Saving vs. Penny Pinching

I've learned lately about myself that while I am really good at pinching pennies and stretching a dollar I am really bad at actually saving that money and putting it to work for me. I wouldn't call it a "lightbulb moment" it was more of a "duh" moment. I've realized that I can look all I want through books and the internet to try and find ways to "save" money, but if I am not actually putting that money into an account, I am just bargain hunting.

My husband and I are taking the Dave Ramsey "Financial Peace University" and reading Financial Peace Revisited.
One of his first steps is to put money into an emergency fund. This is not new advice to me, I've read it and seen it a gazillion other places before, but I haven't put it into practice. I guess now that we are taking the class together and it is sort of like homework, I feel more empowered to work towards that goal.

I've been getting some extra income doing work for my mother. My father recently passed, and I am working on cleaning out his office and I have been doing some "mystery shopper" stuff to get a little extra cash. This month I plan to sell some more things on Ebay and Amazon and hopefully I will be able to post how much cash I have actually accumulated towards my goal.

More about the groceries...

So last week we did great with our "grocery challenge" this past week, I spent about $75 on groceries. That being said, I got some great deals and I figured since I was under budget by about $25 the first week, adding it to the next week's shopping wasn't a horrible misstep.

One of the really cool things that I did this week was negotiate with the manager at the grocery store. I had read about doing this before and thought I wasn't the type of person that would do this, but it happened quite serendipitously. I was walking by the freezer case and the store manager said "we really need to move this stuff that has been marked down." I told her that I had bought two of the items that were on clearance. She told me if I bought the other two, she would take and additional dollar off each one that I bought. I knew it was something that I would use, and it was already deeply discounted, so I saved myself $4 there. Then she went through the case and negotiated with me some of the other items. I got 4 2 packages of seasoned frozen steaks at .99 a piece. They had been marked down to $1.99. So I saved another $4 there and got the steaks at an unbelievably low price. It's not like they have meat of this quality at the dollar store.

So far, we have been doing really well about eating at home and staying within our budget. Knowing that I have set this limit for myself also prevents me from making impulse purchases like those "Snackables" lunch things that my son loves, but are a ridiculous waste of money.

Update $50 Grocery challenge

Well I succeeded the first week. I did one more trek to the produce store and spent a little under $10 and we purchased two soft drinks at a gas station. Some of the produce I bought included: spinach, broccoli, strawberries, and apples.
I had planned to write out all of my menu plans to share, but it just didn't happen. Here's some of what we did to be able to manage staying at that $25 level for the week.

I had a frozen turkey breast (actually a gift from my mother who bought two because it was BO GO free at her local grocer.) We cooked that up one night, and we used that for sandwiches, and I also made a noodle casserole with it in the crock pot which was enough for dinner one night and lunch the following day. The basic recipe was similar to tuna noodle casserole- Egg noodles, can of cream of mushroom soup, turkey, chopped carrots, celery, and onions. I also threw in some of our leftover vegetable soup that I had made earlier in the week.

My husband made salmon cakes (like crab cakes) using some canned salmon we had on hand and a recipe he found on line. So that was our dinner another night.

Some of our breakfasts included: milk & cereal, spinach omelet, sausage and frozen waffles.

For lunches with the kids, we had some of the turkey sandwiches, peanut butter sandwiches, and some chicken nuggets (already in the freezer) with fresh fruit.

Some of the things that we were able to learn from this: 1) we did the challenge at half price 2) I need to do more planning ahead of time to make sure I had enough snacks while on the road with the kids 3) baking from scratch is way cheaper, but makes for a lot more dishes 4) $25 was probably too low and we felt a little deprived.

$50 Weekly grocery challenge Day 1

So, today we ate a lot of things that were leftovers in the fridge and the pantry for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
DH had leftover brats and kraut for lunch,
kids had chicken nuggets and carrot sticks w/snack of "fruit snacks"
I had Soy sausage patties for breakfast/lunch and a snack of fruit snacks

Last week when I was at Aldi, I picked up something on clearance- it was a "Soy Ginger Noodle" thing for .79 inside was: the seasoning packet, the noodles, and some sesame seeds to put on the top of it. The directions recommended different vegetables and/or protein to complete the meal (about 3/4 a cup.) I chopped up one Spanish onion, three carrots, and added a can of mushrooms. I also prepared two chicken breasts which were already marinated in a terriaki sauce. It came out great and there were no leftovers. I have another flavor, same type of "Asian Meal Starter" and I plan to add (from my fridge and freezer) carrots, fresh mushrooms, green beans, onions, and (depending on what DH says, some scrambled egg for protein.) I really liked making this type of dish because I only really had to use two dishes and the meal was totally prepared in maybe 20 minutes.


I had made a list up and my husband went to Aldi and didn't stray from the list here's what we got:
Waffles $1.15
Whole Milk 2@ $1.49 ea
Whole Wheat Bread $1.69
Unsalted Butter (for baking) 1.99
Hot Dogs .75
2 pkg Brown and Serve Sausage @ .89ea
Ham Tub Lunch Meat $2.49
Hot Dog Buns .79
Total including tax: $14.66

A couple things about the above- I know hands down that Aldi is the cheapest place here to buy any of these items. If I were to go to another grocer close by I could expect to pay twice or three times what I paid for these items. IE. When I was at Target, they had Milk for 2.49 /gal and Waffles on sale for $2.49 the waffles being almost twice as much.

My breakfasts for this week will probably include:
Waffles, sausage, orange slices
High Fiber Cereal (in pantry from Trader Joe's or Target) w/milk
oatmeal
yogurt
apple slices
eggs

Tomorrow I plan on making a hearty vegetable soup,
And Wednesday's meal is more involved as I plan to make a turkey breast I had in the freezer

The $50 Grocery Challenge

I have been distracted lately and haven't been focusing on my budget. I've overspent in some areas, and it has annoyed me. My husband hasn't been working this past month, and we are trying to budget based on what we think he will bring in the next 5 weeks or so, so that we have some left over.
I'm trying to tackle one thing at a time, and since grocery/food is usually where you can do the most cost cutting with some creativity, I am going after that first. We've already set an "eating out budget" for the month which is half of last month's expenditures. I hope we can stick to that.
With some "guesstimating," we think that on average, I've been spending about $100 a week or $400 a month to feed our family of four. I know I am overspending, because I haven't been planning every meal- and I have a surplus in our pantry. So we've decided to try and spend $50-$75 a week on groceries. I am not counting diapers or cat food in that approximation, but everything else counts. We'll be keeping track of random soda or coffee purchases at the gas station, because, let's face it, those can add up fast. I head to the store tomorrow, so I'll keep you posted on the damage, I mean my progress.

Bill time and Quicken

I mentioned the other day that I thought it would be helpful to plot my income and bills on a calendar. I still haven't done it yet. But I did sign up for Quicken and there are a lot of bells and whistles that can help you get a visual picture of things. They have a tool that pulls all the info from your bank accounts and automatically charts pay days and when your bills are due. Of course it isn't 100 % accurate- you have to check the details, but it did a pretty good job on mine.

I plan to use Quicken in addition to an actual tactile calendar to keep track of what is coming in and what needs to come out. Right now I feel as though I am barely treading water- I hope to get to a point where I have my Emergency savings and other savings set up so that I can do home repairs, or vacations, etc.