We’ve incorporated a weekly meal planning template into our home and it’s made family dinners so much easier

A couple of weeks ago I decided to simplify meal planning and family dinner. I make dinner basically every night for my family, but coming up with a meal plan each week was tedious and annoying.

I had the idea to do a simplified meal plan, just to take the guesswork out of my meal planning.

Every night has a general theme that easily helps me decide what to make.

These are our meal planning themes that work best for what we already eat and love

Monday: One pan

This will be roasted veggies, meat, etc. all on a sheet pan roasted in the oven — Tuesday is my grocery shopping day, so this is a good way to use up things that are about to go bad)

Tuesday: Taco Tuesday/Mexican food

what started out as Taco Tuesday morphed to Mexican food in general because there are a lot more options under that umbrella.

Wednesday: Pasta night

Thursday: Soup/Salad/Sandwiches

During the warmer months we’ll do more salads and sandwiches, during the colder months we’ll do more soup

Friday: Pizza or Grilling

Saturday: Date Night

This is either date night for Philip and me, or a family date night with all of us going out to a restaurant.

Sunday: Crockpot, dutch oven, or meals that take longer

Here are some other recommendations that people made:

• Leftover night (I eat leftovers for lunch a lot, so we don’t usually have enough to make a whole day out of it — but if you do, it’s a great idea!)
• Breakfast for Dinner night
• Seafood Night
• Ethnic Food night
• Chicken night
• Meatless Monday
• Casserole night

There are endless variations on this — do what works for your family!

Someone also recommended organizing seven different pinterest boards for each of your meal categories, so it’s really easy to scroll through and make meal decisions as you meal plan. I’m definitely doing this!