Would you like fresh fruit with that?

Do you find meal planning to be a big time hog? I do. I research and look up recipes, and try new things. They sometimes flop. Take way longer than anticipated. Or my son won’t eat my latest, greatest toddler meal creation. And I’m back to the drawing board again.

I have intentions and goals for “homemade” meals from scratch. I know some of you are genius at that, and I’d love your ideas for nutritious meals on a busy schedule.

But…since I haven’t achieved meal-planning-perfection, I do rely on a few “ready-to-go” options. One thing I’ve tried to successfully (when I take the time to set it up) include nutritious meals in my daily routines, is to create “Mommy’s Take Out” tray. This works especially well for lunch. And it also works because we have a second refrigerator which gives me the extra room to do this!

I know this might sound SUPER simple to you, but it’s something that really works for us! I started doing this several years ago after thinking about why I was avoiding making lunches and just going for the “fast food” option instead. I realized it was because it is EASY to just run through the drive through or school cafeteria and have someone else do all the work and hand you a lunch to eat.

So I decided to be my own drive-through. By creating a “pick up and go” lunch for each day of the work week in advance, I cut back on my hemming and hawing in front of an open refrigerator every morning (which often led to that inevitable drive of shame through the fast food line!). All the work gets done in about 15 minutes on Sundays, and I don’t have to think about it again. Save time. Save money. Eat healthy!

What I do is plan out the lunch menu for the week. Then I get a big cookie sheet. On the sheet, I stack all the foods I’ll need for an entire week of lunches. I’ll group them together for each day. It might look something like this:

• M –  Soup (usually leftovers from the weekend), crackers, apple
• T –  Yogurt, granola bar, carrot sticks & celery
• W – PBJ, banana (For PBJ I don’t actually MAKE the sandwich, I just put the bread slices in Tupperware and the PBJ right next to that. It’s the most time-consuming lunch of the week! LOL!).
• Th – Yogurt, pretzels, banana
• F – Hard boiled egg, orange, granola bar

The above is just an example. It depends what I have on hand. Doing the weekly meal tray made sure I had lunch ingredients on hand, and it ensured my husband and I were eating a healthy meal for lunch, without breaking the bank, or wasting our time.

It’s hard to find time for a nutritious meal on a mom’s busy schedule. Planning ahead to have ingredients on hand, creating meals that can “walk out the door” with you, and sticking to your plan are great ways to fit good eating into your lifestyle!

What’s your biggest meal planning challenge?