B2S Meal Planning
For me the hardest part about preparing breakfast, lunch or dinner for our kids during the school year is the planning portion of the meal. We are all faced with so many decisions, coming up with solutions to a variety of problems, and whatever else is thrown our way in a day that we feel burnt out come meal time. At least that’s how I feel. I have the physical energy to make whatever meal I need to make, I just can’t come up with any ideas of what I am going to make. And if I do, and my kids meet the meal with any sort of resistance, game over - especially if the meal is dinner and I’ve had a rough day.
So this school year we are working through a brand new strategy, going straight for the easy button, and I encourage y’all to do the same.
A couple of weeks ago I sat down with our kids to discuss meal options. They got to weigh in on what they would actually eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner. They rattled off all of their ideas for meals of the day and I then sifted through the input to create a weekly meal plan for them. Our kids are still super picky, regardless of what I expose them to, so often times their meals are very different from ours. During our intake session, if they told me they wanted pancakes for breakfast, I figured out a way to give them “healthier” pancakes. If they wanted cereal I found a way to introduce protein as a side so they would stay satiated for longer. Allowing our kids to weigh in on what they will actually eat will encourage more successful meal times and less tantrums - unless my kids are the only ones who act out when they are served food they don’t love ; )
Once I had feedback from our kids about what they would eat I came up with a menu, or schedule if you will, of when they would get these specific items. To make things easier for us our kids will be getting a specific food item (or category) on a specific day of the week. For example every Monday they will eat protein pancakes for breakfast (Monday’s suck, start it with something everyone looks forward to), Tuesday scrambled eggs, Wednesday yogurt parfait, etc. Assigning a food item (or category) for each day of the week makes it easier on the parents (less decision fatigue) and the kids know what to look forward to. To prevent food burnout with your kids you can alter the meal each week - add blueberries to their pancakes, add bacon and cheese to their eggs, try different fruit in their yogurt and so forth.
I highly recommend downloading + printing the file below to work through your family’s weekly meal plan for the upcoming school year. This will take one more thing off your plate (see what I did there?) to give you more time to live your very own well designed life.
