Category Archives: Budgeting

A Day of Shopping

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I am really interested in the way people shop, especially how you shop if you have a large family. Yes, I know we have a large family but I am often curious if I am doing it right? Can I do it differently, smarter or better? This is one of the reason that I watch TV shows about people with large families. So I thought since I haven’t done a post about a day in my life in a long long time, I would share today.

Preparation- This is the most important part of the trip for me. The more prepared I am the less chance of missing something in the store. I also really dislike running to the store to pick up one item at a time. We usually will start to notice that we are running low on things, look at the calender and decide we need to make a trip to Costco. At that point, I usually place a list on the fridge to add things as I realize I need them. This list went up last Saturday. It also serves as a reminder to me to check out things that we might be running low on.  Next on the list of preparation is checking out the Costco coupons. Are there items we usually buy that I will definitely get  because there is a coupon? Because we simply can’t purchase very thing at Costco I usually have a second list for Aldi or Food Lion. This week happens to be “Super Doubles” at Harris Teeter so I have spent around 2 hours gathering coupons and placing 2 separate orders for this. Matt took the kids and picked up the first list yesterday.  After discovering they did not give me credit for any of my coupons, I spent another 20 minute on the phone and decided to use up some of the value and place an order for today.  In the category, I put things like making sure the cooler is in the car as well as getting all my coupons and list in one spots so I don’t forget them. We also usually take a small cooler with drinks just because someone is always thirsty.

Trip itself- We first window shopped at BabysRUs for a new car seat. We ended up purchasing one at Costco, it is a booster for Lily. Costco had a good deal on pork. Highlights of our purchase include: bag of chicken breast, 3 large pork roast ( at home I divided these into a total of 10 separate meal and froze each individually), 2 packages of pork chops ( these are divided into 2 meal each, we had one for dinner and froze the rest0 6# of hamburger ( I am planning a cooking day on Saturday, this should be 3 meals), 2 gallons of milk, 6 gallons of Apple Juice, 2 gallons of Orange juice and 7 dozen eggs. I did purchase a lot of meat today as well as staples that I have not been able to find cheaper through coupons.  We had lunch at Costco, ran over to Harris Teeter to pick up and then came home to put away everything. I did make a quick trip to Aldi for beans, rice and taco seasoning.

The End- I spent approximately half of our grocery budget this week. Just looking at the meat we purchased this should be the only large trip we make this month.  Since we don’t have any plans on Saturday, I am planning to cook  that day. Items on the list included chicken for stews, beans, 2 cheeseburger pies and 2 meals of Salisbury steaks. Today alone, I was able to divide up the pork roast and pork chops. On average we have enough of both of these items for 2-3 months! So that is exciting to me!

How I Spent my Christmas vacation…

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I remember doing these in school, the only bad part is that I don’t remember doing anything grand to write about then, pretty much the same as now but at least I am writing it down. I am really focusing on accountability this year, basically if I post it for the world to read, I need to be honest and give it my best shot. In addition to that, please ask me about specific things that way I have some real life accountability as well.
So back to how I have spent the past several days working on my goals for 2012 of course.
                   Dieting-Yesterday, I was conscience of what I ate, weighed in using the Wii, consumed 8 glasses of water and exercised for 30 minutes on the Wii. The down side to this is that I have a long way to reach my goal of 150 by next December but the good news is that I am starting at all!
                  Saving Money/budget- One of the ways we are going to save money on groceries is finally eliminating the need for diapers/pull-ups.  Since last Thursday, we have been attempting to potty train Zach. He was doing really well in pull ups but did not complain when he was wet or didn’t even seem to care. So after buying underwear, he has been in underwear for about a day and half. The results are not as stellar as I would have hope but we do have results: Zach gets very upset when  he is wet, he even thanked me for cleaning up his mess.  We are going to continue to work with him this week, I would be very pleased if he is able to stay in underwear at home and move to underwear in public by the end of the month or as long as we have diapers!  Next I have been cleaning out the freezers and refrigerators.  I actually went shopping in the freezer in the building this morning. I was able to bring up enough meat for an entire week as well as lots of veggies. I did not have any “extra” money this month to work on purchasing the final window or beginning to pay down debt so the plan is to squeeze some of that out of our grocery and dinning out budgets. I have also spent some time searching for ways to use of the remaining items from Angel Food that we really didn’t like. Last night I used some pre-breaded chicken wings to make Buffalo wings for Matt’s dinner, he is planning to use the rest of the smoked sausage for sandwiches. Finally, I am planning to do some cooking this coming Saturday of “conveince meals’ because after looking at our schedule for the month of January it is going to be really easy to get off track.
                Blogging- 2 days, 2 post a really good start.

I was able to get together a donation for Goodwill on Saturday as well as done alot of general cleaning and cleaning out done.  Best of all I have been able to spend time with the kids just being a Mom. Not rushing to get to something or tired from working.

Budget-Year in Review and Goals

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I have had a goal all year of keeping our grocery budget $800 or less, in addition in the last several months I have add to that of getting our “baby” Emergency Fund” at $500. At the beginning of the year last year, I had in mind that we would be out of debt except for our mortgage by this point. I will say up front that I did not met these goals completely but I feel like I have made substantial progress. I want to take an good look at the goals from last year as well as establish new one in the area of finance for next year. Look for the final year in review post on Saturday.

Grocery budget-Goal was $800 or less a month. Our average spending per month was $821! Matt and I both have decided that was a success. I am not going to increase this budget at all for 2012. When I look at the numbers that is $26 a week per person, or around $1.10 per person per meal. Of course I will be so happy to come in under this number but I also want to be realistic.

Emergency Fund- We actually met this goal approximately 2 weeks ago, followed by us having to spend $450 of it on a new dryer when ours stopped working. I have found that the best way for us to accomplish this goal is to move $10 a check to the account and then if we “find” more money push it in the account as well. Our goal for 2012 will be to re-establish this fund and increase it to $1000 by June and maintain it at this amount for the rest of the year.

Outstanding debt- This is the area in which we have made the least amount of progress. In one sense, we have been really great, we have not acquired any new debt this year. This includes unpaid medical bills. My goal was to be complete out of debt so this is a failure. My goal will be the same for 2012. The importance of this goal is more pressing as our income will be reduced in June of 2012.

Where did our money go in 2011:
Disney Trip
Vacation at the Beach for a week
New windows for the entire house.
2 New Televisions for our bedroom
Car and Van maintenance.
Taxes paid for 2010 and 2011

Random Sunday Thoughts

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Well it has been awhile at least a month since I post a list of the things going on around here. I do have several post of pictures coming up but they have to get on the computer first.

Upcoming Events

  • Tuesday- Lily’s “Winter Party” at school, I get to go and help make Reindeer cookies. My plan is to spend all morning in her classroom, I am thinking that I am more excited about this than she is. Also on Wednesday,  Lily gets to wear her pj to school. I have also heard that Santa will be calling to check in this night as well
  • Thursday- Our Annual family torture called “Family Pictures”  I love pictures but the stress of getting all of us there and dressed and happy is becoming too much. Maybe this will be the last year I force the torture but probably not.
  • Work is really strange, I am working at the Nursing home on Monday. But plan to spend any extra time at home between Christmas and New Year’s just to say I was here.
  • Our Christmas present to each other (new TV) for the bedroom is finally schedule to arrive on Wednesday. I ordered it Wednesday prior to Thanksgiving and after 3 phone calls and about 3 hours on the phone with Best Buy. I am hoping it will arrive on schedule but of course when I went to check the status, Best Buy site is down.

Past Events/Other Random Items

  • Both the little Girls have sang at church last Sunday night and this morning as well. Kendall was so proud that you could see her singing all the words. We have been privileged to the practices for the past month.
  • Lily has Flat Stanly for the entire month of December. She has enjoy getting her picture made with him several time. I hope we can at least do one picture/entry a week. She will get to share the journal with her class the first week of January.
  • As of today, the bathroom in our room has a new coat of paint on the walls and ceilings. It also has a television. I am planning to post pictures as soon as the molding goes up. I didn’t think it would be such a dramatic change but it is. We now have white ceiling and sand (tan) walls. This room now looks complete!
  • Matt and I have been looking heavily at our budget, I am hoping to have our goal of 500 in Emergency Fund by the end of the year.
  • Along the same lines, we are again taking stock of food and trying to prepare in that area. Since August, when Angel Food stopped, we have been trying to clean out the freezers to get a good idea of what items when have as well as what we need. Today we made a list of 18 different meals/main meats with no repeats. I still love Angel Food and miss it but I did not realize the amount of food we had stored and we just kept getting  more. I now am questioning if this type of bulk food purchases are a good option for our family.
  • A huge success in the area of budgeting for us. NO eating out this weekend! In fact, I have cooked 5 meals this week. We did have soup on Saturday for lunch. We already know that we will be eating out on Thursday but the hope/plan is that will be the only meal out till January as well.

Paid to Use Harris Teeter Express Lane

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One of the reasons that I like Harris Teeter as a whole is that they are really focused on customer service. I have had only one bad experience with them, and the good one make up the difference. I have said in the past and will say again, “if ” they would ever get “Express Lane Order” straight it would be a great thing.  I knew we would be in Winston on Thursday so I took about an hour on Wednesday night to assemble and place our order to be picked up on Thursday.  A big advantage this week was that they waiving the $4.95 fee.  After hitting all our stops in record time, we headed to Harris Teeter. I knew that we were mostly likely going to have a wait when there was a car in front of us, using the Express Lane. We ended up waiting around 20 minutes to get our order after the car in front of us finished. I am still not sure what happened to our order to start with but that seem to take longer than usual as well. Next, after bring the groceries to the car, I realized he had not subtracted my coupons from the previous trip.  When planning this trip, my estimate was that we would end up paying around $10 and I have 15 in coupons to use for the next order. But something even better happened, they ended up charging $23.83 on our debit card, handing us back $25.02 and I have $15 in coupons for the next order. I do know that we received $5 for waiting the 20 minute but as for the rest of the math, I still have not figured it out.  We ended up being paid to take groceries home!

Black Friday Shopping

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I actually started my shopping on Thanksgiving morning. After getting all the good things in the Crockpots, I headed out to CVS where I met a couple of friends. I was super pleased with my first transaction which I ended up paying $1.69 for, next was a flop in my eyes because I paid around $35 for it even rolling ECBs. I think what happened is that I was missing 5 ECB from  my first transaction that were out of stock and I added several “free” items that I originally didn’t plan to purchase. I ended up with my final purchase using rain checks to purchase Diet Cokes.  Overall I spent $40 and came home with over $40 in ECB. Matt and I went to a different CVS in Winston on Friday and used Amanda’s card to grab the “freebies” that were left. I ended up buying 2 boxes of eye patches and some children’s medicine with the ECB I earned. With Amanda’s card I spent $20 for everything I purchased and got lots of rainchecks to use in the next several weeks.  I am most excited to go to CVS tomorrow because I will be using the ECB and plan to spend nothing out of pocket except for tax. I will try and get a picture and details together ASAP. I also went to Walgreens on Thursday morning with a friend. The register was printing free movies so I grabbed 3 to watch. I was able to do okay at Walgreens. I did realize that several of the items that I got are “nutrients supplements” I usually do buy this type of stuff so it will go in the donation bin.  I was able between the drugstores able to definitely restock out toothbrush and toothpaste box as well as deodorant. After this week at CVS I should have enough shampoo, conditioner and diaper to last several months.

Friday morning,  Matt and I headed out around 2:30am to shop, we called this our date, as it was the longest that we both have been away from the kids at one time ever. We returned home around 11:30.  I have heard the horror stories but honestly it was not bad at all. We did stand in line at Belk’s for about 5 minutes. I wanted to purchase boots and did but I will be returning this week because they are too narrow. I did grab several bras and Zach a Christmas sweater.  After checking out at Belks we headed to Walmart, with a quick stop at McDonalds for breakfast.  We purchased several Christmas presents there but missed one of the major items we were looking for. So after discovering out mistake we took at second trip to a different Walmart and found several more gifts.  The rest of the day was Lowes, Best buy, Starbucks, Costco, Krispy Kreme and home. I have also purchased several items online including 2 TVs and the one portable DVD that we couldn’t find at either of the Walmarts. The longest line that we waited in was at Krispy Kreme.  The reason I think it was so easy on us was that we were shopping at the off time, hitting stores after the initial opening but still early enough to grab most of the deals.

As for shopping, I am finished except for a couple of additional items for my nieces. I hope to purchase these locally. I would post more details but my girls like to read so I am not giving away the surprises! Stay tuned for Christmas pictures~

Saving Money- Something you think about

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Saving money is not just something you do or in my case something you want and try to do it truly is a way of thinking about things.  I actually had started this post several days ago and just did not get enough of my thoughts down on paper.  Saving money for us means we think about things in a different way.

 First, especially when buying grocery type items this means that we have to make two important decisions; a) is the item on sale/ do we have a coupon ? b) how much or how little of this do we really need today. A great example of this is Matt when to Aldi to pick up flour and other items that we did purchase at Costco. All the kids LOVE Poptarts and would eat them every morning for breakfast if we let me. We only saw Strawberry Poptarts at Costco so we didn’t get them even tho we have been out for several weeks.  The Aldi brand Poptarts were $1.83, Matt remembered that I had been able to purchase Poptarts for 1.50 or less with coupons in the past so he only purchased one box.  The same items apply when I do shop sales, when I find the lowest price I have seen or just a really good deal on an item then I usually buy the limit or the number of coupons I have. An example, Sugar  a good price is $2.00 or less so last time I found this price I used all 3 coupons I had, and I have 1 bag still in the pantry.

Next before making any purchase even if it is going out to eat we have to decide why we are considering going out. Today, we had decided that we would go out to lunch after church with friends. Our friends decided not to eat out so we decided to come home and eat out of the fridge.  The purpose of going out to eat was to enjoy time with friends not to eat out. We ended up saving at least $30 by not going out to eat today.

Finally, keeping a list of things that will need to be purchased in the future and buying things on sale or with rewards reduces spending and increases saving. I have been able to use diaper rewards to purchase several puzzle and other items that I use as gifts.

In other posts I have talked about some other ways we save money, but in reality deciding that we wanted to save money and then using that as one of the things we base decisions on has really helped in our lives.

Waste Not…..Want Not..

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Sounds simple and straight forward, a good principle to live by. I have always thought I was pretty good at living by this principle as well. But today, I am beginning to realize that maybe I am wrong.
One of the things we attempting to do in the month of October is live out of our freezor/pantry with as little shopping as possible. Matt and I have been doing really well getting together a menu on Sunday so that we don’t need to rush out and eat somewhere. In reality it is actually working. We have begun to empty out the meat from the freezers in the house and even need to bring up some items from the big freezer in the next week. We are also beginning to see a difference in our pantry as well. Let me be clear, in no way, shape or fashion are we running out of food. Instead we are beginning to run out of our favorite snacks and foods. For example, currently we have one Poptart and only have 7 boxes of cereal. The strange thing is that I noticed this afternoon that my first instinct was to start a grocery list and plan a trip. Then I remembered wait this is a good thing. Next Matt mentioned that we will soon need more cereal. Finally, Haley is looking for something to snack on and say Mom you need to buy more Poptarts. So now I am thinking, maybe it is not always simple to waste not want not.

It is simple to buy food on sale or purchase in bulk, plant a garden and freeze thinking “I don’t want to waste this so I will save it for later.” We, as a family, are discovering that it is not as simple to use what we have on hand, things we have saved for another day instead of rushing out to get our favorite foods.

Since I want to end this on a positive note because I really thing this is a good thing for us and it will help us save at least 1/2 if not 3/4 of our grocery budget this month for other things. I am going to mention 3 meals this week that have used items that are on hand. First, I made a chicken casserole on Sunday from the cooked chicken we put away last week, rice that had been cooked for other meals and some cheese. Second on Wednesday, we had hot dogs and used left-over manwich meat with a dash of chili pepper to top. Finally, today we had Taco Rice and left-over chicken casserole for dinner.

Freezer Cooking

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One of the things that we realized last week with staying so busy in the evenings was that we seem to eat out more just because it is easier. Last week we ended eating out Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday. So after a little of discussion we decided to try and get some food prepared in advance for the upcoming weeks. Matt and I have spent most of the day in the kitchen. We did make a trip to Aldi to pick up some hamburger and ended up buying up canned fruit and other things. We have actually accomplished alot today. We have agreed to make October an eat out of the pantry and freezer month. We will of course have to purchase juice, milk, eggs and bread but these will only be purchased when we have ran out. Along with this plan is to really dig in the freezer and try to clean it out so that we can purchase meat in bulk. I hope that Harris Teeter does not have any special event for the month of October. So here is a list of what we cooked, actually a good start to the month for eating food that is convenient.

3 packages of Taco Rice- this makes excellent taco, burrito, nachos and stuffed green peppers.
4 packs of cooked chicken- I can use these for soup, chicken pies or other recipes.
2 cans of chicken broth
1 Baked Ziti- this is actually lunch for tomorrow that we will share with friends
4 packs of Salisbury Steaks- basically you make and add the gravy to make a much better meal than a frozen meal.
1 pack of cooked grounded beef to be used for Sloppy Joes.
2 packs of Chicken Fried Rice- Haley’s favorite food. This is a good quick meal of chinese.
1 Cheeseburger Pie- It has to be heated for a quick meal this week.
Matt also cooked an awesome breakfast, I cooked Banana Muffins, we had a take and bake Pizza for lunch.

So just above is roughly 16 meals. We also have several packs of pork chops, hot dogs, hamburgers and at least 2 meals of steaks. We should be able to make it through the month with ease!

The “Hits” of September

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I can honestly say that September has been a difficult month on us so far in all aspects of the word. It seems we are getting same hits from all sides. So I thought I would share a few of the highlights here with one request…if you read these…please pray for us.
1. Our dryer was on it’s death bed. It was taking 2-3 hours per load, the final straw was the HORRIFIC sound that gave me a headache. But it has been replaced with a new to us dryer that works get so far. Cost $150
2. 2 flat tires within 3 days of each other. First was one on the car which Matt was able to get repaired at Walmart for $10 and the second on the van which cost $45 to purchase a new one from Costco. We have learned that the car is in need of tire in the next month or so so that should be another $500. I am praying that we can at least wait until Mid to late October for these.
3. Oral surgery is on the horizon for me . I was informed at the dentist that 2 of my teeth are abscessed and infected, with one actually draining in my sinus cavity. I have an appointment with the oral surgeon on Tuesday. The initial cost is $200 and then I will get an estimate at that appointment. I honest don’t have a clue what the final cost or where we will get the money for this expense at.
4. The closing of Angel Food Ministries. This alone does not sound like a big deal but when we really started looking at our budget, we have been heavily using Angel Food as our source of meat for the last 2 years. I have started a price point list for meat and hope to be able to maintain our grocery budget at its current level but to be honest I am not sure this will be possible.
5. The exhaust system on the van messed up. We needed up having it towed and fixed in one day. But I can not describe the stress this added to our life this one day. Cost of the repair was $170
6. Zach had his 2 year old check up this month and despite the fact he has gained weight and it on the growth chart, the doctor is still really concerned. To add to our concern is the possibility of a heart murmur. The doctor told Matt that it sounds like a “mild one.” This is one concern that I am giving over to God. I mention it here just so that I can have a record but I have peace and really think the doctor needs his hearing checked.

Add to this hit list that school is back in and we are all trying to adjust to the new schedule and that I am adding more hours at work then it all equals A LOT OF STRESS!