Kickstart the Year: Simple Meal Planning!

posted on : January 2, 2024 posted by : Graceful Duo- As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases

Meal Planning made easy with meals the family will enjoy!

Struggling with meal planning? I do too and this is a big goal for myself this year. Mom and I have decided to share our meal plans with our readers! Say goodbye to dinnertime dilemmas and kitchen chaos. Join us as we simplify your life with a free meal plans each month! Feel free to use the same meal plan that we share or pick some meals from our recipes to mix in with some of your favorites. You will find two downloads in this blog. One will be our January meals and the other is an empty calendar so that you can make your own.

As you look at the meal plan you will notice that my family likes to have theme nights for some of the days of the week. These theme nights help me when I’m meal planning. Because lets be honest meal planning is a big struggle when you have a big family with picky eaters.

Monday we love to make breakfast food.
Tuesday is our famous taco Tuesday night. What I love about these recipes is that you can switch them up between ground meat or chicken.
Wednesday is always our leftover night. If there isn’t enough leftovers it becomes kid’s choice of whatever they would like in the house.
Friday is our crazy night of hockey so it’s crockpot dinner night. Prep after I drop the kids off to school and then its ready to eat a early dinner after school.

Recipes for the Meal Plan:

Here are the recipes that I will be using this month to go along with my meal planning calendar-

2- Baked Tacos

These are a favorite because I can make them how everyone likes. Most of the time ours turn out to be just meat and cheese baked. Then add toppings to your liking.

4- Pork chops

This ranch recipe is a great one. My picky eaters eat it because it has ranch and then they dip it in more ranch.

5- Crockpot Chicken Parmesan Soup

This recipe is a new recipe to us and I’m so excited to try it.

7- Smoke Sausage Bake

This is a recipe that I have shared on the blog before. It’s a household favorite!

8- Breakfast pigs in blankets

Cinnamon rolls and sausage…Yes Please! This is also a new recipe for us but these are two of our favorites.

9- Taco Bowls

These are so easy to make! Plus you feel like you went to Qdoba without breaking the bank. I love these because it’s another great one for the picky eaters to put what they want on their plate.

11- Chicken Broccoli Tortellini

I love making this recipe. The only thing I do differently is keep the broccoli out and just steam it on the side to add to my plate when finished.

12- Crockpot Pizza Casserole

A yummy twist on pizza night. Super easy to throw together. Plus super easy to add your favorite pizza toppings to it.

13- Chicken with Veggies

This is a yummy recipe using everything bagel seasoning on the chicken. Super quick and the best part it’s a sheet pan meal so not a lot of dishes at the end of the night. What I love is that you can do whatever veggies that your family likes.

15- Breakfast Bowls

This is another household favorite. We do eggs, frozen hash browns, sausage and cheese for ours. Everyone in the family makes their bowls how they like and makes for an easy dinner.

16- Lazy Enchiladas

This is a tik tok recipe that we found over the summer and enjoy. So easy and dinner is ready in 20 minutes!

18- Easy Stuffed Peppers

Stuffed peppers made easy! We love stuffed peppers but hate how long they take to prep and cook. So we do this recipe a lot. One thing that we do differently for ours is instead of using ground meat we use Jimmy Dean’s ground sage sausage. So yummy!

19- Crockpot Ritz Chicken

This recipe is a great easy meal. I server ours with rice. Also buttered noodles are great to go along with this recipe.

20- Creamy Tuscany Ravioli Soup

This is another yummy recipe that I’m excited to make this month. I love soup season!

21- Homemade Chicken Nuggets

We have shared this recipe on the blog before. It has become a family favorite that the kids have been asking for me to make again. So they will be happy to see these on the menu.

22- Biscuits and Gravy Casserole

We love biscuits and gravy. I love how quick I can throw this together in a foil pan for easy clean up!

23- Walking Tacos

My kids love these! One way I save money on this recipe is just buy a big bag of chips. Instead of buying the little bags for our family. Then we layer it on a plate. But I can’t call it a taco salad or my picky eaters won’t eat it. This is a go to for an easy dinner night and easy to meal prep for ahead of time.

25- Orange Chicken

For this dinner I use a frozen kit from Sam’s Club for an easy meal. I just throw the chicken in the air fryer and put some rice into the instant pot. Super easy and delicious! If your a Sam’s member check out this meal

26- Slow cooker Cheesy potato sausage

This is a great recipe for those cold nights. So yummy!

27- Sausage Rigatoni D

This is a copycat meal and one of our favorites! The recipe calls for chicken. I like to switch it out for Italian sausage. Feel free to use either one.

28- Bubble Pizza

This is another kid’s favorite recipe and I love that you can add your favorite pizza toppings to it.

31- Cheesy Tater Tot casserole

We love tater tot casserole so this is a new twist that we are trying this month. Looks delicious.