A question left to be answered...

I ran across a question on webanswers.com today as I was searching for an answer to a question of my own. This person generally asked how to make her money for food stretch to fill in her month. I have had difficulties with this in the past as I'm sure most newlyweds/new mommas have.

Meal Planning
As I mentioned in a previous post I believe in meal planning. It has really saved my family a lot of money. If we generally know what we are going to eat each month we don't purchase unneeded items.

Make a list and stick to it.
Only buy what is on your list. I have also found that if I buy a vast majority of my groceries one day a month I spend less because I am not tempted to buy junk because of multiple trips to the store. Save twenty dollars or so for the end of the month to buy essential staple items.

NEVER, NEVER, NEVER go to the grocery store hungry. 

Portion Control
Another thing that has helped is only cooking what we will eat at a sitting. If I have a large bag of frozen beans I may only cook half of them and save the rest for another meal. This prevents waste and reminds us of portion control. Eating breakfast allows us to not often want more for lunch than a small snack size meal. If you do have left-overs eat them even if you have to make them into something else.

Don't buy pre-made drinks.
Make them yourself. Tea is easy: hot water, tea bags, sugar if you desire-you can customize to your liking and then refrigerate. Lemonade, and other juices I usually make from actual juice from that fruit or a concentrate found in the frozen section. Eliminate sodas-they will eventually kill you. Drink more water. Milk has mixed feelings in my household. I have read numerous studies that say you shouldn't drink milk or consume dairy over the age of 5 years and I have very mild lactose intolerance. So I drink milk when my body craves it or on cereal only. I use milk mostly to cook with. Don't buy buttermilk- mix milk with 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of vinegar and allow it to sit one minute before adding it to whatever you may cook that calls for it.

Make it if you can.
Buy staples: flour, sugar, salt, spices, baking soda, baking powder, oats, etc and mix it up. There are some really amazing recipes out there for Fake Betty Crocker Cookies and All Purpose Baking mix. Check out some of my previous posts for some recipes or follow me on Pinterest. My board America Makes Dinner is chock full of recipes. Also check out:

http://fakeitfrugal.blogspot.com

www.Eatingwell.com

www.Self.com

www.BHG.com

 http://onceamonthmom.com/

Avoid prepackaged meals.
They are often full of a days worth of sodium and not very filling. Make your own frozen dinners instead-It Is Possible! If you want more info on this leave me a comment.

Couponing Update

Yesterday was my grocery shopping day...I was actually so excited about this trip. I had compiled my usual monthly menu and shopping list. However this month I also clipped coupons. Now, I don't claim to be an extreme couponer by any means, but I figure any money I can save is worth it. I bought $400.00 worth of groceries for only $300.00. I even bought stuff that I didn't plan to buy. I started my trip this morning at Food World. They had some great sales going on. I went through the list and picked up everything paying close attention to what I had coupons for. Our first haul consisted of a thanksgiving meal minus fresh collard greens that I will pick up closer to the actual date. It also consisted of about 25 other dinner meals for the month (meats, produce, pasta, etc), breakfast items (pop tarts, sausage, biscuits, cereal, etc), and basic staples (salt, pepper, oil, spices, bread, milk, coffee, tea, sugar, creamer, etc). This is the first time in a long time that everything I bought was not store brand, but actual brand names. Above and beyond the coupons, I knew that on Mondays  Food World gives a 5% student discount with an ID (which I have of course). I saved $55.00 at Food World. I then went to Walmart for a few things I couldn't get at FW. I ended up picking up some snacky foods that were not part of the plan. I did have a coupon for some of the items so it was ok. We also picked up some lunch items for my husband and I. I lack picking up two items for the end of the month right now and have about $30.00 left to use. Needless to say unlike in months past our grocery budget might very well make it to the end of the month. Our kitchen is clean (well almost), stocked, and ready for cooking in.

Couponing...

So within the last few days I have decided that I want to start couponing. I have been clipping coupons for years but I have never been able to save much money with them. A little here, a little there. We try to never eat out without a coupon or getting a deal like the big-box dinner at Pizza Hut or the Family Deal at Captain D's. HINT: if you are planning on buying a large sweet tea at Captain D's buy a gallon of tea instead. They will give you a water cup with ice if you eat in and you save money. The gallon cost less than 2 large drinks. Any who, so I have been clipping coupons and looking at my local sales and comparing deals. I don't go shopping until the 5th of November but it is officially November the 1st. Man has this year flown by. Here are some videos to checkout if I going to accomplish this task.



There are so many more videos online and you can check them out by going to your favorite search engine and type in "How to Coupon" I would also like to apologize in advance for any possible typing errors I am having trouble staying awake as I write this post today. I'm thoroughly exhausted.

Tips for Gift Giving

I have been gathering ideas for Christmas gifts. I am trying to start early to maximize our minimal budget this year. Here are some great websites I have found that are full of wonderful ideas. I am also thinking that clutter free gifts are the best option.

Meal Planning via Cozi

I have noted on other sites that many bloggers share how they menu plan. I have had a lot of fun learning new ways to do this for my family. I would like to share my process with you. As I have stated before, I work nights so when it is time to cook a meal I don't want to worry about how long it is going to take me to prepare a meal from start to finish. Not only does meal planning save me time on a day to day basis but it also saves me money at the grocery store. In an earlier post, "Cozi.com", I told you that I used this site for my menu planning. This is how.

 Step 1

 When I find recipes I like I add the recipe to my recipe box. You can do this one of two ways (1) type the recipe into the form or  (2) use my handy bookmark that works like the pin it button; some times this takes minor modification as all sites do not always work well with Cozi format. Not to fear I can COPY and PASTE. LOL! Okay recipe is now in my recipe box....YAY!

 Step 2

On or after the 5th of every month I make a big monthly shopping trip about 1 week before this trip I plan out meals for the month. In the past I would do this on a weekly calendar print out, now I use Cozi.com Dinner Plan. I scroll through my recipes on the Right and I click and drag them into the appropriate day. I can then click the meal on the calendar and the recipe appears.

Step 3

Within the recipe is an option to add the ingredients to the shopping list (See Below--I have pulled up the recipe for October 10th-"All Day Chili"). Click "Add to shopping list".

Step 4

A box will appear that will allow you to choose a shopping list. Either create a new one or use an existing one. The selected list is the one it will go to when you click "Add to List".

Step 5

When you do this your Shopping list will appear. When this happens you can either go back and add others to the list or you can print the list, send it to your phone, or change the list and add new items. Usually I try to combine like ingredients at this point. The shopping list is by default in categories by meals. If I am doing OAMC I will print this list plus one that is by category (i.e., meat, dairy, produce, etc). Once you print the list or send it to your phone. Now you are ready to go to the store.

• I buy everything I need for the dinner meals for the month, some staple breakfast items (cereal, frozen biscuits, frozen pancakes, etc), and some lunch items (deli meat for sandwiches, fruit, chips, etc).  I use coupons when I can and I buy store brand most of the time. One of our local stores offers a 5% discount for students on Mondays so I try to take advantage of that. I usually spend about $340/month and feed 5 adults at least 1-2 hot meals a day with a light lunch. Usually the only reason to go back to the grocery store is to pick up milk or bread. I would like to add that we do not always stick exactly to our meal plan but having one allows us to have every thing we need to make enough meals for every day of the month. Sometimes we repeat favorites within the month and other times we don't. Leftovers become lunches or I turn them into what I like to call "Unrecognizable Leftovers".
• Unrecognizable Leftover Example: Mashed Potatoes + Hashbrowns + French Fries + Potatoes Au Gratin + Cheese + a can of Cream of Mushroom = Potato Casserole (that actually gets devoured)
• Unrecognizable Leftover Example 2:  Leftover Pork Loin/Baked Chicken/Roast/etc + leftover vegetables + broth = Vegetable Soup/Camp Stew/ etc. 

• I hope this was enlightening and helped anyone interested in the process of learning to meal plan. This was the easiest way I found to meal plan and have everything in one place. I encourage anyone still using pencil and paper methods to try out Cozi.com today.

• I apologize...I tried to include print screens so that you could see what was happening because I tend to make the simplest thing very complicated but Blogger doesn't want to let me do so today.

Movie Night Tonight via Redbox

Tonight the DH and I will be having movie night. We have picked out a couple of DVDs to watch this evening. I love renting from Redbox. Redbox is a kiosk type vending machine. Redbox currently rents DVDs, Bluray, and Games for XBOX and PS3. You can pick your rentals online and have them ready for pick up at the swipe of a credit/debit card or at the Kiosk. They also offer freebie and discount codes. I have had many a free rental. Check out Redbox today! Click HERE.

http://redbox.tellapal.com/a/clk/1NSm0T