Working on first financial resolution

Last week, I posted my New Year's resolutions on here. My first financial resolution was to get $1500 into our savings account. We are working hard on getting to this point so that we can begin to pay off our credit cards. My husband really wanted me to start paying off the credit cards right away, but I explained to him that I didn't think that was a great idea. Even financial gurus like Dave Ramsey tell you to save $1000 emergency fund before paying off credit. If something happens (for instance we need to buy a new tire, etc) and we don't have the emergency fund we would end up using a credit card. I finally convinced him that this was the way we should go.

It is my goal this year to post the amount I transfer to savings each week. I will also be posting my weekly meal plans (on Mondays) and how much I spend on groceries each week. Once I have my emergency fund fully funded I will post how much I send to credit cards and how much is left.

This Week's Totals (1/7 to 1/13)

Weekly Amount sent to savings: $550.00

Total Amount in Savings: $558.51

Weekly Amount spent for groceries: $19.73 / $75.00

(hubby went to Wegmans this a.m. - bought a newspaper, 3 gallons milk, pound of deli turkey, 3 loaves of white bread and 3 loaves of wheat)

Total for Groceries this Month: $59.48/$300.00

Meal Plan expected to be done by tomorrow.

All You Grocery Challenge

Thursday - Day 11

It's been a pretty uneventful week on the food front this week. We had cereal for breakfast on Thursday with cut up bananas. For lunch, the husband and kids polished off the last of the deli meat that was left over from Saturday. I ate while I was out shopping (see below). We had these on homemade bread with lettuce and strawberries for dessert. For dinner, we had chicken and biscuits (has veggies in it) with strawberry shortcake for dessert. I made up several pizza crust doughs tonight. I baked two of them, one will be used on Friday for dinner and the other was wrapped and put in the freezer. I also put some dough in the freezer after the first rising.

Spending: Today I spent a little bit of money. I took my friend Yan with me shopping for clothes for my new job. I actually did really good and spent only a little over $200, and I ended up getting a few things on clearance for the kids. We were going to go to Friendly's in the mall but after waiting 15 minutes for a waitress to even come ask us what we wanted to drink, we left. We were pretty thirsty by that point, so we grabbed drinks at Aunti Anne's for $3.33 for both, which I paid for. We ended up going to Salasaritas for lunch. Yan had never had Mexican food and I had never eaten there before because it's only been there a few months. We ended up getting a chicken quesadilla to share and two soft tacos. We didn't get any drinks because we still had our drinks from Auntie Anne's. They gave use a discount because we had never been there and we ended up paying $6.30 for lunch for two. Yan gave me $3 towards lunch, reducing my cost to $3.30. It was very good and Yan really liked it.

I almost forgot. I stopped at Tops on the way home to get a couple things I had forgotten the other day when we were there. I ended up buying 2 ham steaks at $2 each, severeal pounds of boneless pork chops for $1.99 a pound, and 8oz of mozarella cheese. My total spent at Tops was $11.92.

Total Spent Today: $18.25
Amount Saved at Tops: $10.39

Friday - Day 12
For breakfast we decided to have eggs and toast and then some blueberries and strawberries in yogurt. Lunch was leftover italian pasta from a couple nights ago with fruit cocktail. For dinner I made a homemade pizza with sausage (from Aldi's), pepperoni, peppers and onions. It was very yummy, as always! We had green salad with dressing with it and chocolate pudding for dessert.

Spending: no money spent today.



Saturday - Day 13
We still have a lot of cereal (bought cheap) so we had that for breakfast with strawberries and blueberries. For lunch we had grilled cheese sandwiches with green beans from our garden and a can of peaches. I was trying to get a lot done, because I start work on Monday, so I wanted something quick and easy. I decided to make pancakes with chocolate chips (these were the ones bought on clearance a week or so ago), eggs and toast. For dessert we had jello with fruit cocktail in it.

Spending: no money spent today

Tops Deals 7/19 - 7/25

Here are the deals I see at Tops this week. If you see anything I may have missed, please leave it in the comments below.

• Boneless Center Cut Pork Chops 3-4 lb package $1.99 a pound ( I will be buying these this week. We are getting a little sick of ground beef and chicken)
• pint of blueberries or pound of strawberries. Buy one at $3.99, get one free. (Not a bad deal, but if you are going near an Aldi's you can get these for $1.50 or less, Wegmans might also have them in this price range still)
• Boneless Sirloin Steak 3-4 lb package $2.99 (this would be a good buy if you have a little extra in your grocery budget this week and are looking for something different to eat)
• Pepsi 2 liters $1. I will be stocking up on these since I am really low on 2 liters (had to buy Coke last week - the horror! LOL)
• Crest toothpaste $.98. Buy 2 and use coupon for $1 off ANY 2 Crest Toothpaste (these are not the ones from 2 weeks ago). There is no reason this shouldn't work since the coupons says ANY Crest Toothpaste. Your final price will be $.96 for 2!
• 8 oz chunk cheese $1.69
• Fresh leg quarters $.79 a pound
• Hatfield boneless ham steaks $2 each (I will also be buying a couple of these this week)
• Tops butter $1.69 a pound
• Heluva Good sour cream or dip 2/$3. Buy 2 and use $1 off any two sour cream, dips, or cheese, (expires 7-31 or 8-31) and it makes them 2/$2 or $1 each
• Weight Watchers yogurts 6/$4. Buy 3 and Use online printable for $.55 off 3, which will double to $1.10, making these about 3/$.91 or $.31 each
• Bumblebee light tune $.89 each
• fresh green beans $1.29 a pound
• cucumbers 2/$1
• Zatarains $1 each. Buy 2 and use $.75 off coupon from 6-7 insert, which doubles to $1.50, making these $.25 each! (Thank you Katie for letting me know about this since I did not have this coupon in my binder)
  

If you would like to see more coupon and store matchups, head over to BeCentsAble.

Aldi's and Target Trip 7/7

We had to go to Aldi's tonight and then we headed over to Target to get a few things. They were out of the oatmeal for the kids at Aldi's, so we will stop in quickly the next time we go to work on the garden.

Here is what we got at Aldi's:

• 3 loaves of white bread $.79 each. I have started making my own sandwich bread, so these loaves are for those times when I don't have time (or energy lol) to make more of the homemade.
  
• 2 packages of 40ct paper plates $.99 each. These are to be placed in the basement and only used on certain occasions.
  
• 3 pack of green peppers $1.99. I will be chopping these up tonight or tomorrow and putting in freezer for future use.
  
• Tastes Like Butter $.99. We were out of the I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, and I don't have a coupon for any other tub butter, so I decided to try this. My mom says it is pretty good, so I have to believe we will like it.
  
• 6ct of popcorn $1.49. This is a really good price. I usually pay $.99 for 3 on sale at Tops.
  
• 1 pound of ham $3.49, to make panninis with later this week.
  
• garbage bags $2.49
• 2 jars of strawberry spread $1.99. We thought we would try these since they are considerably cheaper than other spreads/jellies without high fructose corn syrup.
  
• bag of onions $1.99
• 2 packs of white American cheese slices $1.49 each
• 1 package of sponges with green scrubby on one side - 2ct $.99
• jar of salsa $1.49
• 1 lemon $.39
• box of animal crackers $1.29. This was bought only because my 3 year old daughter begged and pleaded with me. I would rather buy her animal crackers than candy or goodies.
  
• Canola oil $2.49. I buy this instead of vegetable because it is better for us.
  

Amount Spent: $30.84
Amount saved by shopping at Aldi's:at least $13

We then headed over to Target to use a bunch of Kashi manufacture coupons along with Target coupons. Of course, none of them rang up right, so the poor cashier had to ring each one in by hand. What a pain, but it saved me a lot of money. lol. If you would like to print the Kashi coupons (they expire on the 14th) click here to go to a Target coupon generator.

The picture below shows what I got at Target, except for the gift for my daughter and 1 box of Kashi bars (my husband broke into those on the way home lol).

Here's what I bought at target and the coupons I used:

• 3 boxes of Kashi Waffles at $2.54 each = $7.62. Used 3 $1.50 manufacture coupons, along with 3 $.25 off Target coupons to make these 3/2.37 or $.79 each
• 1 box of Kashi Waffles at $2.54. Used $1.50 manufacture coupon alone (because I was a bonehead and only printed 3 target coupons instead of four - but I wanted to use it anyway because it is still a pretty good deal and the coupon expires soon), making this box $1.04
• 2 boxes of Kashi cereal bars on sale for $2.50 each = $5. Used 2 $1.50 manufacture coupons plus $1 off 2 Target coupons to make these 2/$1 or $.50 each
• 2 boxes of Kashi TLC bars on sale for $2.50. I only had one manufacture coupon (I was bummed) which was $1.50 plus I used a $1 off 2 coupon to make them 2/$2.50 or $1.25 each
• Hanes 5 pack of ankle socks $5. At $1 per pair of socks, this seemed like a good deal and I desperately needed socks. The monster in the dryer has been eating mine lately. I got the ones with the pink on the toes so that my husband does not try to wear them when he runs out of clean socks. LOL
• 2 boxes of Kashi cereal $2.66 each. Had a Target coupon for Buy One Get One Free (I thought I had a manufacture coupon for the cereal also but couldn't find it - C'est la vie) which made them 2/$2.66 or $1.33 each
  
• Princess coloring table. Originally $12.98, on clearance for $9.08. This is for her birthday next month and will be deducted from her amount, making the balance about $76.
• Degree Fine Fragrance deodorant $3.64. I used a $1.25 manufacture coupon and a $1 target coupon to make this $1.39.
  
• Degree Fine Fragrance spray $3.64. I used a $1.25 manufacture coupon ans a $1 Target coupon to make this $1.39 (I bought Sexy Intrigue and it is awesome smelling!)
• Target brand antacid (generic Tums) Originally $2.29, on clearance for $1.60
  

Originally Amount:$57.19
Amount Saved: $29.02

Amount Paid: $28.17 (saved 50.7%)

If you don't include the socks and the gift (neither are part of my grocery budget), then the I saved more like 64% on this shopping trip for food and HBA. All in all, I think I got some pretty good deals, especially considering the amount of Kashi products I was able to get cheap.

As a side note, I just wanted to pass along to you that Target is having a clearance on a lot of their toys right now, and I only see them having better clearance prices. Most are at about 30%, but if this year is anything like last year, there will be even better toy clearance prices within the next month or so. This is the time of the year where they want to get rid of last year's toys, to make room for the new toys for Christmas. So, if you have a little extra money, this would be a great way to get some gifts for the kids.

Also, if you are looking for patio furniture, they have them marked down 75% off!!

Quick Wegmans Stop

So, I have a few things I need to add to my food total for the month. My husband stopped at Wegmans last night and got milk and some fruit, plus our prepaid card for our phones (these are in another part of our budget - we buy them every other month at $30 each).

• gallon of whole milk for the little guy $1.99
• gallon of skim milk for the rest of us $1.99
• pound of strawberries $1.50 (I doubt these will be as good as the local ones we had last week, but we will see)
• pint of blueberries $1.50

So, he spent $6.98 which I now need to add to our total amount spent on our food for this month.

All You Grocery Challenge

Looking for a way to challenge yourself to spend less money on groceries? All You magazine is running a Grocery Challenge that begins July 13 and runs for 4 weeks. The challenge is to only spend $25 per person a week. This would be $125 for a family of five. The nice part is you can use food from your stockpile or your garden, or even food that you barter for. As long as you aren't spending money on it, it doesn't count. All You will pick 10 finalists and the winner receives a $1000 grocery card and a year's supply of Knorr's side dishes, plus a chance to appear in All You magazine.

I have entered the challenge and am hoping to slash our spending for the next month dramatically. I have $200 for the month budgeted for food, but would like to actually spend less if possible. We shall see. So, for the month of July, I will be documenting here how much we spend on groceries, eating out, and even my husband's occasional coffee at the convenience store. Unlike the All You challenge, I will be including household and bath products in my overall grocery budget. The only thing I will not include is diapers. I have 3 packs left, but Rite Aid will be having some rebates this month that I would like to take advantage of when they have the packs on sale for less than $10. Even though I have quite a few Pull-Ups, I have a coupon for $5 off that expires this weekend so I will make sure to take advantage of that also. Thank goodness my little girl decided she wanted to start using the potty. This is saving us so much, since she only wears them at night now!

If you have any suggestions on how I can cut my food budget further, or would like to share how you are cutting your expenses, leave me a comment. And don't forget to go sign up for the Grocery Challenge.

Meal Planning Saves Money

Would you like a way to save money easily, with or without using coupons? Well, meal planning is it. Planning your meals can not only save you time during the week, but also save you money. It also helps keep you from walking into the kitchen and searching for half an hour trying to figure out what are going to make for your family.

Menu planning does not have to be an elaborate thing. It doesn't have to be complicated or look fancy. You can use a blank calendar that you buy from the store, or that you print off the Internet or Microsoft Word. You could also use a spreadsheet and just list the days in a single column. Or, you could also just use a scrap piece of paper (to save on paper).

I usually just list mine on a piece of paper or in a spreadsheet. It is easier to do it in a spreadsheet because you can move things and delete things easily. It really is about your preferences though.

After you decide what kind of format you would like to use for your meal planning, you need to check your schedule for that week. Is there something going on a certain day. Is there a picnic or other event where you will be eating? You won't want to schedule a meal for that day then. Is there a day where your kid has a game at 6 pm? If so, you will want to plan on making something easy and quick.

You will also want to check your cupboards and freezer and see if there are meals that you already have most ingredients for. You can also meal plan around the weekly sales at your local grocery store. All you need to do now is fill in which meals you would like to make each night. Just remember, you can always change meals around if you'd like.

After filling in the week's worth (or you can plan for more than a week if you would like), make a list of ingredients you will have to buy to make those meals for the week. When you go to the store, just buy the stuff on the list. You will save a lot of money doing it this way. If you stock up on things for your stockpile when you get great deals, and then plan your menu around your stockpile, you could possibly have very little to buy each week for your meals.

As I make the meals each night I cross them off my list, that way I know I made the meal and the ingredients are not available anymore. What I also did to help myself menu plan, was to do a list of all the meals I make on a regular basis. I posted it on the inside of my cupboard and use it for meal planning and for when I have not had time to meal plan. These are the meals that I always keep ingredients in my stockpile for.

I hope this helps you plan your meals and saves you lots of money. Let me know if you already meal plan or if you are going to start. How do you plan your meals?

More Tips from Frugal Dad

I was reading through the list again on Frugal Dad's website and found some more tips on saving money on food. I thought I would share them with you.

• Taking lunch to work or school everyday saves a fortune. If you feel you need to go out once in a while, you can plan to eat out once a week, for instance on Fridays.
• When a recipe calls for a pound of meat, use 3/4 of a pound instead. You will never know the difference and be saving money. If you do this for three meals, you will have enough extra for another meal.
  
• Eating out should be a special treat. Maybe limit it to once or twice a month. Not only will it save you money but also save your waistline.
  
• When you do order out, have your younger children share a kids' meal or share your food with them.
  
• Buy meat when you can find it for less than $2 a pound. Stock up and freeze it when you get a good price. Buy a nice steak for special occasions.
• Practice portion control. Actually eat the recommended serving of a food. This will not only save you money, but also keep your weight down.
  
• Plan your meals for the week or the month. This helps when you do your shopping list and helps with making dinner each night. It doesn't have to be followed exactly and mine usually gets shuffled around quite a bit. Just cross the meal off when you make it so you know you have used those ingredients. This also helps you stay away from take out.
  
• Buy meat in bulk (when it's cheaper) and portion into 3/4 pound portions. You can either freeze at that point, or what I do is I cook it up and then freeze it. Then when I need to make dinner, I just throw the meat in the micro to defrost and then throw it in the meal. It's quicker and easier and helps you avoid eating out.
  
• Drink water from the tap (or get one of those filtering pitchers). Cut down on soda and coffee. This will save you tons.
  
• Making coffee at home is cheaper than buying it at a coffee shop. Even if you buy really expensive coffee beans, you will save money doing it this way.
  
• The less you are in stores, the less likelihood you will overspend. Consider buying the bulk of your foods every other week or even once a month.
  
• Take only cash when you shop. Whatever you have budgeted for that shopping trip is what you take. Leave credit and debit cards in the car. This will make you have to be more aware of how much you are spending. Take a calculator or use a scrap paper to write a running total.
  
• Buy generics when they are cheaper than buying a name brand with a coupon. Many are of superb quality and are made by companies that make the name brands.
  
• Try to run all your errands on one day. If this isn't possible, what about stopping on the way home from work to run your errand?
• Make a list. Making a list of the things keeps you on track. It keeps you from buying things that you don't need and you make sure that you get the things you do need.
  

*Tips in purple are the ones I added.

Tops Shopping 4/18/09

Went shopping at Tops yesterday. They had some pretty good deals.

• 2 Liter Pepsi - $.69 with special coupon
  
• 5 2 Liters of Pepsi - on sale for $.99 each - $4.95
• Lipton/Knorr sides -on sale for $1 each = $4 - 2 coupons for $.75 off 2 which were both doubled ($3) = $1 or 25 cents each
• 3 bags Malt-O-Meal cereal Buy Two Get One Free with Tops coupons - $6.87 - $1.99 = $4.88 for 3 bags or $1.63 each bag
• Oreos (we usually don't buy these but they sounded good) $1.99 with special coupon
• Tops sandwich bread - on sale for $.88
• 3 boxes of Tops popcorn - on sale for $1 each
• Tops crackers - on sale for $1.67
• 2.81 pounds of bananas = $1.66
• 1 green pepper = $1
• 2 pounds of onions = $1.29
• Ball Park hot dogs = on sale for $2.50
• DiGiorno pizza - $3.99 with special coupon
• DiGiorno pizza - on sale for $4.50
• hot sausage links = on special for $2.12 a pound = $6.18
• Tropicana 50 = $2.50 - $1 coupon = $1.50
• 2 gallons of milk - $2.15 each
  

Total Before Savings: $84.09
BonusCard Savings: $29.46
Coupon Savings: $7.31
Total Paid: $47.85 (saved 43.1%)

I Hate When DH Goes to the Store...

but I had no choice but to let him go by himself. I've been sick the last 2 days and standing up for any period of time is just nor good!! He took the Little Princess with him. She loves to go to store with, especially to Wegmans because they have the little carts she can push around.

He actually didn't do too badly. Wegmans recently announced that they have cut prices on groceries that people need the most, like bread, peanut butter, etc. A regular size loaf of white bread is normally $1.29 at Walmart and $1.69 at Tops. Wegmans had it for 99 cents!!! They also had my 2 liters of Pepsi for $1 each. This is the only time I will buy them I HATE paying more than that. He bought 3 loaves of bread, 3 2-liters of diet Pepsi for me, a pound of deli ham, a pound of deli turkey, 6 pack of rolls (they were pricey - $2.50!) and apples. So, we had sandwiches for dinner. I know it's not the healthiest, but it sure beats eating out!! Oh I forgot. Wegmans also reduced their price on a Jumbo pack of Huggies from $10.89 to $9.59. Anytime it's less than $10 it's a good price now. I had given DH 2 coupons just in case and he bought 2 packs.

We now have about $20 for next week's groceries. No problem! I will just meal plan for the week (until Thursday), stick to my list, and, of course, shop at Aldi's.

What a great site for all us frugalistas!!!

One of the Yahoo groups that I belong to, but I seldom take an active role, had this link last week. http://tastyplanner.com/ I checked it out and it is really awesome! I think it could really help all of us plan our meals and shop better.

Sign up is free, of course. I wouldn't be singing its praises otherwise. lol. You can find recipes that other users have added and even add your own recipes. I really like the meal planner. It is as simple as dragging and dropping the recipe into the day's column. The ingredients you will need to make your menu for the week, will automatically be added to the grocery list. You can then print out your list or access it using an iPhone (Being a frugalista, I, of course, do not have one of these, but a girl can dream can't she?)

So, if you are not meal planning yet or are doing it on paper, check this site out. I think you will find it very interesting. Let me know what you think of it.

Blog of the week

Each week I will be posting a blog that I find interesting or informative. I will add the link and talk about things I find particularly interesting. Please feel free to add your comments.

This week I chose 5 Quick Ways to Save on Money on Groceries on The Daily Dish blog.

The first way she says you can save money is to cook from scratch. This is so true, especially if you have a family. If there are 5 people in your family and you each eat a frozen dinner at $2 a piece, that is $10 for one meal. Many times I can make a dinner that will feed all us plus have leftovers for a day or two for around $5. I have heard that 90% of your food should not have any ingredients, they should be ingredients. My family is currently working on this, though I do sometimes resort to using a box of macaroni and cheese or a can of soup. An added bonus to cooking from scratch is that you know what's in it and you can control the amount of salt or sugar that is added.

The second way she talks about saving money is by using coupons. Coupons are great and in the past I have saved a lot of money. I would go from having to pay like $50 down to $30 or even less. Lately though, the amount of coupons in the Sunday paper have been decreased dramatically. Last Sunday I think there were 10 actual coupons in the paper. You can print coupons online but not all stores takes these, so you will need to ask them. Also with coupons you need to look at how much other brands cost. Sometimes it is not worth it to use the coupon, even when doubled. Lately we have been buying generics and shopping at Aldi's.

Buying in bulk is the writer's third way to save money. This is true sometimes. You have to be careful though. Just because it's a bigger box, doesn't mean it's a better price. I have noticed a lot lately that buying several smaller boxes/cans can often times be the same price or cheaper than buying in bulk. Check out the unit price on the shelf or use your calculator/cell phone calculator to find out if you are actually getting a better deal. To figure the unit cost all you have to do is take the price of the product and divide it by the ounces or pounds that are in there. I also sometimes divide it by the number of products if there are single things in there, like granola bars, oatmeal packets, etc.

Number four is 100% correct. Shopping on an empty stomach is just asking for trouble. If you're hungry, all those packages of chips and cookies are going to be really tempting.

Meal planning and making a list will save you quite a bit of money, especially if you can stick to your list. I meal plan for 2 weeks, since this I shop every 2 weeks. I take my list and next to each product, I write down where I want to buy it and an approximate cost of that product.

So, what do you think? Do you agree or disagree with what the blog says or with what I wrote? Let me know what you think.