I meal plan every week, I find it's the easiest way to curb my spending in the supermarket and make sure everyone is eating a well balanced diet. Meal planning means I visit the shops less, as I'm not having to pop in and pick up random bits and bobs to make dinner, I have it all ready from our one weekly food shop. I tend to sit down at the weekend and make a meal plan for the week, and from that I will make a shopping list of what we need. The easiest way to do the food shop then is to do it online, which is really easy with your shopping list to hand and it means you don't pick up extra things that you see in the supermarket so it saves me money and keeps me in check every week!

I also like to meal plan because as myself and the children are vegetarian it's really important that we eat a well balanced diet to make sure that we are getting all the correct nutrients (this is important for any diet really!). I can write out the meals on the meal planner and have a look to see if they are protein / carb heavy and whether there is enough vegetables there and make adjustments to the week's menu accordingly. I also like to plan a couple of snacks or cakes that we have out to nibble on or in case we have guests - my friends will know that my cake stand in the kitchen is never empty!

With baby number 4 not long away I'm trying to be extra organised and get a few systems into place to help me manage the household tasks, four children and a job without going insane! So whilst I always meal plan, I usually just scribble it down on a notebook or word document and have to go hunting for it during the week when I want to find out what we are eating that night! So to combat this I have designed a really pretty floral printable meal planner that I can print off every week and keep on the fridge. It's pretty so it looks good (better than my scrawled on list!) and it's great beingto see at a glance what I have planned for the week.

And because sharing is caring lovely readers, I've made my printable meal plan available to you guys as a free download. I won't even make you sign up to my newsletter (but it would be great if you did anyway!!).