Grocery shopping is such a game to me. I love it (most of the time). My rules: I take my time. I check the ads before I go to the store and make a list. I plan my meals for the week (generally around what is on sale). I never (hardly ever) buy anything unless it is on sale. When it's on sale, I stock up. I repeat, I have a list. And, I clip coupons. You may think, "woman, that is a lot of work." But for me, it pays off. Literally.
I feel like a successful shopper when my "savings," as deemed by the store computer and calculated at the bottom of my receipt, is more than I spent. It happens often. My Albertsons receipt from last week: spent $86.48, saved $86.44. Pretty close. I feel good about that.
I just think all of it is such a game. How can I find a way to be smart and save money?
I was upset this week because baby carrots weren't on sale, since I am trying to eat more healthy and really needed something not junky in the house. But, I remembered someone once told me that the bigger uncut carrots are a good alternative and actually taste sweeter. So, I bought myself a 2-lb bag for 97 cents (which wasn't even a sale price!), when I'd usually pay $1.00 for a bag of baby carrots. Half as much! I've already cut them up and they're in the fridge, waiting for me to make healthy eating choices. (We'll see!)
Yesterday at Fred Meyer I bought an 89-cent 16-oz bag of green peas, came home, steamed them, stuck them in the blender, and poured them into ice cube trays for baby food for Wesley. I filled two ice cube trays, with 16 cubes in each. 32 "servings" for those of you doing the math at home. At Wal-Mart (the cheapest of the cheap, right?), a two-pack of two-serving Gerber baby food peas is 97 cents. Four servings for 97 cents, versus 32 servings for 89 cents. C'mon folks, it's a no-brainer!
I also think it's empowering to know how much things cost and how cheap it gets. We go to Sam's Club and I can look at the cost-per-pound of laundry detergent and say confidently to my husband, "I got it for less last week; this isn't a good price." It feels good to know what things are worth. It just takes a little bit of effort to get familiar with how much things cost.
The point to all this madness: I love to save mulah! It's my money I worked hard to make; I'm not just going to "give" it away! I think with the uncertainty of the economy, etc., we could all try to be a little more frugal. It's easy! It's fun! It's like a game! I wish you many successes. If you have any tricks of your trade, feel free to share!
7 comments:
It's great you do that. I need to be better at finding good deals. I've talked about clipping coupons, but I don't know where to get started with it. I am enjoying the Wal-mart here and how cheap you can get things compared to other places. Why get the $3.00 spaghetti sauce when you can get the just as good Hunt's sauce for under a dollar? I also make my own bread. I can't stand paying so much for 15 slices of bread when I can make my own for pennies. Thanks for sharing! I always love reading your blog.
We love to go to stores the double coupons. The only thing better than saving $0.50 is saving $1!!! Melani actually scours the weekly ads every week and sends out an e-mail to people in the ward on what deals are good deals. It never ceases to amaze us how some stores say something is 'on-sale,' but they're still charging a whole lot more than they should for things. I think the economy wouldn't be in such a wreck if we all were always frugal. What is happening is all of the sudden people are discovering they can't live on credit, so they stopped spending. The media is trying to tell us to grow the economy we need to spend more money. I don't think that's the solution.
You ought to appear on the Price is Right!
Oh yeah, making your own baby food is so easy. I felt better knowing exactly what was in the green mush too :-)
I am so with you on that! I am thrilled when I can save more than I spend. I'm not yet such a pro as you are, but that's my goal. Anytime you want to share your tricks of the trade I am more than willing to learn. :)
You sound just like my older sister! She makes grocery shopping into a game and finds so many deals it's crazy. You should check out her blog and all of the great links she has to money saving sites. Here's a link:
http://vanakenfamily.blogspot.com/2009/01/this-weeks-deals.html
Brad and I always buy what is on sale, plan our weekly meals according to what's on sale, clip coupons, and go to two different grocery stores. It just so happens that because of this we save an average of $40 per grocery visit! How great is that!
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