Okay. I’m gonna tell you right now, keeping up with cooking for my bunch is no easy task. And while I don’t have a crazy number of tots, they are enough that this mama has to plan ahead, or we end up eating frozen dinners or hot dogs every night. lol.
To do this, a few years ago I started planning a menu. A month at a time, usually. I do this on a large calender dry erase board. Like this:
When I make dinner, I try to make double what I need so that I can stick that second part in the freezer. Or I’ll take the leftovers and turn it into something else also for the freezer. So, at the bottom of each post (or most posts 
) You’re going to see: “what’s on the menu tonight” and “for the freezer.” Now you know what these mean. A lot of these books want you to cook for an entire day and get the whole months food done and in the freezer. This is overwhelming. I don’t advise doing it. Cooking double meals will get you stocked up pretty quickly.
When I grocery shop I use a ‘master grocery list.’ (I know, it sounds so official, right?) It’s basically just a page with everything on it that I usually buy. I’m a creature of habit, so I usually only use one kind of laundry soap, dishwasher tablets, etc. So I typed these in and when I need that I check the box. When I was home educating my tots this was Mr. Smartypants’ job (when I’d remember ) to find the item and check it off or put how many of said item we needed to buy. 2 gallons of milk, 4 loaves of bread.
At the bottom of this page are some excellent books on how to get started with this. I bought a couple from Amazon.com and read them. They are very helpful, and have so many different recipes to help you get started. Though, after awhile common sense will take over, and you’ll figure out the specifics. So, go ahead, click on the books below, check them out, add them to your cart, and get started!
