I noticed that I was not enjoying the following scenario.

Daughter walks into my bedroom in the morning and asks, "What are we having for dinner tonight?" And I tell her homemade soup and she sighs, and says thank you but she thought we were grilling hamburgers.

Toddler walks into the kitchen later, while I am chopping carrots for the soup and asks, "What are we having for dinner tonight, Mommy?" I tell her homemade soup and she says "Oh no, not again." She gets corrected for being complainy-poo.

I'm doing math with teenage daughter and she asks what we're having for dinner tonight. I tell her homemade soup and she says "Oh, okay." In a polite but not so thrilled voice.

Teenage son walks through kitchen as I'm chopping onions later for the homemade soup and asks, "What's for dinner tonight, Mom?" And I tell him and he says, "Mm-kay?"

Husband gets called away on a trip and won't be home to eat dinner with us tonight.

I know my family appreciates my cooking, but after all this yinging and yanging with all these people, I'm not quite so enthused about my homemade soup anymore. I prayed about it, and got the idea to put a chalkboard on a shelf in our living room, with that night's meal written on the chalkboard. A piece of paper stuck under a magnet on the fridge would work too. 

Now, instead of having the tedious Q&A with my entire family throughout the day, they can take a gander at the chalkboard and discuss amongst themselves.