currently eating
here is our meal rotation for all our breakfasts, snacks, lunches, and dinners:
see this blogpost for more on why we love our meal rotation, how we created it, and tips (plus a freebie!) for making a meal rotation work for you. see how I menu plan here and where I find new recipes here.
and remember: my 2022 intentions were to make one cookbook recipe a week and one fish recipe a week, so we’ll see how that goes.
currently cooking
sunday:
dinner: grill and chill
brett grills pork chops
or makes glazed ham steaks
depends on prices + availability, let’s be real
blistered garlic green beans and/or honey balsamic glazed carrots
brett’s favorite biscuits - pull the leftovers I froze a month-ish ago out of the freezer
monday: sandwich night (+ soup/salad, if we're feeling it)
why we love a weekly sandwich night
If you’ve been around longer than two minutes, you know I’m a relatively picky eater. So we do a lot of build your own meals and family style meals so that Brett can do his version of dinner - or in this case, a fully loaded club sandwich with a big bowl of potato soup piled high with bacon, cheese, and green onions - and I can do mine - a plain bowl of soup, maybeee with a BLT or a turkey sandwich. everybody’s happy!
tuesday: taco-ish tuesday
build your own breakfast tacos
use leftover bacon from monday
wednesday: pizza, pasta, or rice
artisan bread, if time/energy
frozen green beans (let’s try cooking them this way) or garlic butter frozen vegetables
thursday: chicken, fish, or sausage
big bowl of fruit + steamed broccoli
friday: takeout or leftovers
saturday: snack dinner saturday or dinner with loved ones
(use costco frozen fish in freezer + leftover tortillas from tuesday + leftover lettuce/tomato from monday)
big bowl of fruit + frozen sweet potato fries
currently using
our favorite toys, activities, books, and sensory bins for january
our household items from this month’s subscribe and save order
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currently meal prepping
i usually do a little meal prep on Sundays as a part of our Grill and Chill, but I may instead do a bit here and there throughout the week. (you’ll notice I allow space in my daily rhythm for potential meal prep.) at a minimum, I try to always do this - makes the whole week SO much smoother!
below is the list of what I hope to meal prep this week - it may not all happen, and that's okay! even 5 minutes of prep is super beneficial.
prep some dinner components:
none
prep some sort of dessert for the week:
one of my favorite podcasters said this is an incredibly easy way to plan joy into your week and I SO agree. see here why it’s our new favorite thing for our marriage.
blackberry cobbler (i sub blueberries) from this cookbook, thanks to my my 2022 intentions to cook one cookbook recipe a week
prep some things to make breakfasts/snacks/lunches smoother - because while I love to cook dinner, I prefer my breakfasts and lunches to be made ahead of time. at a bare minimum, I try to always prep some sort of eggs, some sort of oats, and some sort of muffins/waffles/pancakes for our breakfast rotation, and I try to change up the recipes each week so that cooking stays fun for me and so KK is exposed to variety:
pull favorite mini blueberry muffins from freezer
make easy egg and potato breakfast casserole
or pull egg muffins with bacon and cheese from freezer (I omitted bacon so that they’re cheesy egg bites nommmm)
or make a batch of peanut butter cookie oatmeal bites (link has 7 other varieties)
or make a batch of oatmeal like this
excerpt from my “my breakfast and lunch favorites” blogpost:
up until, like, a year ago, i swore I disliked oatmeal. but it turns out I was just eating the wrong kind. my mom one day made oatmeal like this with good oats, and served it to me plain with a generous slab of butter stirred in. it was this savory risotto-like situation. it was heavenly. and from then on, I was a converted oatmeal lover.
so now I make a batch - at least once or twice a month - of the above recipe, and I portion them out into smaller mason jars like this. that way, when it’s breakfast/lunch time, I can grab one of the containers, heat it up, stir a slab of butter into the hot oatmeal, and enjoy. i thank Past Haley profusely whenever I find these gemstones in my fridge.
make a stack of freezer pb&js, if time/energy
move frozen cherries/mango/pineapple to fridge for kk
prep a big jug of carrot orange juice, if time/energy
read more about my juicing routine here
Need more ideas for make-ahead breakfasts and lunches to meal prep? Here’s my list of favorites!
currently reading
finally finished this historical mystery - i love love LOVED it!! starting this book next after seeing rave reviews.
curious how I read so often? read that answer - and other FAQs - here!
currently loving
my evening rest - lately i’ve made a point to read every night instead of working on my computer and it’s slowly breathing new life back into me
one of my favorite things to freeze: “for my after school snack as a teacher, for when I was hangry after swim practice, for when I was nursing KK around the clock, for when I was working on bridesmaid bouquets, for when I didn’t want to waste precious naptime making myself food, for when I wanted to make an easy lunch for my toddler.”
currently working on
resting, taking care of myself, and clearing my calendar of the nonessentials
lately I’ve been feeling a little burnt out/irritated due to a few small things that on their own feel completely manageable, but piled together quickly feel overwhelming: kk and i overcoming the last remnants of a cold, kk sleeping poorly as a result, our puppy having an ongoing issue that requires seemingly-constant attention (i’ll spare you the boring details), brett working really late into the night this month (and me realizing how much I rely on his usual evening/weekend availability), brett and I having a miscommunication about finances, me missing swimming (and wondering what I can change to prioritize that better in this season), me overthinking a few things, me feeling strung out as an INFJ, me continuing to feel all the frustrations/anxieties that come after a pregnancy loss, etc. so i’m going to reallyyyyy focus on this list of things that make me feel my best, i’m going to guilt-free cancel a few prior engagements, I’m going to spend less time on Instagram, I’m going to ask myself what I need in this season, and I’m going to give myself all the grace in the meantime.
all that to say, if you’re having a similar week, know that you are not alone, you are seen, and you deserve whatever you need to take care of yourself.
currently sharing
always sharing our favorite routines, our favorite systems, and our favorite dinners on Instagram - come say hi! your kind words make my day. truly.
and know that when you share my page on Instagram with your followers, I do a happy dance. your support means everything, and your support allows me to spend time creating free content, like this menu plan. xo.