Month End March Shopping and Budget Review

I maintain a budget of $160 for our family of three for all of our household and grocery needs.  The great thing is that it helps me be creative in the kitchen to get the most things for the lowest price and then figure out how to use it to make tasty meals.  I shop with sales and coupons to get the best prices on the most variety of things I can find.  This month super doubles had a lot of great deals but not a lot of freebies so the spending was high fast into the month.  I have lots of things in the pantry, freezer and fridge after lots of these stock up sales which have helped me make meals for just a few dollars every day even with these crazy splurges on a variety of meats.

I also budget $40 for eating out so that the total for both is $200.  I used to track these two separately but I find that on months that I splurge at the store and get different things then I spend less on take out or eating out.  The two amounts seemed to be so closely related that it was hard to talk about one without the other.  This month I made steak and cheese sandwiches for $2.13 and used the roast beef that was $4 after sale and coupon for three meals with homemade rolls and the same cheese to make another tasty treat.  I got a whole 7 lb. chicken for $5.73 which we had a big meal with sausage stuffing from the freezer and mashed potatoes and used the leftovers for tons of other meals and froze the rest for future meals.  All of those splurges were about the price of buying two pizzas but I made more then 6 meals with that money instead of spending it on meals out.

Here is what I got for the month including with the breakdown for everything purchased after the middle of the month.  The first half of the month items are pictures and totals listed but the breakdowns can be found here.  Check out how I did for the month below:

Harris Teeter $15.70

Harris Teeter $3.04

Aldi $45.74

Harris Teeter $6.64

Harris Teeter $1.13

Harris Teeter $7.40

Harris Teeter $8.21

Harris Teeter $10.93

Harris Teeter $6.45

Harris Teeter $20.22

 Harris Teeter $6.45

Harris Teeter $12.52

Harris Teeter $3.21

Harris Teeter $9.44

I got a free cottage cheese and Stoneyfield yogurt.  I got the Quaker Chewy bars for $0.69 each after sale and coupon which was an amazing deal and I probably should have bought more but it was the end of my budget so I decided to pass.  While I was at the store and splurged a little and got steak which was on clearance for $2.13 which my husband grilled and I made it into steak and cheese sandwiches for dinner one night which was a tasty treat we really enjoyed.

Aldi $5.18

I went to the store to get turkey and milk because we were out again.  It feels like I do this all the time.

Harris Teeter $1.53

I went to use the rain check for the cottage cheese and I also found the Hershey Reese bar that I also had a rain check for so they were both free.  I went a little crazy and bought half priced Ricotta to make lasagna.  I mixed it with the cottage cheese and made two for the freezer and a small ones for dinner that night with the other one from the freezer.  It was super yummy and I got three meals out of my $1.50 splurge.

Harris Teeter $0.05 

I had a rain check to get the Stonyfield free and I enjoyed the cookies.  I got the Uncle Ben's free with the coupon from a friend.  My son enjoyed the rice for a quick dinner one night.

Safeway -$0.32

My friend gave me coupons from the Monopoly coupons for the drink and the Pure Protein bar.  I had two electronic coupons for $1 off the bakery goods and $1 off canned soup.  I got a doughnut because two would have cost money.  I was planning on getting the Safeway soup because it was on sale for $1 but there was a managers special on the Campbells and that is my husbands preferred soup so I got it but it didn't ring up correctly.  I had two other electronic coupons that I was hoping to use but I couldn't get a deal to work so I passed on them.  Then at the cash register the cashier was super mean because the electronic coupons didn't come off.  He over rode them and I spent $0.18.  I looked at the receipt to see how it worked out and then went to customer service to get the $0.50 back on the soup so it turned into a money maker of a trip and I got to eat a doughnut for lunch.

Giant $0.06

I went to the store to get the freebies this week.  I got the Chobani that was free which I wanted for my son to try but he didn't like it.  I also loaded $1.00 off Danon Oikos which made it $0.59 so I used a coupon for $0.50 which doubled so I knew that I was going to have overage so I got two packages of Kool Aid that were on sale.  Ended up only paying tax.  I enjoyed my yogurt and my husband enjoyed his Kool Aid.

Aldi $5.18 

We were running out of the milk and lunch meat so I decided to go into Aldi and grab some because we were passing the store even though I knew that we weren't totally out but it would save me a trip later.

Harris Teeter $5.06

My whole family went to the store to get the soda deal and a free yogurt because my husband was in charge of doing most everything.  It turned out that the cashier didn't ring up the last soda but my husband doesn't pay attention to anything so we didn't know until we got home and I got the receipt.

Total Retail $639.81

Total Saving $465.99

Total OOP $173.82

I know that I went a little over budget but I think that I did a good job getting a bunch of things we would use including lots of meat which we were running low on.  I was also a little worried on how long I would be out without driving after my surgery so I got lots of every deal that I might have passed on previously.  The great thing is that we are really enjoying the fresh chicken nuggets and the amazing chicken strips.  We have made tons of wraps and just had an amazing and easy chicken parm dinner.  I made steak and cheese sandwiches and grilled roast beef which were big treats for us.  The other big expense was the Windex which was almost $13 but we were totally out so it was a great stock up price so that we don't have to buy it for many months to come.  I hope that you have a good month and made good use of your budget.

Eating Out

We went out as a family to Delia's which is one of our favorite places that has millions of different things to choose from and we always get the same things- one large pepperoni pizza, one chicken salad with corn and house dressing and 1/2 Peruvian chicken which my son, husband, mother and I split.  My father orders his own food because he is always against sharing for some reason.  Anyway, my parents picked up the tab so that was no money out of pocket for us.  We got Pizza Hut one night because it was Family Movie Night at school so I promised my son's favorite pizza at home first and then it turned out that he was too tired after putting away most of one pizza himself so bonus good time for $10.60.  Knowing that I still had money in the eating out budget and that I only went over $8.76 on groceries, I agreed to a second pizza night so I would have a break after surgery and the boys would have a treat after soccer for another $10.60.  Out total eating out budget for the month was $21.20 which is well under my $40 monthly budget.  Even counting my grocery overage, I am under my total by about $5 so I call it a win!!