We’ve done a loose vegetarian capsule meal plan for a couple of years now. I’ve always been vegetarian, so that’s no different, and I’ve appreciated having a relatively consistent set of meals to work around. Still, I hadn’t really solidified … Read More
Since our family celebrates Christmas, December always feels chock full of family traditions ideas. We love coming together nightly to read scriptures, read a picture book, sing songs, and more. It feels so specially and connective. But then once the … Read More
After exploring outdoors so much in our RV this year, we’ve found a lot of incredible hiking. But Sedona was unique and really special – between the red rock, beautiful winter weather, and abundance of trails, it felt pretty magical. … Read More
Today is Inauguration Day in the United States! It feels like a particularly momentous presidential change. It’s also the first time I’ve had several kids who are old enough to be really interested in the process. I’m looking forward to … Read More
When Dan and I first started traveling, selfies weren’t really a thing. I mean, you could hold a camera out, but it was significantly more difficult. Still, we didn’t really need any family photo tips because the quality of that … Read More
Race can often seem like one of those taboo topics. There’s often a feeling that it’s better to ignore it than address it head on. So maybe you’re wondering why talk to kids about racism? Let’s talk about race and … Read More
I’m a firm believer that lots of different parenting styles can be successful. One persons parenting strengths may include crafts and joint projects and peaceful correction. Someone else may be great at adventuring and exercising. All these things have value, … Read More
We’ve visited the Grand Canyon a number of times, both before kids as well as with kids. But this was our first time visiting the Grand Canyon in winter! The Grand Canyon is vast and you can certainly find plenty … Read More
Here are some fantastic children’s books about Martin Luther King, Jr., as well as a few highlighting other Civil Rights activists. While kids books about MLK won’t work against racism in and of themselves, I hope you use them as … Read More
Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the third Monday of January. For a long time, especially since it comes on the coattails of the winter holiday season, it just felt like another day … Read More
One of the trickiest things about having a lot of little ones is managing one on one time with kids. With 5 kids, it’s no joke to give individual attention to each child. We struggled for years trying to figure … Read More
We can’t fail to act against racism and also act surprised by it. We can’t agree to disagree about racism and white supremacy. Little steps to dismantle them aren’t enough; we must take huge steps. Raising antiracist kids can help. … Read More
We’ve done a loose vegetarian capsule meal plan for a couple of years now. I’ve always been vegetarian, so that’s no different, and I’ve appreciated having a relatively consistent set of meals to work around.
Still, I hadn’t really solidified our meals such that we rotated intentionally through the same set. Rather, I unintentionally defaulted to the same standbys and always felt like I was scrambling for new ideas. I decided this year was the perfect time to actually choose a set meal plan – on purpose. We have so many other things going on right now that I think it’ll be really nice to streamline our cooking.
As I mentioned, things are a bit nuts right now with homeschooling all the kids and both grown ups working from home. Plus, these years with young children just seem to feel extra busy. With all that, I HATE the feeling of scrambling to think of what to make for dinner each night.
While I used to be really good at meal planning tips, I’ve fallen off the bandwagon in the last few months. I know it’ll make dinner prep so much less stressful if I just decide in advance what to make.
Still, it often felt overwhelming even to decide what to make each night. What ingredients do we need to use up? What do we need to order? And what am I in the mood to make? I would waste so much time looking into new recipes to fill in gaps with our old standbys.
I’m so excited about a two week meal rotation mostly because I won’t have to plan things out every week or two. Instead, I could plan once and we’d do the same dinner rotation for about 3 months, during that season. Then once the weather started to change a bit and different items were in season, we could switch up our meal plan, too.
This also meant that my 2nd child could get in on the dinner rotation. With 4 meals kids can make, she and her older brother could each make dinner one day per week to cover the 2 weeks. I’m hoping this is a great chance to continue to practice their kids cooking skills and also get more efficient at making those meals.
Finally, with a solid rotation, I’m hoping we’ll be able to use up most of our ingredients. I have a couple of recipes that use similar ingredients. So I’m hopeful we’ll be more efficient with our ingredients, too!
I knew we wanted a bit more variety than a vegetarian one week meal plan, so a two week meal plan felt perfect. We already make certain types of meals on certain days of the week. So it was easy to plan around those (like pizza on Fridays or breakfast for dinner on Sundays). And then I could just research the additional meals ONE time and have them ready to go, instead of hunting for new meals each week.
I’m not really bothered by repetition in meals, and having something once every two weeks seems like plenty of variety to me. The ones in this set are more winter comfort foods.
We figured we would do this two-week meal plan for about 3 months to try it out, and then we’d be ready to switch to a more summer-focused family meal plan.
All the meals in this family meal plan are ones that we’ve loved in the past to keep it easy for this first round. Then next time, perhaps we’ll change to incorporate some more new reacipes.
Here are all the recipes we chose for our two-week vegetarian capsule meal plan – I hope it gives you some ideas for your own rotational and seasonal family meal plan!
Here are the meals we’ve chosen for our first 2-week meal plan rotation! We only have 11 meals in the rotation. That’s because we’ll do takeout 1-2 times over the two weeks, and leftovers 1-2 times over the two weeks.
Any questions? I’ll share recipes for some of these staple meals over the next few weeks!
