I’ve been brainstorming a lot about meal time at our home.  Too often lately, I’ve been stuck on the edge of Balancing Meal Time Mountain asking myself, “What Can I Make for Dinner Tonight?” and it’s a long drop down when the answer whispers, “I have no idea.”

I promised my guys yesterday that I was fighting for our meal time again. No more excuses. Our family time around the table is too important to rush. Basketball season ended this past Saturday (with our two oldest sons’ team winning the NC State Homeschool Championship), and golf tournaments can only be played till the sun goes down, so we are re-prioritizing it.

That also means I need to get my meal planning game face on.  (I’ll be printing my Free monthly and weekly printable meal planner.) No more procrastinating about why I can’t squeeze in my Power Cooking Sessions. I mean if I share with others how to make 4 meals in 4 minutes, surely I can implement it myself. It means I need to spend this Saturday wisely by doing some freezer cooking, and then it means I need to remember to take those meals out of the freezer in the morning (or the night before.) If all else fails, at least I can enforce my One Hour Power Cooking sessions.

I’ll never forget when my family chuckled, “You just spent tonight teaching women how to cook “4 meals in 4 minutes”, but we’d be just happy with one meal in an hour.” 🙂 It was said in fun jest, and we all chuckled. My family makes lots of meals with out me, but it reminded me of my desire to have quick, homemade meals on the table, so that we can spend that quality time together, and my only excuse was I didn’t plan ahead.

(Mexican Freezer Meal Ideas)

My stockpiled pantry is bursting (Stockpiling 101), but there are only so many Mexican homemade burritos one can eat in a week.

So I am excited to get my Family Manager Meal Planner back into gear.  Three of my friends are going to hold each other accountable over the next week with our meal planning. I suggested we text each other throughout our freezer cooking day on Saturday and get each other excited about all that we are going to prepare for our families. I need that. Yes, I am geeky like that, but I do better with that challenge. Some of my most fun meal planning days occurred when I did my “Kitchen Sister’s Club.”  A group of us would get together like the old fashion quilting bee and we’d leave with eight, different freezer meals.  (Read about my Creative Group Meal Planning here and here. Don’t miss out on the comments. Everyone shared their experiences.) I am not up for organizing that this month, but I plan to do that again in the spring. It’s a lot of fun.

Since we all care about family meal time here, let’s try and solve this meal time dilemma.

If you are in a rut like I am, have you taken the time to try and narrow down what’s going on? Sometimes that’s all it takes. (Along with a little encouragement that you can get back on track and yes, you can. If I can, you can. 🙂

What are some of the things that stand in your way of getting dinner on the table?


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