Why You Need to Start Menu Planning Save Time Waste Less and Eat Healthier

Welcome to The Cherry On Top.

I'm jumping in here quickly to share the idea of menu planning, again. It's such an amazing habit to develop and practice. You will thank yourself. Trust me. To help you out, I've designed more coordinating kitchen printables.

Let me explain how I do mine and you can determine if it's for you or if ya need to change it up to make it fit your life.

Every Sunday morning, when all four of us are sitting in the living room with tea and coffee, I find out everyone's week's schedule, ask if there are any cravings and get to work planning our meals for the next 7 days.

I write down each meal, usually just dinner, but sometimes breakfast and lunch, both in my paper agenda and on a piece of 4x4 paper with the menu on one side and a grocery list on the other. Then I simply stick the paper on our familial white board in the kitchen so everyone can see what's on the menu.

Writing down the menu in my agenda is something I've been doing for over 10 years. It's really fun to go back to old agendas and see what we were eating and how our diets have evolved into incredibly healthy and nutritious meals.

You can write down details about the meal. What was the family's opinion or yours or both? Did you need to add something else to pimp it up or suit your family's needs? I often make up stuff according to what is fresh in the fridge and if it turns out great, I can write the recipe in my agenda for future use.

I made this pizza with weird leftovers from the fridge, A lonely premade dough, three different cheese sorts where there was only a little left, a tiny handful of hamburger that was somehow leftover, the remnants of a bbq sauce jar (it was really strong and super spicy. So, I didn't need much.) a nearly shriveled green onion and some fresh basil.

I love flipping through my agenda when I'm not feeling so motivated. I often start at the beginning or jump to the middle, depending on where we are at in the year and can quickly pull together my menu.

A friend of mine shared what her family does: 

"My husband uses Ai to suggest 4 recipes per week. He has it create a grocery list and sort it base on the department it would be in at ... (name of grocery store) I then delete anything on the list I know we have and add anything else I know we need like toothpaste..."

Isn't that a neat idea? I also lovED Pinterest, but some annoying aliens came and destroyed Pinterest. At least I still have my boards with thousands of meal, drink and dessert ideas. Today's lame ass Pinterest is full of ads, Ai and countless Pins of which I have absolutely no interest in. You can always hit up our many boards on Pinterest. They are full of healthy-ish, easy-ish ideas and I even have a vegan board which I like to hit up now and then.

Here's another great way to clean out the fridge. Old, wrinkled veg and the remnants of cream cheese.

You will save a lot of headache when you plan and when you are prepared to cook. You'll waste a lot less, too. You might even be able to zip through the grocer if you've got a great, ordered list. I sure do! This may be cheeky, but sometimes when I go to a store that is very tempting, I only take two bags and NO cart. I get what's on the list and if I still have room I can get things that are not on the list. This might take some discipline! Hehehe...

I endeavored to write nearly a year's worth of weekly menus that you can access on our blog and or our Weekly Menu Planner board on Pinterest. There's a Lunch for the Little Ones board, too. It has great, healthy-ish ideas for kids lunches and yours.

These are a ton of work. I only make them on my hub's birthday. I had the youngest help me and he learned how to make fresh, buttermilk biscuits and homemade sausage patties. I'll be sharing the recipes later. I used Paula Dean's biscuit recipe. It's my favorite so far. Feel free to share your favorite. I find these difficult to make and time consuming.

I've got another blog with some kitchen hacks and another menu planner printable. Here's another blog with more printables that might suit your needs better.

This blog has some ideas as well as some super cute printables for in the lunch box. We have learned to eat a lot healthier than what I posted then. I am in the middle of updating most of my blogs and plan on talking about the improvements we've made over the years.

Here's one of my all time favorite blogs.

Both our boys have Autism and they both were such terrible eaters. My youngest didn't even want to breast feed! The youngest was the best breast feeder ever. Yay! Then he got Autism and everything changed. Including his eating habits. He had PICA. Goodness gracious, is that something to go through. I'm feeling ya if you are dealing with this, too. Click on that link and read some tips that will totally help you.

Our oldest was so darn skinny and so darn hard to get to eat. We really had to get creative. Over the years we found many tips and tricks. Read the blog, share it with other parents that are finding it difficult feeding their kids healthy food or any food for that matter. It might save them a whole lot of hassle.

You're all set now to get planning and get shopping. Remember, if you're trying to eat healthier or trying to not eat processed food, don't frig'n buy it. Hehehe... We gave away our fryer so that we don't eat fried stuff. We eat fried food when we go to restaurants which is hardly ever. You may have to start off with one thing like soda. Don't buy soda. Maybe after going a few days without soda, have a small soda when you're out. Make your own with all natural ingredients. It's easy! Slowly but surly, start buying less and less processed junk. That's what we did, too.

80% of what we eat is made from scratch. We buy local products whenever possible and shop at mom and pop stores. Your neighbors will do all they can to give you good products or you won't go back. Besides, they don't want to poison their neighbors. When you shop at big chains, full of large corporation food companies like Nestle, Tyson, Kraft and Pepsico they don't give a rat's ass how healthy their food is or how healthy you are. Plain and simple! They are rolling in it, too. Unlike your local little guy. You'll feel so good knowing you are helping support your neighbor. I realize this isn't always an option. I have to go out of my way too and shop at a couple of different stores to get everything I need. I'll be going in to much detail about grocery stores, shopping and health in future blogs.

Come on back and learn more about food shopping so you and your family can live healthier, longer lives.

Thanks for checking us out. Enjoy all of the free designs.

Leave us a comment with any tips you've got or recipes that your family loves. Links will work, too.

Bon appetit!

What is Pica and What Should You Do About It

Welcome to another Autism edition of The Cherry On Top.

Every Monday we are looking across the Autism spectrum at various aspects.  We are keeping it simple, to the point, informative and hopefully, helpful for everyone.  We're mostly discussing things we've experienced because we are not professionals per say.  However, we've got over 10 years dealing with the symptoms and behaviour of two boys at different levels of the spectrum.  So, we've got a pretty good arsenal on how to live happier with Autism.

Last week we touched on oral fixations.  Letting you know the signs of potentially harmful behaviour and what to do about it.

We wanted to go a bit more in depth over pica because it's very serious and can cause illness and even death.

Firstly, if you are dealing with pica, let me tell you, we understand!  It may seem like quite strange behaviour to others and it may even be difficult to see or perhaps even be brushed off due to the incredulity alone.  I really needed to get my head around it before I started being more active with the call of action.

Pica is the consumption of non foods.  In other words eating things that are not meant to be eaten.  Our youngest had it bad when he was a toddler.  Sand, rocks, spiders, insects, nuts, bolts, rusty screws (I know right?!) and especially and still things that are rubbery or squishy.  We missed a lot of school because of illnesses attributed to pica and he ruined his teeth from chewing on rocks.

Extreme vigilance is necessary.  It could save a life.  We often had to save our child from choking.  Make sure you learn how to do this if you also know someone with pica.  Tip:  What helped us the most was explaining each and every time that you may not eat things that are not food.  Like I said, JJ was a toddler when it started and he was also 100% non verbal.  We spoke clearly, without anger, attempted eye contact, nicely held his hand or shoulder and with as less words as possible told him that this was dangerous. Don't expect confirmation from the child.  Especially, if they are non verbal, but continue to speak with them even if you think they are not listening.

It's equally as important to alert family, friends and caregivers or teachers about this condition.

It is unclear what causes pica.  A dietary inefficiency perhaps.  I would assume that the pica JJ experiences is because of the developmental disabilities attributed to his Autism.  It may also have something to do with wanting to know what something tastes like and feels like in the mouth.  That might sound strange to you and me.  However, through our time with JJ we see that Autistic folks look at things a lot differently, on completely different levels and with an entirely different background experience. 

Read This

If you are experiencing pica, be patient, but diligent.  Alert family, friends and caregivers about the condition.  Make sure you know how to prevent and help someone who is choking.  Learn the signs of poisoning and by all means, do not take any chances.  You must constantly watch for potential consumption of non foods.  Be sure to address this behaviour EVERY time you witness it.

Vigilance and the constant reminder that this is not acceptable is necessary.  It is dangerous.  It is not healthy and could be deadly.  These are what you must continuously remind the person of.  Don't forget about the effectiveness of reverse positive reinforcement.  Commend them for eating real food! It worked very well for us and JJ is so, so much better.

Occasionally, I'll remind him of his previous behaviour.  "Hey, JJ.  Do you remember when you used to eat sand and spiders?  You don't do that any more do you?  Because you can get really sick from that!  I'm glad you don't do that any more.  You are so smart."  It may sound silly, but I do occasionally see a piece of rubber or foam missing from various objects.

Those are our tips for living with pica.  I hope they were helpful and that you'll join us again next week when we look at tools to help pay attention in the class.

We wish you success!