I am beginning to think I’m a little weird. Or at the very least, have a lot of time on my hands {which really, I don’t}. Since I started to post pictures of some of the foods I prepare for my family on a regular basis this year, I am learning things about myself that I didn’t really get before. I’m starting to connect the dots at how I make this frugal living thing work.
Which is strange because I’m doing the exact same things I’ve always done.
Take growing sprouts for instance. I usually only grow alfalfa sprouts when I’m craving an egg salad sandwich. They take about 3 days to grow. But when it came time to make my egg sandwich, we only had a four slices of bread left and I wasn’t planning on going to the grocery store for another 3 days. So I decided to just make a bowl of egg salad and eat it without the bread. So I could use that bread for my son’s peanut butter sandwiches instead.
Whoop te do right?
But by doing that, I saved myself from going to the store one day earlier than I had planned. Not a big deal in the whole scheme of things right? But it exhibited self control. Which is something I think most of us are lacking when it comes to spending our grocery money. We don’t have to rush to the store for that one thing. We can make do with what we have and stick to our plan.
I’ve also learned this year that I am incredibly lazy {or maybe smart, I’m not sure} when it comes to food prep. I like to cook double, triple, or quadruple portions of things to save time.
And of course there are those crock pot meals I adore so much.
Not only did I have two choices of soup for dinner the night i made them, but I was also able to pop 18 meals into the freezer for later use. The HH typically eats leftovers from the previous nights dinner for lunch, or some sort of soup or chili from the freezer I have frozen into individual sized portions. I can’t imagine how much money he has saved over the past 22 years by bringing his own lunch to work everyday.
In the beginning he brought packed lunches to work because we couldn’t afford take out. A few years later after he started making a little more money, he’d come home and tell me what the other guys were having for lunch and how they were spending about $10 a day on fast food. I guess he did the math and figured bringing his own lunch to work everyday was the smarter thing to do.
Chocolate brownie cookies. Have you make these yet? They are delicious! And if you use a 1 tablespoon scoop you can get about 6 dozen cookies out of 1 batch. And yes, they freeze beautifully. 🙂 Monkey Boy loves them.
And last but not least…
I have a total love/hate relationship with Costco bananas. They are either green and hard, or nice and yellow {rare} and get spots within 2 days. Luckily I have just perfected a Nutella banana muffin recipe {coming soon} so no bananas were tossed.
Even though I didn’t buy a whole lot of groceries this week, I still feel like we have plenty of good food to eat.
Spend less, save more and BE HAPPY.
~Mavis
Total Spent This Week $45.19
Total Spent Year to Date $154.66
Go HERE to read more Shopping Trip Stories.
Jill Frank says
So, you have a yummy picture of molasses cookies, but didn’t comment on those. Are they a favorite in your house like they are in mine?? Just curious.
Mavis Butterfield says
Click on the words chocolate brownie cookies and it will take you to the recipe.
Linda says
I would love the recipe for the molasses cookies! They look yummy!
Mavis Butterfield says
Click on the words chocolate brownie cookies and it will take you to the recipe.
Lori N in Vegas says
That’s my experience with Costco bananas too. I actually laughed when I saw your pic thinking “boy she must get better bananas at her Costco than mine,” haha!
Ann says
Hi Mavis, back in September, Lisa posted a question on your crockpot lasagna soup recipe, and I don’t see a response and was wondering this same question myself.
Mavis Butterfield says
Go it. Thanks. 🙂 Sometimes it hard for me to get to all the questions.
Marcia says
Very good post. I am trying to be extra careful this year on groceries (last year I was focusing on weight loss, our grocery bill was abysmal).
I had gotten out of the habit of just making do with what we had. So I’ve set a weekly budget, and if it’s gone, it’s gone. It can wait until next week. And if I manage to have leftover money, great! It’s a habit you have to get into though. Now I just need to stop the takeout habit. I’m not that bad, really, but my husband is so much more likely to stop for a burger with the boys, or stop for a smoothie with the boys, and it drives me batty.
Certainly packing lunches has saved us buckets. I calculate that by packing my lunch and my hubby’s lunch (he packs his own now, because I do mine and the elementary schooler, but I make sure we have food), it’s a new car every 5 years, about $16,500.
Karen says
I totally agree about Costco bananas. I think it is because the plastic bags they are in….. Doesn’t that make them ripen faster?
We also make do and stretch our groceries out. Dinners are always made to make at least a few single serve frozen meals for the hubby’s lunches and toward the end of the loaf of bread, it gets rationed for the kiddos lunches. Usually, at the end of the week, I make a pot of kitchen clean up soup. One carton of chicken stock, all the leftover veggies, some ground sage & thyme, and some cooked cubed chicken…..salt and pepper to taste. Sometimes I throw in cooked pasta or rice too.
We are doing so much better about food waste with all this too. Mavis, your page has been so very helpful!
NCJill says
For the month of January I told my family if they ate what we had in the pantry/fridge/freezer we would use the grocery money for something fun.( Like clothes for my teenage and pre-teen girl.) They bought in, hubby too, and we now have a couple hundred dollars to spend. Woo-Hoo! I hate spending money on things like food that just come right back out! Haha!
Sakura says
This year my focus is back on cutting down on our grocery spending. This month I pull out the entire months budget in cash and made a list of Main meals to make, hopefully everything will work out perfectly and I’ll only be going to the store for a few produce items and dairy. (haha) But I am going to try the when it’s gone it’s gone approach. I’m a little nervous but I’m sure we’ll do fine. As for freezer cooking, I loved it the other night when I pulled out taco meat and frozen chili verde I made back in december and thru together a quick baked burrito dinner for my family in about 25 minutes. My goal is to fill my freezer with more meals or parts of meals rather than “raw” goods.
Heather T. says
This is my third year doing no grocery shopping in Jan (family of 6), I love it. I have to get slightly creative some-days but I make our bread and almost every meal is from scratch. It is funny that now its Feb and I don’t want to go to the store! Love shopping, hate shopping!
Karagan says
Made the Chocolate Brownie cookies today and oh my, they are delicious! Thanks for sharing the recipe!
I love my weekly shopping trips to Costco so I can’t express just how much I’m enjoying this challenge of yours. Good luck!
jamie says
Have bananas that need to be used, so I bought nutella just to make the muffins. Didn’t realize the recipe isn’t on the blog yet 🙁 Hope it’s coming today before I eat all the nutella!