Fit For Me: Meal Planning

As I've stated before, meal planning is so important! It's important for your success in weight loss, to save money to ensure you don't waste food or have to make several trips to the grocery store, and in the end helps save time. It might initially take time to meal plan, but how often do you sit around wondering what you're going to eat? That takes time away from other things, like your family!

One thing I do is make the same thing for my whole family, nearly every meal. I write out the dinner menu on our board in the kitchen. My children can't read yet, but my husband and I can see it, and it helps prevent us from going out to eat like we used to, when we can see exactly what's for dinner. It's a constant reminder throughout the day, so I have something to look forward to, and so I know to be prepared. Whether that's starting the crock pot on time, or cutting veggies to get ready for dinner during the afternoon when I get some free time. I prefer eating at home anyway, so if I see a delicious dinner written on the board, I'm excited about that, and not wondering what we're going to have and giving up and going to get pizza.

I used to have a left over night where we'd have leftovers throughout the week, but now I eat left overs for lunch most days. If this doesn't work for you, I'll have a lunch idea picture a little later on in this post.

Honestly, my meal plans aren't all pretty and color coded, or super organized. They're usually written out on a scrap paper, and then I write out a grocery list so I can pick up what I need. But I've had so many friends ask for me to make meal plans, so I've decided to start sharing those meal plans I've made. Here's a few of them! If you find one that has the majority of things you like, you can use that and make substitutions for things you don't like. If you are in a higher bracket and need more containers/calories, you can add more at a time, or throughout the day. Generally, if I'm having a salad I usually use two green. I also didn't count for every single teaspoon I use. I usually use a teaspoon when I cook, and if I'm low on teaspoons, I add coconut oil to my Shakeology. I also didn't add in all the free foods and seasonings. I'll get into that later.

1200-1499 Calorie Bracket Meal Plans

You can add in proteins, fruits, vegetables, healthy fats, or whatever that you like instead of what I have, but it's nice to see it laid out and have a plan in front of you. I also recommend making a list from each category of foods you like, and then going off of that list instead of the one in the book. There's no point eating foods you don't like. If there's things you haven't tried, try it! You might find some new favorites, as well as expand what you will eat. I will start posting my weekly meal plans if I can force myself to be more organized.

Teaspoons I generally use to cook are coconut oil and extra virgin olive oil. Seasonings we commonly use are cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, pepper, crushed red pepper, paprika, cumin, any of the Mrs. Dash with no salt, chili powder, and occasionally pink Himalayan salt. I add in free foods whenever I can, like raw honey, pure maple syrup, lemon, lime, and vinegar. We like spice and flavor to our foods!

I also love the idea of having something on my fridge I can mark off. If you have a printer, you can print out these pages based on which bracket you fall under, put it in a page protector, put it on your fridge, and mark off each food you eat with a white board marker as you eat.

Are you vegan? Check out my vegan meal plan!

Bracket 1: 1200-1499 Calories