menu planning.

In a desperate attempt to save myself from that panicked feeling that comes from wondering what to do for dinner every day around 4pm when the kids are going nuts, I have been organizing my recipe files. My plan is to create 10 master menu PDFs with 10 dinner meals and a corresponding shopping list to keep in my kitchen binder. Each menu should get us through about two weeks of meals. My plan is to just rotate through the ten menus throughout the year and make changes as needed. I'll have to supplement the shopping list with pantry staples and breakfast and lunch items, etc. Really, though we eat mostly the same things for breakfast and lunch, so that part of the menu doesn't change.

I'm also making dividers for each set of recipes in each menus for my recipe holder and paper clip the recipes to the menu divider they belong in, so all I have to do is pull out that set of recipes when I start a new menu. I used the dividers from old photo storage boxes that I had lying around, which I cut to size and covered with some lovely black and white patterned scrapbook paper I had left over from some sort of project {the paper clips are from Walmart I think...} I plan to make dividers just for breakfast and dessert recipes, and probably also side dishes, appetizers, beverages etc.

It's going to be a lot of work at the outset, but I'm just quick printing the recipes that I want and resisting the OCD temptation to write them all on matching recipe cards.

I did, however, design my own recipe cards inspired by these and these {drooling}, just for kicks and giggles...so maybe someday all the recipes will all be on matching cards. Hey, a girl can dream.

Here's the menu PDF as an example and a link to print my recipe cards...
Menu 1

Recipe Card Spoon and Fork