An ode to my refrigerator menu board

From the early "dinnertime zoo" days through divorce, kids growing and leaving, and remarriage, my meal plan has helped me (mostly) hold it all together.

Yesterday, as I typically do on Mondays, I sat down to make my weekly meal plan.

For most people I know, meal-planning seems to something they either rely on or resist. I am firmly in the first camp. There’s something comforting in the knowledge that there’s a plan to feed all the inhabitants of my home with the resources I have at my disposal; plus, after meal-planning consistently for well over a decade, I know just how integral having a plan can be to avoid the 5 PM “Oh no, what are we going to eat?” panic, followed by “Well, I guess we could hit the drive-thru…” surrender.

And my meal plan has also been an indicator, over the years, of the changes and fluctuations my family has gone through, from a big family of small kids, to a much smaller family of big kids who are sometimes with me and sometimes not.