Category Archives: Budgeting

5 Things Financial

Posted on by
Reply

A day late and a dollar short…. so I thought I would share anyway. I can’t even say these are five frugal things but this is our reality.

  1. The first pay of the month was this week. Unfortunately, both our electricity and water bills were both the highest we have had in several years. The water bill was $45 due to a leak. The electric bill $301, mainly due to extreme heat we are experiencing this summer. I saw last night that we have had 53 days in the nineties, our average is 26.  The good news is that we are expecting to have cooler this week, which means the end of our air!
  2. We were planning to keep our grocery budget at bare bones this month. We already have a menu plan in place. We did need some breakfast items including milk so I head to Costco. Our membership was due. We also decided to purchase some steaks from Zaycon, so we are still under budget but no where near bare bones.
  3. I am really liking the McDonald app. Today, I enjoyed a large diet coke and Kendall a hashbrown for $1.07.
  4. Baseball is an expensive sport. Zach decided he wanted to try it out this fall. I am really surprised at all the cost associated with it. I did purchase cleats and a helmet from a family at our pool.
  5. After  a month of struggling with Verizon, Matt and I both have new IPHONES. They really are a lot faster and easier to read for me. This should be the end of electronic purchases for the year!

Saving on Saturday-9/03/2016

Posted on by
Reply

Just for the record, I have 3 or 4 post that I have planned in my head and just no time to get posted. I am going to have to work on a better schedule for the next month if I have any hope of meeting my goal of 20 post. Now on to the regularly scheduled topic… saving.

This week, I have been saving and using gift cards to keep our budget low. If I purchase a gift card that is one thing but these cards are free from either swagbucks or MPlaces.

Thursday- I used my McDonald’s app to purchase Matt, Lily and myself breakfast for a grand total of $4.70. Total saved $10.00
Next Matt stopped at Starbuck’s to grab he and Lily a treat. He used a gift card earned from Swagbucks to pay so no out of pocket. Total saved $8.50
We picked up donuts to take to Zach’s class at school for his birthday. I purchased a BOGO card several years ago and continue to reap the benefits. Total saved $8.35.
I was disappointed that my Disney gift card order at Target was cancelled but decided to use the money to purchase some K-cups. I was able to purchase 4 16 packs and a container of pumpkin pie spice for zero out of pocket. The best part was I received free shipping and an additional 5% off because I have my target card store. Total Saved $53.
Total saving for Thursday: $80

Of course, it is Labor Day weekend so we had to go to Lowes. Last week, we grabbed a $10 Lowes card and a $5 Lowes card from MPLACES. We purchased bug spray, mums, pavers for the garden and light bulbs. I was able to use the cards with no trouble. One was actually on my phone and the second was a printed one. Total saved $15.

I did some planning ahead for this weekend, we have enjoyed three meals at home today, in addition to work outside the entire day. I am very tempted when we get busy to grab some fast food or order a pizza, so this is a true victory. I am going to say we saved $10 on pizza that we made at home instead using Sour Dough bread, spaghetti sauce, cheese and pepperoni.

Aldi is a great place to shop for groceries and their price in our area are significantly lower than the other stores. I sent Matt to pick up a dozen eggs on Friday. They were on sale for $0.79 a dozen so he grabbed the last 4 dozen available. Total saved $3.00

Our biggest and final saving of today is on clothing. My sister in law called and offered hand me downs for the girls. I am excited to spend a couple of hours see what we were given.

I think this is probably one of  my biggest weeks of saving so far!

5 Things Friday

Posted on by
Reply
  • 5thingsfriday-logoRED

 

  1. Kendall got her first real injury this week on Wednesday. She was hit by a baseball bat. The result lots of blood and plastic stitches. Unfortunately this means that we will not be making a trip to the water park because she is suppose to keep them dry till Saturday and then the doctor specifically said no.
  2. Zach and Kendall both enjoyed their first full week of school. They both were excited to have homework a couple of nights this week. I hope this continues.
  3. We have declared September as a low spend/no spend month with the hopes of getting our budget back on track.
  4. Matt and I both purchased new iPhone and after several weeks of frustration I *think* everything is set. I really like the size of mine because I can read the screen easily.
  5. The weather is beginning to cool down here so. By the middle of September I hope to be able to open the windows and turn off the air.

Saving on Saturday 8/27

Posted on by
Reply

sos

This week has been back to normal for us. We also are really trying to control spending and focus on saving. First this weekend, we have been taking stock of what foods we have in our pantry and freezer. I am very pleasantly surprised to say that we are very well stocked with food and not over our grocery budget this month either. I ended up making a meal plan for the month. We are going to have a different meal each weekday with no repeats. I leave the weekends open and we can have something that sounds good or try a new dish if we want. I also went to Food Lion this morning to pick up some lettuce and a couple of other items. My total out of pocket was 59 cent because I used the gift cards that we earned several weeks ago that I talked about.

My bigger saving is on sports equipment. ALWAYS check on line and ask around before buying new sports equipment!  Zach has decided to play baseball this fall and after asking around I was able to purchase most of the equipment he needs for less than the price of a new pair of shoes!

How did you save this month?

Beach Edition- Saving on Saturday

Posted on by
Reply

sos

We have enjoyed the last week as a vacation which included lots of fun but also a budget. Today, I am going to share some of the ways that we are able to enjoy this week without breaking the bank.

1. Schedule- I am very fortunate that my employer has a condo located ocean front that is available to employees only at a great rate. In addition, the price drops almost by half beginning in August. In order to take advantage of this price, I call the first buisness day of January. A deposit of half is due within two weeks.  On the budget side, I usually recieve an extra (not budget) check in both December and July. I automatically use this to cover cost.

2.  Food-  Part of me enjoying our vacation is not spending a lot of time in the kitchen.  An average meal out for just 5 of us is $50 times 3 meals a day times 7 days equals $1050, which is three hundred more than our regular grocery budget for a month. So we have found a happy medium, which includes some eating out and more eating in.  I purchased snack food ahead of time but this is also a week in which you get to eat much more junk food and individual servings than any other time. This week our menu has looked like this. Breakfast- 2 meals out, Jimmy Dean Breakfast Crosiant x 2, cereal x 1, gravy  and biscuits (both frozen) and poptarts. Lunch- Lunchables- this usually go on sale the first of August for $1 each. Matt and I have sandwhiches supplies and pasta salads. Dinner- Baked Ziti (frozen), Pasta Salads (prepared on Saturday morning), Nachos (frozen taco rice), Chicken and broccoli casserole (frozen) Seafood (resturant ), Special Dinner (Privates Voyage- Amanda paid a large part). Leftovers or pizza.  This year we decided to try a variety of ice cream shops, one each day actually which totaled around $120.

3. Stuff- We stay in a condo so we must bring or buy all supplies. This year, we are using Disney shampoo and soaps from our trip in December. I also have collect other items from our travels such as dishwashing soaps and single serving coffee packages. I bring fast food packet for ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard. I am usually pretty brand specific for toliet paper, paper towels and laundry detergent, not for this trip. I use ECB especially on Black Friday, to purchase the cheapest possible and store for this trip.  Paper products are another way we save money, any left over plates and napkins no matter the occasion are placed in a bag and we use for this trip.

One advantage to the condo is that it has a washer and dryer. I make sure that everything we bring leaves clean. This way we have truly saved a week of electricity. We did leave on our a/c but set the temperature at 85.

Do you have a suggestion for saving money on vacation that I have missed.

5 Things Friday

Posted on by
Reply

5thingsfriday-logoRED

1. Our vacation is coming to an end very quickly. I have enjoyed the time with just family as well as some trashy tv, reading and just wasting of time on the Internet .

2. The kids favorite activity of the week has been digging holes. Each day that have attempted to make a bigger as in deeper and wider hole. Lucky for them that the tide is going out during the morning so they can dig for hours without worry.

image
image
image

3. We have walked at least an hour each day usually to the end of the beach which is really cool and everyone likes to find seashells.

image

4. Matt and I have had talked about everything in general including ideas for a new buisness and ways to stretch our grocery dollar.

5. The weather has been awesome and we have spent hours and hours and hours just on the beach. Life is always good at the beach.

Saving on Saturday 08/13/2016

Posted on by
Reply

sos

I actually have two savings to share today. First, I went to CVS last night and was able to purchase 8 cases of Diet Coke for $10.69 or $1.33 each 12 pack or $0.11 a can, a savings of 81%.  I was able to do this by double dipping as I call it. First, CVS currently has a sale that includes 4 packs for $12 and you get 5 ECB. I had 10ECB plus a coupon for a free 12 pack from My Coke Rewards.  Putting this all together is easy once you understand what is allowed.

Next, savings at McDonalds. A friend told me about the McDonalds app and what cool free items they have. I downloaded at the pool today. I combined this with a coupon for BOGO Chicken nugget happy meal. The McDonald that I stopped at would not let me use 2 coupons in the same order so I split into 2.  I spent a total of $9 to feed four of us dinner tonight. The best part no leftovers!

 

Thursday Thoughts

Posted on by
Reply
  • Zach has been missing his two front teeth for almost 4 years, I noticed today that he has one that is grown in about half the way and a second that is starting. This is changing his appearance and I will miss my toothless wonder.
  • Lily and Kendall both had orthodontic appointments today. Kendall mouth is umm not the best. In fact, she will have a tooth pulled in September and start her first round of braces in October. We are hopefully that two sets will do the trick.
  • Lily will only need one set of braces so we will continue to wait for all her permanent teeth to come in before starting braces. Next summer is the estimate.
  • I picked up one of my two new sets of glasses today. My ordinal pair was over 2 years old and the side piece had broken. The doctor did not include bifocals on my prescription and I lasted less than 3 hours at work before calling and getting the prescription corrected. I do have a second set but of course they are on back order and will be here after my vacation.
  • Lily will officially start school on the 22nd. We are all becoming very anxious about this.
  • We have worked this month on restocking our pantry and freezers so instead of focusing on the budget, I have been focusing on eliminated waste. I have discovered several areas that I can make improvements on. First is water, I am trying to use water that we cook with instead of pouring down the drain. Second is food, we have stopped menu planning this week to focus on eating what is ripe and in our fridge that needs to be cleaned out.
  • Today was our third trip to the water park. It was a much shorter trip only four hours but we all had a blast and I am exhausted! We are hoping to squeeze one more trip in prior to public school starting.

Best Shopping Trip EVER!

Posted on by
1

imageOur local grocery store is running a promotion that is unbelievable, especially when coupled with a 3 day only sale. Today I spent probably about an hour looking on line and printing coupons from coupons.com.   I did make two trips only because I wanted to make sure the deal work before grabbing so much. The picture above represents a total of $120.  I spent $ 72.30 cash and received $90 in visa gift cards back. I was paid $18 to bring home these items!

The promotion is worded that you must purchase 5 items in a single transaction to receive a voucher. I broke up each transaction into 5 items. I also was able to find coupons for each of the items above except for the Bagel Bites and soups. The bagel bites were $1.68 a package and the soup. $1.89. Each item was a money maker by itself.

As you can probably tell I am excited. This should definitely help keep our grocery budget in tact this month!

Saving on Saturday 08/06/2016

Posted on by
Reply

sos

This month we are approaching our grocery budget a little bit different. First, our summer is coming to an end. Next week is our final “slow” week of the summer followed by our beach trip. So after looking at our supplies and realizing that we are to back to school days and crazy nights. So the decision was made to go ahead and get things ready for our crazy busy life. We headed to Aldi on Wednesday night to buy some staples and make sure we had can goods. Next it was Costco on Thursday. Fortunately, Costco had an awesome sale on convenience foods and lots of things that make our lunches easy to pack in the mornings.  Zach and I also went to Walmart and grabbed 40 lunchables which were on sale for $1 each. These are awesome for the kids at the beach and also for a special lunch treat.   On Friday, I stopped at CVS to grab the laundry detergent that was on sale. This is a ton of shopping this week but I am vey happy with feeling confident for the first couple of month of fall.

Next is actually getting some things in the freezer for grab and go dinners. Matt picked up 80# of ground beef that we ordered from Zaycon on Friday afternoon.  This is some of the freshest meat we have ever received the date stamped on all the packages is July 23rd, so 2 weeks ago this was a live animal.  We decided to simple put in the freezer 20 pounds or 10 packages to use for things that call for raw meat.  Next we spent five hours, fry up and packaging the rest in one pound containers. These are also for pulling out for taco meat, spaghetti sauce, hamburger helper, sloppy joes, chili and stews or crock pot recipes that call for a pound of ground beef. I estimate this should last us six to nine months. This morning I made a large batch of French toast. The kids and I enjoyed some for breakfast and the rest was frozen to stick in the toaster for a quick easy breakfast.

We have a very full pantry and freezers. I plan to reduce our grocery budget to $100 in September and $300 in October. I may be able to keep it low for the rest of the year depending on how things work out with sales and how much the kids decide to eat.