Have noticed I've been a little missing around here this week?
No, I didn't have the baby–not yet, but I'll be "full-term" next week so hopefully I'll have some good news to share on that front pretty soon! Instead, I've been preoccupied with details surrounding my brother's wedding tomorrow, including spending lots of time with out-of-town guests and relatives.
Needless to say, blogging has been almost last on the list of priorities this week. I've missed you all, though, and look forward to jumping back into the swing of things once the wedding celebrations are over around here.
I did make it to the store this week. In fact, I had quite the trip to Aldi and Dillons. After going over two weeks without stepping foot in a store, I made up for it on this shopping trip!
Here's what we bought:
I was so happy to be able to snag so much high-quality ground beef, a roast, chicken breasts, produce, staple products, lots of dairy products, cereal and granola bars for $0.50/box and much more. Our cupboards, refrigerator, and freezer certainly look a bit more stocked now!
However, I did something completely uncharacteristic of myself when I was shopping this week and I don't know that I'd recommend it: I didn't use a calculator. I did sort of calculate the totals in my head (I guess it's impossible for me not to do this somewhat!) but I honestly didn't know how much my total was going to be when I went up to check out.
Since I had two weeks' worth of grocery money ($120 total) to use due to our not shopping for the last few weeks, I thought it would be a fun experiment to see what would happen if I didn't keep a running total as I put things in the cart.
The final verdict? I splurge more when I don't calculate. I could have guessed this, but it was good to be reminded of why I use a calculator. I'm pretty sure that I could have shaved $10 off my grocery bill had I been calculating totals and not doing a little bit of impulse buying.
That said, I still stayed quite a bit under budget. In fact, my total was just shy of $80. So in spite of the bit of "impulse buying", it was still a pretty good trip.
And now I'm off to the wedding rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. I'll be back tomorrow evening (hopefully!) with the usual CVS and Walgreens deals and am excited to get back to more consistent blogging around here beginning next week.
In the mean time, Did you snag any great deals or bargains this week or save money in other ways? If so, be
sure to post about them on your blog and leave your link below.
Note:
Please
remember that this weekly round-up is to share deals you personally got
and/or money you were able to save this week. In order to keep this
weekly round-up focused on helping and inspiring others in their
efforts to save money, links which have little-to-no content other than
promoting affiliate links, etc. will be deleted. Also, to make it easy
for everyone to navigate quickly through
the links, your link must link directly to your Super Savings Saturday
post.
A friend at worked turned me onto your website – LOVE IT!!!! I used the recipe you posted for the Baked Oatmeal and my husband can’t get enough of it! Thank you!
I just had a question – Does your $60/week include household items, such as dish soap, toiletries, laundry soap, etc? I didn’t see any of those items in the picture you posted.
I’m also pregnant – due in July with a 7 year old in tow, and trying to find ways to curb spending so I can take the longest leave possible once the baby arrives. If I can cut my spending to $60/week, I will be estatic!
Congrats to your brother and I wish you smooth sailing with your delivery.
Gotta love fantastic shopping trips like this one! You were smokin’!
I nominated you for the Attitude of Gratitude Award, I hope you will accept…
http://hoosierhomemade.com/?p=641
Where I live, we don’t have an Aldi’s. However, twice a year our Kroger-owned store (Smith’s) has a case-lot sale. The prices are about what you pay at Aldi’s (we just get them for 2 weeks out of the year, though).
Basically, you end up spending your month’s budget all in one day, but it saves a ton throughout the year.
We rarely get to shop, but when we do, we always pray to be able to shop at the case-lot sales.
They also had apples on sale for 49 cents a pound. Apples are never less than 99 cents a pound here, so this was very unusual. I was able to buy 160 pounds (I asked the produce man for 4 bushel boxes). We are eating some and I am canning the rest as applesauce. This ensures that we have fruit through the times when my husband doesn’t get paid enough to go to the store. (I do the same thing when pears are 50 cents a pound). The apples we don’t can will last about three weeks without going bad.
Everything else fresh (produce-wise) will come from our garden.
We were able to get mandarin oranges for 33 cents a can at the case-lot sales, so we will have citrus as well. I only buy these at the case-lot sales, but I buy enough to last us 6-12 months.
Great trip! I can’t believe you are full term now! That little BOY (haha) 😉 is going to be here soon! just kidding….but can’t wait to find out if it really is a boy or girl!
Congrats to your brother!
Crystal (or others too :)), what do you think about the Kroger case sale? Makes things quite affordable (individually) but buying a whole case takes quite a chunk out of the grocery budget for the week. Sometimes I have had Walmart cashiers price match the per-single item price (probably depends on the cashier). Anyway, I am trying to figure out if I should get a case of a few things, or just not spend so much now and pay 20-50 cents more per item as I need it later. Thanks for the feedback!
Wow, that’s a haul for $80!
I am happy that I got in on the WAGs Red Baron pizza–family loves that for a treat and at $2 each after coupon, it’s a deal.
Sunshinesavings-
The granola bars she’s referring to are the Quaker True Delights ones. Not sure how she got them for .50/box, I got them for $1/box and was happy with that. Hubby loves them for breakfasts.
I didn’t snag any great deals this week yet. I saw somewhere a suggestion to only go to the store 1 time per week, and that’s what I did this week to help save some cash-o-la. I can’t wait for the CVS ad in the morning though. I read to go save some money!
Hope you have a great weekend with your family Crystal!
Crystal – what do you consider a good deal on the meat?? Just wondering – thanks!
I finally did my first shop after 2 weeks too…I think my total was $81 yesterday…so you got me beat by a little! I don’t remember the last time I paid that much shopping. It was nice to stock up again though.
Sorry about entry # 112, I gave the home page instead of the direct page of the deal ! # 113 is the correct link! Thanks
I am in awe of you! $80 and you “splurged”? You are my new role model 🙂 I blogged this week about some good deals at World Market on cloth napkins. I am not sure if this qualifies as a weekly round-up, but I’d love to be included. Now I’m off to check out some of these other money saving moms!
This week (Wednesday, April 1 to Tuesday April 7) at Brookshires are some really great buy one item x, get second item x for a penny. Like smoked sausage, regular sausage, a couple different kinds of chicken, sliced cheese, chips, etc. Oh yeah, and pot roast – I bought a few and started “stocking” my freezer – but my baby is not due until about 4 weeks after yours, Crystal.
Don’t you just love Aldi’s! It’s my favorite!
Thanks for hosting!
~Liz
Wow, you got all of that for under eighty dollars?
That’s outrageous! Look at all of that food!
You have 5 packages of meat, fresh produce,
wheat bread, milk, and so much other stuff
and it came to less than $80? That’s incredible!
Wow Crystal! Thank you for posting your weekly grocery shopping adventures. I never take a calculator with me and just to the math in my head but I think I will try to next time. With 3 little ones in tow how do you make sure to to accidentally hit the clear button as you are shopping? I’m curious which granola bars you were able to get at 1/2 price? Where they discounted or are there specials that I’m not aware of? Thanks and congrats to your brother and his new wife to be! 🙂
Wow….you did really well for only keeping a running total in your head! I use tally marks…just round up the price to the nearest dollar. Works for me! Great job!
We had some unexpected expenses this week and I was only able to spend a small % of what I usually do. I was also sick and didn’t feel like doing too much. Next week we’re gonna need lots of things. But for this week, we saved by staying home! All in all I think it was a good week for it as there just weren’t that many irresistable deals…
Good JOB! That is soooo awesome you got a TON of stuff…most of that did not have coupons though right?!
I found some fabulous Children’s Place Deals on Amazon. I love Amazon for Target and Children’s clothes. So fun!