Meal planning using Trello

Today's post has absolutely nothing to do with photography, BUT it has a lot to do with organization and planning and utilizing tools that might make your life easier in the long run. As a small business owner and entrepreneur, anything I can implement in my daily life to make things run just a little bit smoother ends up benefiting my business in the long run! 

I'v blogged before about using Trello to create a blog calendar and since that time, I've been digging into this list making system to see what else it can help me with. I've discovered a system for meal planning that really seems to be working for me so far, so I wanted to share it today! 

Before I got married (just over 4 years ago) I never really understood the "dinner struggle" that I had heard other women and mothers talking about. But once I was now responsible for feeding not only myself but TWO other people (a hungry man and a very hungry teenager) the struggle became strikingly real to me. 

Cheese and crackers and thrown together salads were NOT going to cut it anymore. 

I also didn't grow up with a big family or big family meals that happened often and never really had an interest in cooking before, mostly because I just didn't have anyone to cook for. So not only was learning how to make things a difficult transition, but also planning meals and organizing everything to fit in with all the crazy scheduled that happen to two busy adults and one busy high schooler seemed an impossible hurdle. 

I've tried numerous different strategies over these past four years including a glass frame that I wrote out the weekly meals on, to a large chalkboard, to sections in my planner, to scheduling dinners on the google calendar and on and on and on. Nothing really "stuck" because of some sort of limitation in one way or another. 

Until now. 

I think this might be it. I think this might work for the foreseeable future. And I'm pumped. I feel like the stress of the dinner planning has been lifted and I can't wait to share my new system!

For anyone who doesn't necessarily want to READ the instructions and you would rather SEE me go through the process, there is a short and sweet video at the end of this post where I show you exactly how I set this all up! 

The Meal Planning Board

In Trello, everything is organized by BOARD, then LIST, then CARD. You can also add checklists to individual cards. 

I have created a Meal Planning BOARD. On that board I have a few different lists as you can see below. The lists are:

• Grocery List
• Weekly Dinner Choices
• Weekly Dinner (by date)

The Lists

Grocery List

I have two cards. One is for Sunday groceries and one is for mid week groceries. On each of these cards, I have checklists which include a running list of everything I might need to pick up at the store for the upcoming weeks groceries as well as anything we might be running out of. 

Mid week list is for anything that we run out of during the week that I might need to pick up prior to next Sunday. 

The Weekly Dinner Choices

This is a running list of all of the options I have for dinners. I have one really picky eater in the family, so my choices are on the small side plus I just have limited cooking abilities. My end goal would be to get this list as long as possible, so I have a large number of things to choose from to add to the weekly dinner lists. 

This list has been life changing for me. I'm not good at just thinking up meals on the fly, so when push comes to shove, I would always revert back to one of the like four things I can make with my eyes closed, and we ended up eating a LOT of the same meals over and over again. This list has made it possible for me to not have to remember and I can just reference the list anytime I get stuck. 

Weekly Dinner (dates)

This list has 7 cards on it spelling out whats for dinner every night of the week. I have cards as well for various things that might happen during the week as well like a football game, us being out of town, or a pre-scheduled dinner out. 

Building your weekly dinner list

At some point prior to Sunday, I will go in and create next weeks Dinner list. I can add items to this list in a couple of different ways. I can just add new cards and type in what we might be having or I can just copy the cards from the main Weekly Dinner Choices list. 

To do this, just right click on the card, click COPY and then select the new list you want to copy it too. It will add a new card right to that list. 

Like this! 

Then you can go in and change the date of the card to reflect whatever day you are having that meal. This way they will all show up in the calendar view in case you want to view it that way. 

It might be a little small to see, but this is the calendar view, so you can see a history of what you've had for dinner so you can space out certain meals that you might eat a lot. 

Like I said above, this system has been proving very helpful for myself and Paul and Kyle. I also added Kyle as a contributor to the list so he can actually access Trello on his phone and add things to the grocery list in case he is aware of something we need that I might know we are out of. I also have the Trello app on my phone so when I go to the grocery store, the list is right there ready to go! 

I am really loving everything Trello has to offer so far and I can wait to use it for workflows once I start booking here in NJ!!

If you are interested in watching the video, here you go! 

If you are interested in giving Trello a try just click this link and you can sign up for FREE! 

CLICK ME

How to create a blog calendar with Trello

I was recently introduced to Trello by Katelyn James who apparently was introduced to it by Zach Gray. Some heavy hitters were using this app and singing its praises so I thought it was worth checking out. 

I was instantly impressed with power of this organizational...app? system? website? I'm not exactly sure what to call it, except life changing. Yes, I will go there. It is on its way to making it to the list of top tools for new photographers. Heck top list of useful things for ANYONE, not just photographers!

I've used some other online "to do list" and notebook type systems before but none of them really worked intuitively, nor did they seem to have the ability to really do what I needed them to do. I wanted to make to do lists that were customizeable, moveable, flexible and functional. Something I could use on my computer and my phone that was easy to understand and update. So far, Trello wins in all of the above! 

Since the system is so powerful, I'm still getting a handle on using it for various personal and business tasks. One thing I have however figured out is an amazing system for scheduling my blog posts! This has been something I have struggled with for YEARS and I am ridiculously excited to finally have found something that just works. And its EASY! And VISUAL! I could go on and on, but instead how about if I just show you instead? 

The Trello organizational system is broken down into Boards, Lists, and cards. You can create multiple BOARDS and then on each BOARD you can create LISTS that apply to that board. On each LIST you can add CARDS to further delineate. On each CARD you can add multiple things like due dates, labels and checklists. All of these things are easily movable between each other and you can even add multiple USERS to share things back and forth!

Here is what my current BOARDS look like: 

LISTS are listed by column and then you can add cards to each list

When you add a CARD you can customize many things. You can add a description, you can add in a checklist, you can label the card and also add a due date or comments to the card. You can also upload photos to a card or add documents or links to cards as well. 

I will likely do a few posts in the future with more suggestions on setting up boards, lists and cards but for now I want to show you my system for using Trello to schedule my blog posts. Its worth using just for this feature alone, I promise!

On my Blogging BOARD I have multiple LISTS. One list is to keep track of ideas. One list is for posts I have decided to write and have put on the calendar (need to write), the next list is for posts I have written and scheduled in Squarespace and then my final list is for posts that have posted (kind of like a complete or done list.) 

The beauty of this system is that once you write a CARD, that card is easily moved in between lists. You can either right click on it and move it to another list (even on another board) or you can just drag and drop the card from list to list. So I have an idea for a post and make a CARD under my ideas LIST. Then when I am ready to move it to the calendar, I simply drag and drop it over to the On Calendar list and then update the card with a red label (to write) and assign a date to the card (the date in which the post will go live.) 

Ok so here is the REALLY fun part. You can enable the calendar feature on your board menu which will pop up this icon in the top right hand corner. 

When you click on the calendar link, it takes you to the visual calendar so you can see all the posts in calendar format. WAIT WHUUUT!!! Yes!! How awesome is that?

And what could be better than this? Well, you can actually update the calendar FROM the calendar! Yes, you can click on a date and add a card right there! You just click on the date and it will pull up an option to add a card and will let you choose which list to add it to and in which position on the list. 

Ok so I seriously hope I blew your mind with this because when I figured out exactly how this worked I think I might have just sat and stared at my computer smiling for a full 5 minutes. I have been searching long and hard for a system that will do exactly this and I am so glad that Trello crossed my path! 

Have you had trouble finding a blogging scheduling solution in the past? What do you think? Will this work for you? 

As always, leave any comments or questions below and I am happy to answer!