End of October Meal Plan

As I alluded to last week, my work situation is about to change. Big time. It's all good, and I'm grateful, but it's going to require more organization on my part. That's okay, bring it on, I'm ready. :)

Grocery shopping is turning out to be one of the most difficult things for me to fit into our new routine. It's hard to squeeze everything I need to into our weekends. I sure don't want to spend a minute longer than I need to shopping for food. So...I'm going back to an old stand-by, I'm going to try a 2-week meal plan again. Shopping for 2 weeks will help me spend less, and even more importantly right now, will free up some time. I know I'll still need to go to the grocery store weekly for milk, bread, veggies, fruit, but having the huge shopping out of the way should help. BTW--Am I the only one who goes to several stores? I shop at WalMart for the prices of basics--cereals, yogurt, etc. Whole Foods sometimes for produce and our organic milk. A local specialty store, Weiland's, (if you're local check it out, it's really awesome and it's fun to support such a great independent grocer), for meat, pork, chicken, lunchmeat, homemade soups, tons of impulse purchases, etc.; Anderson's for coffee and bread. It's insane, but I'm hooked on what each store does best and not willing to give that up. Eventually, probably in January, I'm going to play around with a monthly meal plan and shopping at WalMart once a month for the staples, then filling in with my beloved specialty grocers for produce, bread, milk, etc. Anyone ever try anything like that?

Daycare lunches:
Mondays--chicken nuggets, apples, pretzels
Tuesdays--grilled cheese, bananas
Wednesdays--macaroni & cheese & grapes
Thursdays--PB&J (if Matt not here), grilled cheese if he is
Fridays--pita pizzas, fruit

Friday--Taquito & Flautas
Saturday lunch--soup from Weilands Yum!
Saturday dinner--
Sunday brunch--Pancakes
Sunday (very early) dinner (Halloween & Nutcracker practice)--Abuelos (kid's eat free in costume)
Monday (Julianna's B'day!!)--ribs, baked potatoes, broccoli, chocolate cake, chocolate ice cream
Tuesday (piano, dance)--Spaghetti & Meatballs (from the freezer!), salad, Fat Witch Apple Spice Bars
Wednesday (scouts)--Beef w/Snow Peas, grilled bok choy, rice
Thursday (dance)--Chicken Gyros, potato wedges
Friday--Trader Joe's Tamales, corn cakes
Saturday lunch (OU--Rebekah!)--out, cupcakes for Jul. bday
Saturday dinner--Seared sea scallops and pasta, salad, bread
Sunday lunch (Julianna's birthday party)--leftovers
Sunday dinner--Flank steak, spinach salad, baked potatoes
Monday (dance)--Antipasta Salad, bread
Tuesday (piano, dance)--Lasagna Style Baked Ziti (I'm going to make one for piano and divide ours in half, putting one in freezer for another day) bread, salad, Pumpkin Crisp (keeps getting bumped, I'll fit it in for sure this rotation)
Wednesday (scouts)--Chinese BBQ pork, fried rice, grilled bok choy?
Thursday (dance)--Trader Joe's Orange Chicken, rice, szechwan green beans
Friday--Wonton Soup, egg rolls

Thank you so much for the feedback on my desperate cry for help. You've given me some wonderful ideas. A friend stopped by with the Dream Dinners cookbook for me to borrow. It's chockful of really intriguing ideas, I'm going to try and find some time to prep some meals to have in the freezer. Going to a DD store doesn't really interest me, but I was very surprised at how appealing the cookbook was.

I'm also going to stock up on pasta sauce, pancake mix, Hamburger Helper and Trader Joe's freezer meals that we like. Those are all great options to have on hand for quick dinners that I had basically forgotten about in my panic the other day. I also realized that I need to let go a little of feeling like I have to make a "certain" dinner for Mark. That's nice when it can happen, and usually it can, but sometimes pancakes just might have to do. :)

Thanks as always for all your support. Check out other meal plans at Organizing Junkies. Have a great week!