How I Plan Our Week In Under 30 Minutes

Because even chaos needs structure.

Hi!

Between packing lunches, work deadlines, and stepping on random legos, I am not that mom who is spending time color coding every detail of our day. Kudos if you DO. But I do need a plan to manage a house with two full-time working parents and three kids—something to keep our week from totally derailing by Tuesday.

So here’s how I plan our week every week in 30 minutes or less. For me, I typically do this on *Fridays* over my lunch hour or if I’m too busy at the end of my work day. I do it this way because it allows us to refill the groceries on our weekend. If you are a stay at home parent it may make more sense to do this on Sundays! Do what works best for you. Also, full disclosure while I handle meal planning, kids’ appointments, and a lot of the mental load of our family listed below, John handles most things related to the house and all the family laundry so those are not included in my lists here. Here are my five steps to feeling organized for the week ahead!

Step 1: Calendar Check-In (5 minutes)

I pull up our calendar (that I share with my husband) and note:

- Any kiddo appointments

- School events

- My work meetings & events

- Anything extra like birthday parties or travel (I have regular day trips for work)

Then I quickly double-check the daycare/school newsletters to make sure I’m not missing anything like show-and-tell or fundraiser.
Ask me how many times I’ve almost missed pajama day.

Step 2: Meal Plan & Grocery Gaps (10 minutes)

I open my Notes app where I keep a rotating list of go-to meals (whole other post to talk about how we handle food with kids around here) I loosely plan for:

- 1 pasta night

- 1 crockpot meal

- 1 “bowl” night (taco bowl, burger bowl, etc)

- 1 “fun” dinner of the kids’ choice (pizza, tacos, mac n cheese, burgers, etc.)

- 1 mega quick meal like breakfast night (for extracurriculars night -we stack ours)

- 1 leftover night

- (We leave the option to eat out once a week)

Then I check what we have in the fridge/pantry and add anything to our shared family cart (John has any must haves for groceries in the cart by that point) in our app and I put in the grocery order. John and the girls handle the Costco run on weekends because that is their thing together to get in as many samples as possible.

Step 3: Kid Logistics (5 minutes)

I run through this quick checklist:

- Who’s doing drop-off and pick-up each day?

- Any donation or snack responsibilities?

- What’s the weather? Do they need boots, do I need to buy sunscreen, grab hats, or extra layers?

- Any back-up childcare needed?

Step 4: Life Priorities (5 minutes)

John and I go over personal priorities for the week. These usually involve things like when someone needs to cover the kids solo if someone may have a late meeting or if someone is going to happy hour or seeing a friend. Yes, we need to plan for all of that with child care so we don’t accidentally leave our children at daycare : )

Step 5: Joy & Downtime (3–5 minutes)

This part is simple but so important.

I jot down:

- One thing I want to do with the kids just for fun (nature walk, event around town, ice cream)

- One small thing for me (morning coffee outside, reading before bed, solo Target run)

Because life isn’t just to-do lists. It’s the little stuff that brings us joy!

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If you try this routine, let me know how it goes—or share your own planning hacks. We’re all figuring it out!

Kate