Menu Board {Command Center Step 1}

We have been planning our meals in advance for a couple weeks now, and it really reduces stress, and saves money too! On Saturday or Sunday we will sit down for about 15 minutes and decide what we want to eat, and make a grocery list. Most of the time we go to a couple different grocery stores to get what we need (Costco, Vons, Target, Trader Joes-depending on what's in the list for the week).

I've thought about making more in bulk no freezing, but I'm not a big fan of frozen food. I'd rather make it fresh. Plus, once it goes in the freezer we tend to forget about it or not want to eat it because it just doesn't look as appetizing.

I've seen many different menu boards...check them out here , here , and here . I liked the ones with pre-made recipe cards the best, however, creating recipe cards is a very daunting task! Nonetheless, I put it on my [never-ending] to do list. A few weeks went by, and I still hadn't even started with putting together a list of meals, let alone cards complete with recipes. Then I decided, why not just make a board, see how it goes, then make the cards later!

So, I went to the store looking for supplies. I didn't quite have an exact idea in my mind of what I wanted to make, which kind of made the shopping process a bit long. I ended up going to Michaels, Target, Office Depot, Staples, Wal Mart (eeeeek!!) and back to Michaels. I can't remember now exactly why I went to so many stores...

Here are the supplies I used:

Dry erase board
Skinny foil tape
(found this at Michaels by the scrapbooking aisle, you could also your "chart tape" from an office supply store, but I could only find black or red and I didn't like those colors)
Dry erase markers
Magnetic cup for markers
Scrapbook paper
Letter stickers
Sticky magnets on a roll
Post it or notepad

{Tip: Michaels has a free iPhone app WITH coupons! A lot of the times they have 40% off one item, and this time they had 25% off your total purchase. Making most of the supplies cheaper than Target. In this case I used 40% off for the dry erase board. I think it ended up costing about $12)

I used a coupon for this too on my second Michaels trip...


First I started by making the days of the week out of magnets and scrapbook paper. You could buy pre-made days of the week magnet (Target or Staples had them), but I didn't like the look or colors of them. I wanted flexibility to change the board later, so that's the reason I made them magnets. I stuck the letter stickers (carefully- a few ripped) onto the first paper. Then used specialty scissors to cut them out, and did that again on a different paper.


Then, I just cut a little strip of magnet and put it on the back.



Next, I measured out the spacing for my tape lines and marked them with dry erase markers. I taped them off, and stuck up the days of the week. I put s strip of magnet on the back of a post it pad (much cheaper than buying a $5 magnetic post it pad. Yes I've seen them in the dollar bin, but those always fall apart on me). Then arrange everything on the board and you're done!



The fun part is picking out what you are going to make for dinner. We have been making recipes off of Pinterest along with a few of our favorites. It's nice to try new stuff!