How to: Meal Plan Chalk Board

Just about every day Jason asks “so what’s for dinner?” to which I reply: “umm, I’m not sure, let me look it up”. And then I rifle around until I get distracted, and then 2 hours later when it’s about dinner time and I’ve forgotten to take out the chicken to thaw and Jason’s like “what’s for dinner? I’m hungry” and then I’m like “crap”.

Taking the lead from Average Jane Crafter, I’m posting our meal plan from now on to eliminate all of the above synario. I started out with a dry erase board that I had purchased from the $1 bin at target or some such place. It became frustrating pretty quickly because I had to scrub the dry erase marker off with a scotch bright pad – not so “dry” erase-able.

My next idea was to take a cue from my sister and make a dry erase board from an old vintage frame. She did this for my wedding, but with chalk board paint and it worked great. But after snapping the glass in half and reading pretty bad reviews of the paint, opted to go a new route – use what I already had a pile of in the basement.

I just sharpied the days of the week onto this fine chalk board my sister made and I was all set. Here’s how it came together. So easy.

Materials Needed

• Vintage frame with glass
• Chalk board paint
• Brush
• Metallic Sharpie
• Meal plan

Remove the glass from the frame and paint it with 2-3 coats of the chalk board paint. Let it dry thoroughly between coats.

Use a metallic permanent marker to write the days of the week on your board. I do this to save time. When I’m chalking in my meal plan I just wipe it down and write in the recipes.

One of the draw backs of the chalk board vs the dry erase board is that the chalk can be a little frustrating to write with. But, while working on the chalk boards for the wedding, I found that a sewing chalk pencil works great. Or even better, one of those fancy chalk holders that have the small sticks of chalk in them. Until I get my hands on one of those again (it got lost in the post-wedding shuffle), I’ll make do with just sharpening my chalk in a big crayon sharpener, haha. Works well enough.

What does HFLL and EDF and 125 BVSC stand for? Three of my go to recipe resources: High Flavor Low Labor, Every Day Foods, and 125 Best Vegetarian Slow Cooker Recipes.

Of course here’s the part where Gregory discovered the chalk.

And that he could pick it up in his mouth and run off with it.

I’m pretty lazy, so for me, I didn’t want to fuss with writing in the days of the week each week when I could just do it once and be done with it. Plus I like the way the silver looks. All you need to do is “squirt” “squirt”, wipe it down and I’m all set to write in next week’s plan — which I’m still working on.

Happy Crafting and Meal Planning (which is hopefully then followed by cooking)!
Kristin