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Dinner Planning For Busy School
Days
by Christine Steendahl
Another summer has quickly passed us by. The kids have reluctantly gone
back to school. It stands to reason that life should be a little less
hectic, right? Unfortunately, that’s usually not the case. Between all
of your daily “Mom obligations”, helping with homework and providing
transportation to every extra-curricular activity under the sun, you
probably have little time to devote to dinner planning. Many times busy
parents resort to hot dogs and macaroni and cheese, frozen pizza or
frequent trips to a fast-food restaurant. That’s not healthy for you or
the kids, not to mention its pretty rough on the family grocery budget.
Kitchen time savers
There are things you can do to cut down on time spent in the kitchen.
Pick one day a week and prepare several freezer friendly meals. You can
even go the extra mile and package them in individual serving size
containers. Doing so will provide your family with a larger variety of
entrée choices, on any given day.
Do you have friends that are intrigued with the idea of a one-day a week
cooking spree or a meal planning service? Get together with 2 or 3 of
them. Each of you decides on 2 main dishes you want to prepare. Buy
enough ingredients to make the entrees for each family.
You need to plan ahead
One simple thing that you can do is keep an ample supply of fresh
fruits, salad ingredients, soups and fresh sandwich fixings, on hand.
Quick meals such as this are nutritious and don’t require a great deal
of preparation time.
If you take on the task of meal planning and want to get in the habit of
consistently putting together weekly menus yourself, you may be
surprised at how much time it involves. Did you know that the typical
family meal planner spends roughly 3 hours per week combing through
cookbooks, choosing recipes and compiling a grocery list? That
translates into 156 hours, per year. Yikes!
A menu service can help
You can say goodbye to last minute thrown together meals and eliminate
the stress of dinner planning for your family by subscribing to a meal
planning service. This type of service is very affordable, usually
costing only a few cents per day. Menus are often designed to be family
friendly and easily adaptable.
When you purchase a subscription to a service such as this, your
membership will typically feature a weekly menu emailed right to your
inbox. This includes seven main dish recipes, side dish suggestions and
dessert ideas. As an added benefit, you receive a detailed shopping
list, categorized by aisle, which makes your trip to the grocery store
that much easier. Simply cross off items already in your pantry, add any
other products you may be in need of and you’re off!
If you enjoy planning your own menu, you may want to consider a dinner
planning service, in addition to your own choices. Why? It will still
save you time, in the long run. Use the membership menu as a base. Then,
search for recipes that will deliciously compliment that weekly plan.
Remember, nothing is more important than family time. Don’t let dinner
planning get you down. Consider the suggestions we’ve made and you’ll
spend less time slaving over hot stove and more time with the people you
love.
About the author
Christine Steendahl is a pastor’s wife and mother of two beautiful boys.
Her dinner planning service provides recipes that are affordable, kid
friendly and Mom approved. For a free one week trial of a family
friendly meal planning service, visit
Dine Without Whine - Helping Families Re-Discover the Pleasure of
the Dinner Hour
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