Penny Pinching Pantry Raid Update

We've just finished week 2 of the $100 grocery challenge for 4 weeks. I went to the grocery store on Tuesday and spent $20.81. Here's what I bought:

bread $2.99
strawberries $2.00
cheese cubes $2.00
spaghetti sauce $3.58
watermelon $1.91
lunch meat $3.79
bananas $.52
1 orange $1.19
1 onion $.44
eggs $1.49

That's great, right! WRONG! I sent Jordan to the store to buy 1 head of lettuce because we were having cheeseburgers (we had buns & the burgers in the freezer!) and I wanted to have lettuce for them. He comes home with several bags of groceries! I casually peeked into the bags and saw two tomatoes (which we already had tomatoes), 2 avocados (at $2 a pop), the lettuce, and a bag of cheddar sunchips. I said to him, you know I'm trying to only spend $100 this month on groceries, right? His reply, "Well, I'm not going to starve!" What?! I'm in the process of making dinner - we are 15 minutes away from eating and how is what you bought going to keep you from starving?! lol! Here's the damage:

2 tomatoes $2.73
2 avocados $3.98
head of lettuce $1.69
sunchips $3.00

With tax it came to $11.63 plus my $20.81 gives us a grand total of $32.44 for week two. We should have only spent $26.62 for week two so we went over by about $6. We had $73.87 left and now we have $41.43 for the last two weeks. Which is about $20 for each week. Yikes!

We've used a lot of food out of our freezer, which I think you can really tell by the picture.



Our pantry kind of looks the same to me as last week or at least not such a huge change like the freezer.



Honestly, I haven't been starving my husband. Here are a few meals that we've had for dinner:

London broil, perogies, steamed carrots, salad
Cheese burgers, sweet potato fries, corn on the cob
Spaghetti with sausage, garlic bread, salad
Mandarin orange chicken, broccoli, rice

And a few breakfasts:
Pancakes
Fried eggs & toast
oatmeal
grits
cereal

Lunches:
Steak quesadilla from the london broil
Ham sandwiches
Peanut butter & jelly sandwiches
Left over's ;)

Even though we went over our amount for week two I am still feeling pretty happy about how much money we've been spending at the store. I think as long as I have some chips in the pantry my husband won't think he's starving! ;)

Penny Pinching Pantry Raid Update

Well, I was doing great not spending money at the grocery store. I only went to the store once last week to get 2 half gallons of milk & creamer for my coffee totalling $6.09. I was so proud that's all I had spent! I had to go to the store today to get bread, milk and fruit. I always have fresh fruit on hand for my daughter Saryn to eat for snacks or with her meals. I ended up spending $20.04!!! UGH!! I was so disgusted when the cashier said the amount! So, now my total for week one is $26.13 which leaves me $73.87 for the remainder 3 weeks or $26.62 per week. Hopefully I can make it!!

For week one here are the groceries I bought:
1/2 gallon milk $1.99 (x2)
1/2 gallon milk $1.20 (x2)
creamer $1.99
cheese cubes $2
bread $1.99
oranges $.59 (x2)
red pepper $2.49 (ouch!)
red tomato $1.29 (i need a garden!)
strawberries $2
carrots $.99
grapes $5.49 (buh!)

Everything I bought was on sale and I saved $5.97 that way, but man that's still a lot for what I got! The fresh fruit and veggies are what killed me but that's something I just won't go without.

In just one week we've done a pretty good job of eating the food in our refrigerator and pantry.



Our freezer is still jam packed though! Guess I need to start cooking some of the food in there for the second week!



We usually spend about $150 a week on groceries so I am happy with the fact I spent under $30 this week. That's a huge improvement! Hopefully I can stick with it for next week as well. I'll keep you posted as to how things are going!

Penny Pinching Pantry Raid

I came across this idea to only spend $100 on groceries for 4 weeks on one of the food blogs I visit occasionally. The idea came from She's Becoming Doughmesstic and it was supposed to be for the month of July. I of course didn't come across this until this past week so I'm a little late. I still like the idea of the challenge though. We have so much food in our house yet several times a week I go to the grocery store to get more. I forget what I even have and a lot of it goes bad before we can eat it.

Here's what our pantry looked like on the day we started. Look at all that food! Wow, I really should have organized it before taking the photo!! :)



And here is a shot of our refrigerator and freezer. I mean seriously, we shouldn't have any problem with this challenge. We just need to eat the food we have!



So, I started this on Wednesday July 22 and will end it on August 19th. I'm not going to include going out for lunch or dinner - just groceries we buy at the store.

On Wednesday I bought 2 half gallons of milk and creamer for my coffee totalling $6.09 and that's all I've bought all week!

This morning Saryn & Jordan had Raisin Bran for breakfast. I don't eat breakfast usually so I just had a ham & cheese sandwich for lunch. Saryn had cheese, an apple cereal bar and yogurt melts.

We are going to have dinner at a friend's house tonight so we won't need to buy or use anything for that.

I'll keep you posted as to how we are doing! Let me know if you decide to give this a try and how it goes for you!