Meal planning?! Do you love it or hate it?! I’m working on a nice meal menu guide and planner for you if you are someone who needs that extra push!
Some days the thought of taking time to plan my meals makes me cringe, but I am SO thankful for it when Monday rolls around and I look to see everything is all figured out.
You have to shop the sales of course and you have to know the rock bottom price. Sometimes you will see things on sale for $0.20 less- that’s not a reason to grab 5 let alone 2.
Wait for the good sales. Use coupons when you can. Not sure how to coupon effectively? Read step 1 here. Shop smart. Be wise with your cash. Try each shopping trip to live within your means.
*My goal with this series is to stay around $65 a week for groceries and use what we have. As you can see some weeks it is a challenge 🙂
Just to give you a peek last week I did get my pictures taken just never had time to upload here because we are selling our house! So it was a crazy week!
This is last week’s shopping trip. We were right at $40.
ALDI’S/ TOPS
Here is this week’s shopping trips and breakdown:
2 Fleischmann Corn Bread Mixes $1.99
Used two $0.50/1 printable coupons doubled here
2 Star Wars Cereals $2.50
Used two $0.75/1 printable coupons doubled here
Used $0.75/1 Savingstar offer here- My girls are not into this cereal. It tastes fruity!
2 Belvita Breakfast Biscuits $3 each
Used two $0.50/1 printable coupons doubled here
2 Tops Butter Quarters $2.99 each- $7.58 total
3 Valu Time Tuna $2.07 ( $0.69 each)
2 McCain Seasoned Fries on clearance $3.48 or $1.74 each
3 Redpack Tomato Paste $2.67 or $0.89 each
1 pack of Smithfield Boneless Pork Chops $4.51
Used a $2/1 printable coupon here (change zipcode to 28262)
1 Alexia Sweet Potato Fries on clearance $2.29
Use dthe $1/1 printable coupon here( I acutally got these free- which I didn’t know until now looking at receipt because of that Tops e card in the past for these! and it looks like they didn’t take my $1 off coupon or give me back my coupon.. darn self checkout! )
Domino Super Fine Pourable Sugar $2
Used the $0.75/1 printable coupon doubled here
1 Gallon of Tops Whole Milk $1.99 with in ad coupon and $25 min. spent
8 cans of Tops Veggies ( 2 are missing from the picture) $0.50
Total Before Savings: $63.56
Total After Savings: $34.18
BJ’s Club:
*If you are a BJ’s member I run a blog entirely dedicated to BJ’s deals here!
1 10 lb. bag of King Arthur Flour $6.99
Use the $1.50/1 BJs coupon from November Member booklet
1 Gallon of Wellsley Farms Orange Juice $3.59( It’s REALLY good!)
1 Alexia Onion rings $7.99
$2 clipless coupon
Strech-rite plastic wrap 2 pk. $9.99
Use the $1.50/1 BJs coupon from Nov. Member Booklet
Cape Waffle Chips $4.89( My daughter suckered me into these, sort of..they are really good!)
Pirate’s Booty Natural Cheese Puffs $4.99
Wyman’s Blueberries 4 lb. $10.00
Used the $2/1 BJs coupon from Nov. Member Booklet
Stove Top Stuffing 6 pack $7.99
Clipless coupon for $1.50
Bananas 3 lbs. $1.39
Heinz 4 pk. larger size Gravy $7.29 ( I buy this once a year… I know I know 🙂
Clipless coupon for $1.50
Total Before Tax: $59.59
BJ’s actually put our budget slightly over. Techincally I didn’t HAVE to buy the stuffing and gravy but I love having this on hand for a hectic night and quick side. And I use the gravy for Thanksgiving!
So our total spent this week is: $93.77- wow. $28.77 over budget. We were under last week and some of these items will last longer then a week!
Now when it comes to budgeting if my husband didn’t work overtime I would have been a bit more careful but when we have overtime I know we will be just a ok!
Here’s my meal menu for the week:
Monday
Breakfast: Cereal
Lunch: Pb&J
Dinner: My mom’s pork chop recipe with green beans and french fries
Tuesday
Breakfast: Cereal/Eggs
Lunch: Pb&J or a hot dog
Dinner: Chilli with Cornbread
Wednesday
Breakfast: Eggs and Toast ( we have the sweetest chickens!)
Lunch: Tuna Sandwiches with carrots
Dinner: Homemade pizza
Thursday
Breakfast: Oatmeal
Lunch: Leftovers
Dinner: Tuna Cakes with peas and egg noodles
Friday
Breakfast: Cereal
Lunch: Pb&J with yogurt
Dinner: Italian Sausage Soup with homemade french bread( bought sausage awhile back)
Saturday
Breakfast: Scrambled Eggs
Lunch: Smoothie and crackers
Dinner: Garlic Burgers and Onion Rings
Sunday
Breakfast: Homemade pancakes
Lunch: Leftovers
Dinner: Bean Tacos with a carrot cabbage salad ( freezer for the cabbage )
How about you, How is your budget going this week?
Let’s chat! I would love to get to know my readers!
We can always chat in my Facebook group here too!
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