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Grocery Spending/Menu Plan | Plus the Money Saving Mom winners!

On Saturdays, I share my menu plan for the upcoming week along with a photo of my groceries and a tally of my spending. My goal is to spend $100/week for our food, toiletries, and cleaning products. I’m currently in the midst of trying to buy more local, sustainably-produced food while sticking to my budget. Can it be done? I don’t know, but I’m going to try, and I’ll share what I learn as I go along.

Congrats to Sheila G. and Michelle R.! You’ve both won copies of The Money Saving Mom’s Budget and you’ve been emailed.

By the way, I must say that I love you, readers, for your enthusiastic response to book giveaways. You tend to enter more for books than for $100 Visa gift cards! 😉

If you didn’t win the book, but are still interested in reading it, check to see if your library has a copy. Or buy a copy of your own! Crystal is giving all of the proceeds from her book to Compassion International, so by buying her book, you’re helping to support a good cause (and by reading it, you’ll likely learn how to save at least $8.40, which is the price of the book.)

Ok, on to groceries! I was feeling too lazy to get my zoom lens out, so not everything is visible in this picture.

Here’s some of the stuff that didn’t make it into the first frame.

I spent $50.08 at Weis and $64.71 at Aldi. And then I had to stop at our local grocery store to buy a few things, and that bill was $13.71.

So, my total is $128.50, and I’m not sure whether to say that’s on budget or not, because Mr. FG and I still need to sit down and rework our budget. One of the things I’m hoping to squeeze in is a bit more grocery money. I think I’d really like to have at least $125/week instead of $100.

Oh! I just remembered that I bought two dozen eggs from my local blog reader (Hi, David!), so add another $6 to my total.

What are we eating this week?

Since Mr. FG works second shift, we eat our dinner meal at noon during the week, and at night on the weekends. And our lunch meal happens at night during the week and at noon on the weekends.

We do eat breakfast in the morning, though, all week long!

Breakfast options are homemade yogurt, granola, scrambled eggs, oatmeal, fruit, and cereal.

Lunches will be comprised of sandwiches made with whole wheat bread, homemade yogurt, yogurt smoothies, cottage cheese, fruit, raw veggies, nuts, cheese, and leftovers as necessary ( Mr. FG takes the previous day’s leftovers to work most days.)

Here’s the dinner meal plan:

Saturday

Sunday

  • Not positive about this meal yet. I need to talk to the kids and Mr. FG and see what they want to eat.

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

  • Dirty Rice with Shrimp
  • roasted green beans

Thursday

  • Fish Sandwiches
  • spinach salad

Friday

_________________________

Today’s 365 post: Bare

Joshua’s 365 post: A Nerdy Narwhal

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Dar Winn

Monday 16th of January 2012

I am not too frugal on the grocery bills yet but have been doing pretty well with menu planning and avoiding waste, at least. I have been trying to decide how much imported fruit and veg to buy in the winter, versus the local "staples."

Danielle Murray

Monday 16th of January 2012

Thank you for all your inspiration! I am a SAHM, children's pastor and am trying to be very frugal. I just posted my groceries for the week on my blog. $24.95 for the week. I love looking at your recipes (I just did the yogurt last week) and getting ideas. Feel free to check out what I got as well! www.whyyesiuseclothdiapers.blogspot.com

Beka

Monday 16th of January 2012

Hey there! I'm new to your blog and thoroughly enjoying it. My hubby and I have been budgeting for a long time now, but as others have noted, prices have skyrocketed. Plus we have three kids now :D Anyway, I try to stay within $150 a week for all the household needs/groceries. I was wondering, do you and your husband count your eating out day as part of your total? Oh, and we are going to try the tortellini soup recipe this week, along with the pull apart garlic bread. Thanks!!!

Kristen

Monday 16th of January 2012

Nope, our date night is a separate line item...we budget $20/week for that. :)

Susanna

Sunday 15th of January 2012

LOL looks like you DID get your $125 this week! :-) I know I know it averages out but a man usually agrees to more food I think! I like seeing how you make it with less though - I think the All You magazine challenge was $25 per person per week..so even at $125 you'd be doing better than that challenge I think.

Emily

Saturday 14th of January 2012

I think I've noticed toys in several of your grocery posts. Do you buy a "fun" item for your kids each shopping trip? Do you take that out of your grocery budget, or is it a part of your fun budget?

Kristen

Saturday 14th of January 2012

Haha! Nope, those are just stuffed animals they already own...they like to hide them in the grocery photo sometimes. :)

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