carbonara

Both recipes will be good because I already have the ingredients on hand. But, now that I look at it, I may need to tweak Friday’s breakfast for dinner because the Carbonara is basically bacon and egg pasta. Breakfast for dinner night may end up being waffles, sausage and fruit salad.

On the chore side this week, my youngest finally gets her chore free week. She is doing theater camp from 9-3 each day this week and when the older two went to camp and/or their cousins, they got out of chores for the whole week. Now its Nat’s turn.

What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!

Happy August! Are you looking at one more month of summer or are you looking at kids going back to school in the next week or so? Our kids have 3 more weeks of summer left which translates into one week visiting the cousins for the middle child, one week of drama camp for the youngest and getting in as much time flying his remote control airplanes as possible for my oldest. I’m sure the month will fly by – literally.

As for the menu, I’m sure you have noticed the lack of fancy recipes. It’s summer and we have easy access to fresh veggies and the grill so simplicity is my friend. This week we have no summer swim meets (finals is Saturday), one of the girls is at her cousin’s, and my 15 year old son was the only one who gave me input as to what he wanted for dinner this week.

We had company over the weekend which meant the entire family pitched in and gave the house a once over from top to bottom on Friday. The deep cleaning coupled with the fact that the middle child is not here this week equals a pretty light chore list for the other two.

Here’s to an organized week for all of us! What’s on your menu plan this week? Looking for more inspiration? Visit Laura’s massive Menu Plan Monday link up for hundreds of menu ideas!