End of the Month Grocery Report

We started off with Breakfast this morning with scrambled egg English muffin sandwiches. 
We went to the flea market today, but were only able to sell for a few hours as we were rained out. 
The flea market we go to is in the state of Georgia, which is easy for us to go to since we live right over the state line in Tennessee. 
And there are two Kroger grocery stores in that area that we can go to, so we decided to go to Kroger and pick up a few items.  I have to say I am loving shopping at Kroger. 
First of all I am able to buy milk so much cheaper there than here. It is very close to $3.00 a gallon here for the store brand milk, but in Georgia I am able to buy it for under $2.00 a gallon. As a result we've bought more milk this summer than we have in a long time. 
Secondly, I am able to buy Italian Sausages on mark down there so much cheaper than here in Tennessee. We've had more Italian Sausage this summer than we have in a long time since it is $4.00 a pound here in Tennessee. 
Also, the sales tax on food in Georgia is 4% while sales tax on unprepared food in Tennessee is taxed at 5.5%.  And I can always tell a difference on my grocery bill. 

I found one package of Bratwurst and one package of mild Italian Sausage for $1.99 each. 

I found three one pound packages of Southern Slaw from the produce department marked down to 79¢.

I bought one gallon of buttermilk, one gallon of chocolate milk, which were both priced at $1.89. 

I also bought two half gallons of skim milk, which were on sale for 89¢ each. 
I bought one pound of red grapes for $1.24.
And my daughter found some K cups marked down in the clearance section. 

My total for today was $16.30, which makes my total food cost for July just under $100 coming in at $96.00. We used up a lot of food we had in our pantry and freezer to be able to come in at such a low amount.
As my regular readers know my income is lower in the summer since school is out and I am not working. We did make money at the flea market this summer, which helped a great deal. School starts back on August 8th, so I should be returning to work soon. 

We also had some help from my neighbor as he has put more free vegetables on his front lawn. 

And we were able to pick up these two free items from Kroger's Friday Freebie program. We won't drink these so we will add them to the stuff we sell at the flea market. 
Belinda ~ Living within our Means ~

February ~ End of the Month Report

All of our bills have been paid for February 2016. I did charge several things this month, but they have already been paid in full. 
Grocery:  $242.32 Gas:  $65.77
Grocery spending was up due to me renewing our membership at Sam's Club. Gas spending was down due to lower gas prices here. 
This was a month which saw a lot of expenses for my daughter who will be graduating in May. Seems like every time I turned around there was another fee to pay.  
I paid for her senior graduation package including announcements, graduation fee for the high school, yearbook, tassel from the NHS, and graduation cap and gown. 
Senior year comes with extra expenses, but I believe everything is paid for now unless something unexpected comes up. 
There were extra clothing expenses for my daughter in February due to her Spring Break coming up in March. She is preparing for a trip with her surrogate grandmother. All expenses for that trip have already been paid for as well. 
Looking ahead to March, I already have my budget prepared. Our school system used seven snow days in February, so my paycheck in March will be much smaller as a result and I have planned my budget accordingly. 
Belinda ~ Living within my means in Southern Tennessee ~

Earn with Swagbucks

Wednesday

On Monday after school/work I ran to Walmart for some items. There were several things, like eggs, that I looked at, priced at $2.79, and then left on the shelf because the price was much higher than I have been paying at other stores. I'll just wait until I am somewhere else that has them cheaper. 
For those of you that are still having to pay high prices for eggs, I found the following chart from Ordinary Vegan that you may appreciate. 

One of the reasons I went to town was to get carrots from Aldi. They had carrots on sale this week priced at two pounds for 59¢ each, so I stocked up and bought ten bags. 

After we came home Monday, I heated up two of the Salmon Patty plates I made up on Sunday. It gave me a good feeling to know that we ate food here that did not cost me any additional money. 

Dinner on Tuesday was Cheese Enchiladas, which is one of my daughter's favorite things to order whenever we eat Mexican food. These were super cheap to make too. 

My friend gave some string cheese (free) she wasn't using, so I decided to take some corn tortillas (60¢) and wrap them up, cover them in enchilada sauce ($1.18), and made cheese enchiladas. 

I made twenty of them  in all and they cost under $2.00 for the whole batch.  Even if you had to pay regular price for the string cheese, this would be an affordable dinner. 
On Wednesday I went to Fresh and Low and I'm glad I did. They had the reduced rack of produce out. 

I was able to get one bag of cucumbers, one bag of colored peppers with an avocado inside, and one bag with two pints of blueberries in it! All of these were $1.00 each, which was such a great deal.

I also picked up  sour cream ($1.29), bread ($1.00), 3 baking potatoes ($2.02 or 67¢ each), 2 bottles of Italian dressing on mark down (99¢ each), pepperoni ($2.50), mozzarella cheese ($7.76),  and eggs ($1.59 each). I'm glad I did not buy the eggs at Walmart for $2.79 on Monday. 
These things that I do to save money are not magical or even new for that matter, but they save me money when I do them consistently. 
Belinda ~ Living within my means in Southern Tennessee ~

Earn with Swagbucks

Friday ~ January 22,2016

We went to school today and hadn't been there more than one hour when the principal announced that we would be dismissing at 1 o'clock due to the impending snowstorm. The students were so excited. :)

Once school let out my daughter and I headed to town, ahead of the snow, to run errands and head to Food City for their sale. It was a madhouse at Food City with people trying to get groceries before the snow came. 

I wasn't there to get groceries because of the snow, I just wanted two items that were on the Friday one day ONLY sale. I think I looked kind of funny with canned tomatoes and bleach in my cart when others were buying groceries to survive the snow, but that was all I needed. 
12 cans tomatoes (28 ounces) at 88¢ = $10.56 2 jugs of bleach  (64 ounces) at 99¢ = $1.98 Total spent with Tax = $13.76
We made it home in plenty of time before the snow came. :)
Belinda ~ Living within my means in Southern Tennessee ~

Earn with Swagbucks

Inexpensive Sources of Food

You know the old saying, Different strokes for different folks. The ways that I find to save money on food may be different than ways you or other people find to save on food. I've ran across many people over the years who do it differently than I do. 

Many people go off budget when it comes to eating than in any other area of their budget. From expired food to overspending at the grocery store to eating out. Making a weekly meal planning ensures that you actually use the items you already have, purchase only what you truly need, and avoid harried trips through the drive-through on busy nights.

The ability to manage your money in this one isolated area of your life overflows into other categories of your spending. For example, planning your meals will help keep you out of the stores, which will help reduce any impulse purchases. 

Eat at Home ~ This will save you so much money over eating out. So many families overspend by eating in restaurants on a regular basis. I love to eat out, but I know that if I do it several times a week I am not going to have enough money to cover our basic necessities and that won't work for me. Eating at home saves me money and here are some of the ways that I do that...

Shop at Discount Grocers - Such as Save-A-Lot, Aldi, The Dollar Tree. These will definitely save you money over big name grocery stores. Just the other day I found Secret deodorant at The Dollar Tree for $1.00 whereas I normally pay $1.96 for my favorite brand. These types of stores can definitely save you money. 

Shop the Sales ~ I use this tool over every other tool listed here. Every Wednesday I gather up the sale ads or look at them online and figure out which food items are at the lowest possible price and then I go and stock up on them. by doing this, I ensure that I am buying food at the lowest price possible for me. 

Couponing ~ The one website I use regularly for coupons is Couponaholic. If you see me mention I used a coupon for an item, 9 times out of 10 I have printed it from the Couponaholic website. 

Warehouse Clubs ~ Gale over at Faithfulness Farm and Brandy over at The Prudent Homemaker are two people that I know of that shop at warehouse clubs to save money. My friend Anna pays for her membership just with the savings they receive on medicine. 

Take an Inventory ~ The first step in managing your food supply is knowing what you have on hand and that means taking inventory. You can read about food inventories I've done in my home here and here. It is much easier to save money when you know what you have on hand to make meals with. 

Use the Food You Have ~ Have you done an inventory of the food you have on hand? How many meals can you make out of that food? You might be surprised by how many meals you can actually make with the ingredients you have on hand. The other day I came home and made some rice and then opened up a can of low sodium mixed vegetables, which no one had been eating, and mixed them both together. They were so delicious and very inexpensive. 

Salvage Stores ~ If you are fortunate to have a salvage grocery in your area be sure to shop there for inexpensive sources of food. We are fortunate enough to have United Grocery Outlets or UGO in our area. I have made posts here and here detailing the great savings we have found at our local UGO. Salvage stores are not like regular grocery stores that get new inventory each week, but rather sell items that traditional grocery stores won't sell any longer. They can be hit or miss, but we have found some great deals at our local one. 

Free Food ~ Don't overlook sources of free food. We have a friend who gives us free food regularly. My Mom has shared food with us before as well. Some people volunteer at an event and are able to take some free food home afterwards. Free food sometimes shows up at work events as well. I know just last week I received a free lunch from Chick-Fil-A while subbing at the middle school. 

Stockpile ~ We stockpile. I coupon for items that we use regularly, that have a long shelf life, when they are at rock bottom prices. And this reaps many rewards for us. Amy Dacyczyn referred to it as The Pantry Principle in The Tightwad Gazette. It is buying food at the lowest possible price and stocking up to last you through until the next sale.  

Crash & Burn ~ Do you check out the dented can section of your favorite grocery store? There are usually good deals to be found there. I always visit these areas in our local grocery stores. I have found some of my best bargains in the Crash & Burn section. Just the other day I found a five pound bag of rice for $1.00. 

Eat Leftovers ~ Oftentimes I've read that people don't like to eat leftovers. My family definitely eats leftovers and they enjoy them. My daughter loves to heat up leftovers from dinner the night before for breakfast the next day. This is definitely an area that will save you money, which leads me to my next point. 

Avoiding Food Waste ~

When food reaches the use by or sell by date it doesn't mean it needs to be thrown away. The dates found on food items are suggestions made by food companies to ensure peak quality and do not indicate food safety. Food manufacturers make more money when consumers  toss food they think has gone bad.  Some people discard food when it's reached this date, but the truth is many foods can be safely consumed after these dates. For example, I never toss out buttermilk as it is good long after the use by date has passed.

Dumpster Diving ~  Last but not least, I saved this one for last as some people are turned off by this concept, which I understand. If you're interested in the topic you can Google it and find all kinds of information about it. There was a lady on the old AOL message boards named Mary who used to Dumpster Dive and she found enough food that she was able to share it with friends. 

Be sure to browse through the archives here at the Frugal Workshop to read other ways we save money on food such as buying food in large industrial cans for example. And of course, my readers are a wealth of information on inexpensive sources of food. So please share with us how you find these sources. 

Belinda
Live simply by not spending money you don't have.
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011 - 2015.

Thursday

My daughter was still in a great deal of pain yesterday, so I dropped by the pharmacy and picked up some Azo that the pharmacist recommended and that did seem to help some. I am hoping the antibiotic will kick in soon. 

After dropping her off at school today, I came home and went to work in the kitchen. Using pantry supplies I have on hand, I first made two pineapple upside down cakes.  I did not have maraschino cherries, so I just left them out, which was no big deal. Cost was under $2.00 to make these. 

This is what one of them looked like after came out of the oven.

We ate all the jello I had made the other day, so I went ahead and made more using up two cans of mixed fruit and two boxes of jello from the pantry. This only cost me 50¢ as the fruit was given to me. 

This is before it set up. It will look better after it gels.

I then cooked off the chickpeas I had soaking and made Mock Tuna Salad. I just cook the beans, mash them and add sweet pickle relish, celery seed, and mayonnaise. We really like it as it tastes just as good as tuna salad without the worries about contaminated tuna. My daughter really likes this, which just tickles me because she wasn't crazy about tuna salad like she is this dish. 

This is what it looks like afterwards, just like tuna. 

I did not work today, but am scheduled for a full day tomorrow. I already have plenty of food prepared to take for lunches and I'll be bringing ice water to drink in my thermos. 

Our air conditioner has frozen up this afternoon because of being used so much due to the heat wave. Dinner will be something cold like pasta salad, jello salad, or a sandwich as it is 81° in the house and really too hot to cook or even want to eat for that matter. I'm concerned that the a/c may be on its way out as it did this about a month ago. I turned it off for the rest of that evening and night and it worked fine the next day.  

Belinda
Live simply by not spending money you don't have.
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011 - 2015.

End of October

I hope all of my readers have had a good week. I worked four out of four days this week. School is out on Friday this week, so today was the end of the work week for me. The students were so excited this week for Halloween. I loved seeing them in their costumes on Thursday. 

Groceries

In September I spent $334.22 on food for our family of three and said I wanted to do better in October. Well, I totaled up everything I spent on groceries this month and it came to $324.37. A difference of close to $10.00. While I definitely wanted to do better than that, I have to say that the kitchen is well stocked right now, so I'm happy with that.  

I left home early this morning to snag a couple of deals that were one day only sales and while supplies last. The first stop was IGA where they were offering milk for $2.99 a gallon, which is about an 85¢ savings. I also picked up some ground chuck priced at $2.99 a pound. I plan on making Tacos and Hamburgers this weekend. 

I also stopped at Fresh n Low for Wampler's pork sausage in the one pound packages for $1.99. I bought five pounds of the sausage and put one in the fridge and the rest in the freezer. They had three carts filled with Crash & Burn items. I bought several things including Bubble Bath for hand washing for 50¢ a bottle, Suave body wash for 75¢ per bottle and several packages of Jello for 40¢.

Ebay

This month I made $13.94 on Ebay sales. I mentioned earlier this month that my sales were down from last month. Seemed to me that people were just not buying. My Dad says people are afraid to spend money right now because they don't know what the future holds, which is certainly understandable. 

Gas

Gas for my car is one of my biggest expenses each month because we live out in the country and have to drive a ways to get most places. In October I spent $169.09 for gas for my car. It was nice to see the price drop this month though. On my first fill up of the month, I paid $3.09 a gallon while the last fill up of the month was $2.62 per gallon. My Dad says it's because of the November elections coming up, but I read an article this week about OPEC, the price of a barrel of oil, and US supplies were the reason the price dropped. Either way, I'm happy that the cost of gas has come down so much, and I hope it stays that way. 

Dryer News

We've been dryer shopping last week and this week. We stopped in at the Habitat for Humanity store to see if they had any dryers, but no luck. We stopped in at a locally owned appliance store and found one for $356. Home Depot has one for $314 as well, which is probably what we will go with, but for now we are still hanging laundry up to dry. Our electric bill was $45 less this month, so we are already seeing a savings there. 

The thing that I noticed about hanging laundry to dry is that, if you save up your laundry for one day or are washing large loads, you can run out of places to hang it fairly quickly. 

I cannot hang our laundry outside to dry here because of my daughter's allergies. We live on forty-one acres of land that is mostly wooded and she is allergic to many of the trees and grasses here along with the pollen and the ragweed count is very high right now. 

S0, allergies are the reason we hang our laundry indoors. I have four sets of chairs back to back with brooms and mops on them and one clothing rack and it can fill up quickly. I hang shirts on hangers and then hang them on the broom sticks to save room. As a result of this, I have been washing smaller loads, which is not the most frugal way to do laundry. We are going dryer shopping again today, so I'll keep you updated on that front. 

That is my end of the month report from here. I hope you've had a good frugal month in your corner of the world.  :)

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
Professor Penny Pincher 
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011 and beyond.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”
"Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle ~ It will help you save money"

Bean and Cheese Burritos

Yesterday I put two pounds of pinto beans on to soak overnight and today I cooked them along with an onion in my pressure cooker for fifty-five minutes, so they would be good and soft enough to make refried beans. 

Afterwards I scooped some out and mashed them with my potato masher to make them into refried beans. 

Then I warmed a tortilla in the microwave and place some beans on each tortilla. 

Afterwards I added the toppings each person wanted. On mine I placed cheese, lettuce, tomato, sour cream, and taco sauce. Other good toppings would be onions, black olives, and jalapenos. Even some Mexican rice would be good in one of these. 

Then I rolled them up...

They look as good as anything from Taco Bell, right?! My daughter says once I duplicate the cheese sauce on the Taco Bell burritos I can say that. LOL

I didn't use all of the bean broth, so I made sure to save it as I can use it for other things later like a soup base. 

My daughter even made brownies for us to enjoy afterwards. 

That's what's for dinner at our house tonight. What's for dinner at your house?

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”
"Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle ~ It will help you save money"

Saving Money on Meat or Not

Our local Cooke's grocery store has ground chuck on sale this week for $3.99 a pound. They also have the Ball Park Hamburgers on sale for $6.49. And many people I know enjoy the convenience of having the Ball Park Hamburgers on hand for a quick meal, but is the convenience of having already cooked ready made hamburgers worth an additional $2.50? With the high price of groceries these days, $2.50 can buy more food. This seems like a no brainer to me. 

I can think of at least four meals my family misses having since we have reduced our consumption of meat. They are tacos made with ground beef, meatloaf, Pedernales potatoes, and hamburgers. While I miss the days of ground chuck being on sale for $1.39, I am thinking about breaking down and buying some of this for $3.99  a pound and making a couple of my family's favorite dishes. 

There are ways I can stretch the meat to make it seem like there is more there than meets the eye. I can add potatoes, which I have always done, to the taco meat and I can add crackers to the meat for meatloaf. 

Taco Meat with Potatoes added to s-t-r-e-t-c-h the meat

What do you think?

Update: I went to Cooke's on Saturday and looked at the meat. The packages were slightly over two pounds each and were close to $10.00 in price. Cooke's is usually well known for the quality of their fresh meat, but when I compared the ground chuck to the ground beef, I didn't see much difference. In fact, the ground beef, which was 10¢ cheaper, actually looked better. In the end, I decided against buying any meat. It just didn't look good enough to spend $10.00 for in my opinion. 

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”
"Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle ~ It will help you save money"

My Frugal Week

I went to IGA on Monday morning to take advantage of a meat sale. I bought 10 pounds of ground beef, which was on sale for $1.99 a pound. This was not the ground chuck that I used to purchase. This was ground beef at 73/27 mixture. I made sure I drained this meat well after cooking. 

I don't know if we will ever be able to purchase ground chuck at a decent price again unless I find it on markdown, which does happen from time to time. 

I also bought a package of 3 sirloin pork roasts, which were also on sale for $1.99 a pound. There were three nice sized roasts in the package and I cut each one of them in half, which is plenty for the three of us for one meal. I put 4 of them in the freezer, saved one to cook for dinner, and gave one to my Dad. 

On Tuesday we woke up to snow in the forecast, but school was still open, which turned out to be a mistake. I dropped my daughter off at school only to turn around 2 hours later and pick her up and had a rough drive there and back. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday turned out to be snow days and unfortunately, I missed two days of working as a result. 


All breakfasts, lunches, and dinners were eaten at or came from home this week. 

Dinners this week included:

Monday: Tacos with all the fixings
Tuesday: Spaghetti & Garlic Bread
Wednesday: Meatloaf, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans & Onions
Thursday: Chili
Friday: Chili Tacos
Saturday: LaChoy Beef Chow Mein, Rice, Corn
Sunday: Pork Roast, Oven Roasted Potatoes & Carrots

Other things done to save money include:

1. Read a book for free on my tablet Kindle.
2. Paid bills online to save on postage costs.
3. Entered codes at Kellogg's Family Rewards
4. Entered codes at My Perks for Purina Cat Chow
5. Entered codes at My Coke Rewards
6. Watched Port Charles for free on You Tube during free Internet time. 
7. Stayed home four days this week and spent no money. 

Things we do every week to save money:

1. Haul our own garbage for free to the county dumpsters. 
2. Paid bills online to save on postage. 
3. Used cloth napkins at meal time instead of paper napkins. 
4. Combined all my errands into one trip this week to save on gas. 
5. Log onto MyPerksCatChow.com daily to earn free cat food. 
6. Clip coupons from the Sunday Paper.
7. Check grocery store sale ads for good deals on food. 
8. Combine store coupons & manufacture coupons with sales to get the best price on food. 
9. Use paper in the printer twice by reusing to print on 2nd side. 
10. Make use of residual heat on my electric stove. 

January always brings with it extra expenses for the renewal of my car registration, auto insurance, and auto membership, which is a yearly fee. All expenses have been paid for and I even have a little surplus left at the end of the month, which is a good thing. 

How did your week shape up this time?

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Saving on Food ~ Buying in Bulk

I'm sad to report that my local Walmart is no longer carrying the 2 quart jar of Mt. Olive pickle relish that I blogged about here in May of 2011. I've looked around and couldn't find this product anywhere for sale near me and I even checked the Mt. Olive website, but no stores are selling this here. 

Fortunately for me, I have found another source for cheap pickle relish at Sam's Club. Now, because it is located in Chattanooga, we only go there a few times a year since we live 50 miles from there. But, this jar is big enough that it will last until we make our next trip in a few months. 

This is a photo of the one gallon jar of pickle relish, which I bought for $5.22, and is an even better deal than my previous source.  My previous source would have been $6.72 for a gallon, so a savings of $1.50 over my previous best price.

Now, you may be wondering about my Sam's club membership and the yearly cost of the $45 membership. The savings that I earn on medications, which I blogged about here, more than pays for the membership to Sam's each year. In fact, this month when I paid my membership fees they also gave me a $10 gift card, which I will apply to my next visit. 

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Homemade Egg Mcmuffins for 53¢

My daughter received a Hamilton Beach Breakfast Sandwich Maker for Christmas this year. The gift giver said she could take it to college with her in a few years. 

The idea behind this machine is that you can make a fresh sandwich for breakfast quickly. You pick your bread, cheese, egg, and precooked meat to make a sandwich or any other ingredients you want to use. This appliance cooks the sandwich for you, including cooking the egg, and you have a hot, fresh sandwich in less than 5 minutes. 

I bought her ingredients to make sandwiches for when she goes back to school next week and is in a hurry getting ready for school in the morning. She has been trying it out this week though making eggs for breakfast. I have to admit this does cook eggs quickly!

Ingredients I bought include:

Package of 12 English Muffins: $2.28 - 19¢ each
18 eggs $2.78 - 15¢ each
24 slices Cheese $2.48 - 10¢ each
16 slices Ham (will have to cut in half, so 32 slices) $2.99 - 9¢ each
Total: 53¢ per sandwich

Of course, your cost of the sandwiches may be more or less than mine depending on the cost of your ingredients at the time of purchase, and you definitely don't need an appliance to make one. But either way, this homemade version of an Egg McMuffin is definitely cheaper than the original version at McDonald's, which currently cost $2.89 at my local McD's. 

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”