I’m back! It was so good to step away for a little bit and get out of KC for a little bit and see my family. I’ll recap South Dakota later on this week, but today is the monthly link-up where we share a little look in to a random part of our lives.

First, let’s look back at everything we’ve shared this year.

• In January, we looked at our coffee stations.
• February, we looked at our love languages
• In March, we shared our perfect night in
• April, we looked at our fridge and pantry staples
• In May, we looked at our backyard organization
• For June, we shared our summer bucket list
• July, I shared the most horrendous bathroom organization tour ever
• And last month, I shared my favorite phone apps and phone case

Today, we’re sharing how we meal plan!

Every Thursday, I take thirty minutes of my day to plan out our meal plan for the next week. I take a look at our calendars, what activities we have going on during the week and any weekend plans, and figure out the number of meals I need to plan to cook at home.

I use this meal planning pad that has a magnet on the back to plan out our meals. Usually, I end up cooking three nights a week, we do take-out on Fridays generally, and then we have leftovers the rest of the nights.

Plus side of this little notepad, it’s perforated for the grocery list, so I can tear off the grocery store list for the week, AND, with the magnet on the back, I keep this on the fridge so that Nathan knows the nights we have planned dinner and what I’m planning on making that night.

After deciding on our meals for the week, I make out shopping list including our staples for the boys:

• Bread
• Butter – because we go through a lot of toast in this house. The boys eat toast pretty much every day for breakfast
• Milk – both 2% and whole right now because baby J is on strictly whole milk
• Yogurt. Please see the same explanation as butter.
• Cheese snacks

And then, I order 90% of our groceries from Whole Foods through the Amazon website or app.

I do this for a couple of reasons.

1. Time. With working full time, the last thing I want to do when my little boys ARE home is have to haul over to the grocery store for an hour or more and miss out on doing something much more fun with them. I can’t always get everything that I need from Whole Foods, so I end up having to make a quick trip on the weekend or during the week, if I can fit it in, to get a handful of items from our local grocery store. It’s usually a 15 minute trip max, which is oodles better, IMO, than having to shop for the groceries for the whole week.
2. 9 time out of 10, they do a great job picking out my produce. I hear a lot of people say that they don’t like grocery pick-up or delivery because they like to pick out their own produce. I totally get that. Being able to see what looks good is so much easier. But my number one goal here is to have all of our grocery shopping and planning done and out of the way before the weekend with the boys so that I can spend time with them. So, I opt for the occasional bruised peach. Do they knock it out of the park every time? No. But more often than not, I’ve found that the Whole Foods shoppers do a better job than say, Instacart, or a local grocery store chain. That’s been my experience.
3. I don’t overbuy. You know how you go into Target for deodorant and a Mother’s Day card, and pretty soon you’re leaving with new throw pillows, a new swimsuit coverup, and a blender (because you’ve been meaning to buy a new one to replace yours for YEARS)? Well, I think the same thing happens at the grocery store. I impulse buy things that are not on my list. Sure, I end up with some extra veggies and fruit. But I also end up with three bags of chips, and a new dip, too. And I don’t overbuy when I order groceries online. It more than makes up for the tip I give the driver who delivers our groceries.

So now that I’ve covered the reasons WHY I order my groceries online. I put everything in my cart, I mark the things on my list that I know I will need to pick up from the neighborhood grocery store because they aren’t sold at Whole Foods, and I set my grocery delivery to some time on Friday morning.

Why Friday? Well, I work from home, so it’s easy to have it delivered during the work day after the kids have gone to daycare. And, delivery on Friday morning allows me to know whether there is anything out of stock on my order that I’ll need to add to my ‘buy from the local grocery store’ list.

Friday is also a take-out day for us, usually, so I don’t have to worry about meal prepping something during the day!

I usually fit in a quick trip to the grocery store for the additional items we need, then, on Friday afternoon or Saturday morning, and then we’re set for the week!