We made it to Week 4! Yay!! Are you still with me? If so, I’d love to hear what your biggest challenge was? How did you deal with it?
I have to be truthful and say that I blew this last week, and purchased snacks for our foster boys, instead of making them myself. My only excuse is that I was so absolutely exhausted, I just wanted convenience! Convenience spoke LOUDLY to my ears, and to my wallet! But even with this, we still only spent an additional $13.75 for snacks and milk this last week! Not too bad!
TOTAL SPENT ON GROCERIES FOR THE MONTH OF FEBRUARY: $204.02. Again, this was without meat purchases. BUT, I will say this…that may seem like a lot to spend for groceries if we are not including meat, but if you could see how much food I have left over not only in my freezer, but in my pantry, you would see that I still have a few weeks worth of groceries left over! So seriously, I think we did pretty good!! 🙂
I still have 2-1/2 cases of canned vegetables left over. We still have tons of potatoes, rice, and pasta left over. We have at least a couple of weeks of cereal left over. I will need to purchase tomato paste, spaghetti sauce, and things like that…but overall, I still have a ton of groceries left over! So the total of $204.02 will carry over into March and save us money during March as well! 🙂
The other thing I would like to add to this is that on the 13th of this month, we added two more mouths to feed! We have the pleasure of having two of the most adorable little foster boys in our home, who will be staying with us for a while. So our meals went from 1-2 meals a day for my husband and I, to three meals a day for all four of us, and two snacks a day for the boys! So not only did we spend less, but we fed more!
So, in conclusion, this is what we found during this challenge:
- Less money spent / more money in our pockets
- Better planning
- Less splurging
- Less stress in what to make for dinner
- Healthier meals
- We were happier with more meatless meals
- Fun to experiment w/more recipes
- Didn’t eat out as much because our meals were planned ahead of time
- Convenience foods don’t have to happen often but, when they do, they don’t have to cost a fortune!
I’m glad I did this challenge this month. I learned a lot! I will definitely do this again in the future.
Visit me again next week on Wednesday, when we start a new series titled “All Things Green“!
His Blessings,
Christi
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If you would like to send Christi an email in regards to this blog, you may send it to:
Christi@GirlfriendsCoffeeHour.com
When my kids were little (5 of them and 2 day care children) I learned that I had to have a dinner plan in place. There was a summer where I just could not get it together and when my husband got home from work, we would figure dinner out. He would run to the store and get what we needed. After totaling the month up on what we spent for food I was shocked and that doesn’t describe the intensity of it. We spent $1200.00 in one month. What an eye opener. I have never done that again and I have always had reserve and something to fall back on. We do a lot of sale shopping and I buy chicken in bulk when it is on sale.
This challenge was a nice reminder to use up what I have so that I can rotate and use up what needs to be used. Thank you Christi. Looking forward to All Things Green.
Very valuable lesson learned Jackie!! Wow!
I am quite happy at how the challenge played out for me this month. I may have bought bread, or my husband’s snacks, but I haven’t bought anything canned, frozen, or boxed since this started. I successfully “hide” 4 boxes of cereal so the kids wouldn’t plow through it. It was nice knowing my ideas for dinners were already written down and all I had to do was pick from the list. I’ve gone from grocery bills being between $100 and $200 a week for our family of five to less than $60. And, much fewer nights eating out or bringing in take-out. HUGE!
And, I’ve seen the mindset of using the excess overflow to my craft supplies. Now to just keep up this momentum after the challenge!
It’s funny how this seeped into other areas of our lives, without us even realizing it would! I will do this challenge again in a couple of months…only next time it will be using ONLY what is in our cabinets, pantry, freezer, and fridge…and no outside shopping! Yikes!! That will be a real challenge!! 🙂