Weekly Savings: Playing Catch-Up

Thank you all for being patient with me as I work to balance school and the blog! Here is the LONG list of weekly savings pictures that I have not taken the time to post for a while!

Not Pictured:

Target Trip 7/10:

Bread, bananas, organic peaches, organic strawberries, Roasted Chicken, Potato Salad, rolls, and organic eggs

Spent:$20.55

Saved:$0

Target Trip 7/21:

2 pkgs whole wheat hot dog buns BOGO, 2 pkgs whole wheat hamburger buns BOGO, 1 head garlic

Spent:$4.17

Saved:$3.78

Kroger Trip 7/13:

The Organic strawberries were on sale. The ketchup was on sale and I had a coupon. I also had a $10 pharmacy reward credit that I used this trip.

Total Spent:$22.35

Total Saved: $13.08

Trip to the U-Pick Blackberry Farm!

On 4th of July we made a trip out to a U-Pick Blackberry farm. We were able to fill up a 1 gallon Bucket for $15! I froze 1/2 of the berries and I made blackberry syrup with the other 1/2. I will use the syrup on pancakes, waffles and to flavor our homemade yogurt.

Spent:$15

Saved: Priceless!

Trip to CVS 7/10:

Pictured is two different transactions. I was using up some ECBs for household items I needed. and I also used a bit of a pharmacy gift card.I ended up with a $5 ECB remaining and I will submit for the Neutrogena rebate. (I will count those savings when I use them)

Spent:$0.79

Saved:$59.80

Trip to Brahms 7/10:

We went to get soft serve cones as an after dinner treat but they were having a sale! $4/10 so I too advantage. They are regular $3.67 each. I love their Frozen Yogurt!!!!

Spent:$10

Saved:$4.68

Kroger Trip 7/23:

You can read the details of this trip here.

Spent: $21.25

Saved:$ 70.03

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Total Spent: $94.11

Total Saved: $151.37

Kroger: Shopping Trip 7/23

Sorry I have been slacking on posting my shopping trips and weekly savings lately. I am working so hard right now to get my thesis done by the end of the summer!!!

Anyways here is my trip to Krogers today. As I am sure many of you know they have a mega event going on right now. There are several things you can get for free this week, a few of these will end up in out donate box.

For this break down I am using the AFTER mega sale price (add .50 to each item to determine the before mega sale price)

*Also remember my Kroger doubles .50 coupons and triples .35 coupons

Non Mega Deal:

MM's-$0.50

Kraft Home style Mac and Cheese-$2.99-Free Item Coupon=Free

Kraft Extream Mac and Cheese-$1.59-Free Item Coupon (took of $2.25)=-.66

Organic Lettuce-$3.29

2 Bananas-$0.40

Goat Cheese-$4.49-Free Item Coupon=Free

Mini Ice Cream-$1.39-Free item Coupon=Free

1 Dixie napkins $2.99- $2.99 peelie for free wyb 2 plates = FREE

Total=$2.29

Mega deal:

First group of 10:

1Qtips $1.50 - .30 tripled 5-23 RP = .60

2Dixie plates $1.49 - .50 insert 5-23 RP = $0.98

1 Sargento Cheese $1.88-$0.50 home mailer=.88

3 Scotch 3M Foam mounting squares .99 - .50 IP = -0.03

2 Dannino $1.79 -$1 insert 7-18 ss=.79=$1.58

1 Activia$1.79-$1 insert 7-18ss=$0.79

Total=$3.42 (plus got back $1 Catalina for Dannino)

Second Group of 10:

4 Gatoraid $0.50=$2

5 Philly cream cheese .99 each =$4.95

1 Kraft cheese$1.99-free item coupon (took of 2.99)=-$1

Total =$6.94(plus got back $5 catalina)

Third Group of 10:

2 Tombstone pizza $2.49 - $2 IP = .98

2 Aquafresh kids toothpaste $1 - 1 IP = FREE

2 Soft Soap $1- $.50 Softsoap =FREE

2 Spagettios $.50- $.50/2IP =FREE

2 Chicken Nuggets $3.99=$7.98

Total=$10.84

The cashier missed one of my $.50 off coupons but they seemed to double ring one of my free item $2.99 coupons so I came out ahead

Grand Total =$21.25 (plus I have a $5 and a $1 Catalina!)

**There is a great money maker if you store has it in stock (mine did not)

20 ct Motrin PM's are $2.50 each after mega event andyou can use the $3 coupon from the 4-18 RP for a $0.50 MM!

I Love Garage Sales!!!

Have I told you how I adore garage sales?!?

Today we went to two church rummage sales and look at all the close I got! 59 pieces for $10 and a pair of girls boots for $1!

(26 of them are name brand Old Navy, Gymboree, Baby Gap...so I should be able to resale for more than that when I am done with them!)

I know 59 pieces of clothes is a lot for 2 kiddos but they are not all for one season. Some boys clothes are 3T for my little man to wear right now and in the winter and 4T for next year. The little girl cloths go from 2T for this winter to 4T. Yes, I know that is a long time away, but one of the churches had a deal: each piece was .25 each or you could fill a garbage bag for $5. So I chose the garbage bag option and picked the best pieces I could find (46 pieces came from this one sale)!

Weekly Savings: 7/1-7/10

I needed to do a bit of stocking up and preparing for freezer cooking (I will post the plans/pics early next week) so I did quite a bit of shopping!

Not pictured:

I got my order from Organic Prairie 6 packages of Organic Brats. We ate one pack the other night for dinner they were delicious!
Spent: $34.00
Saved: $21.00



Kroger

I used several (6!) free item coupons, plus coupons for the foil, rice (.09), pineapple, hot dogs, butter, healthy choice, chips.
Spent: $68.21
Saved: $62.25



Target:

The 2 bottles of suave, and the Popsicles were free item coupons. I also had high value coupons for the yogurt, strawberries, and the smart ones. The corn was only $0.10 and ear so I got 15!
Spent:$30.90
Saved:$24.87

** Target shoppers need to watch carefully as coupons ring up with the new register system. They have attempted to fix the registers so they do not allow overage but there are some issues. For example, my smart ones coupon was for $5 off 10 smart ones but the register would only take off $1.82 since that is the highest price of one item (it thinks it is avoiding overage). The cashier happily adjusted it for me, but with two toddlers I could easily miss this so be sure you keep your eyes open when shopping at target!**


Amazon:

I took advantage of the Huggies Overnites Diapers, Size 5, Big Pack, 56-Count Box deal at amazon I told you about earlier. (it is still going on). You get 30% off the $15.19 price when you use subscribe and save (you can cancel at any time) which drops the price to $10.63. Then I used my Swagbucks so I paid nothing! Gotta love that!

Spent: $0

Saved:$15.19

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Total Spent:$132.30

Total Saved:$123.31

Weekly Savings: June Wrap-up

Sorry for skipping the last couple of weekly savings posts, I have not been shopping as much this last week and a half because I was over budget and trying to keep our spending low. I realized I forgot to post the pics from the 3rd week in June! So here you go our June shopping/saving wrap up:

Not pictured:
June 27th Hubby made a trip to Albertsons for Milk, Strawberries, and bananas-
Spent: 7.48
Saved:$0

Not Pictured:
June24th-Quick Run in CVS for Dish washing detergent and cotton balls
Spent $1.06
Saved $4 (used ECB)


June 19th-Sams

Spent - $45.45

Saved-$19.15 (Sams does not allow coupons - this savings is calculated on what I should have spent on the same items in the grocery store since I made a special trip to Sams to save money on them. There are not tons of great deals at Sams but the cheese is one of them, and I discovered that the bread it pretty cheap too, if I am already going for something else.

June 16th-Target:

Spent: $21

Saved:$33.47



June 15th:

Trip to CVS (the frugal failure I told you about before!)

Total OOP: $0 (used a pharmacy coupon gift card)

Total saved:$15.27

(I also got a $4 ECB and a will submit for $8.99 rebate and will count those savings when I use them!)

Total spent for the last 2 weeks of June: $74.99
Total Saved: $71.89

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Total Spent for June:$298.34

Total Saved for June: $187.65

Weekly Savings: 6/6-6/12

Here is my weekly spending and savings from last week:

I went to Kroger and CVS last Thursday,
Spent: $53.81
Saved: $14.53




I stopped in a local health food store on the way home from the park to get this red quinoa (because Kroger wanted $7.86 for the same box!) and I grabbed an organic lime while I was in there.
Spent: $5.36
Saved:$3

I also got my two orders in from the Medco deals I told you about last week. I spent a little more than the minimum because I wanted to get the kids some natural bath products.

Spent:$11.87

Saved:$20

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Total Spent:$71.04

Total Saved:$37.53

Weekly Savings: 5/30-6/5

I didn't go shopping the last week of may because we were over budget so I did a lot of shopping to fill our fridge back up and get ready for freezer cooking! I think I did pretty well, although I did spend a large chunk of our monthly budget (about 1/2) we have our dinners covered for the month, plus many of our snacks and breakfasts.

I stopped in Target Last Saturday so I could take advantage of the Mountain Dew deal. I have told you all before that Mountain Dew is the one area my hubby will not bend on in the "all natural" department!
Spent: $24.19
Saved: $18.25

I went to CVS for the Diaper clearance!

Spent $0.18 (for three packs!)

Saved $39.40

I picked up some staples and a few items that I had free item coupons for at Krogers, plus some of the things I needed for freezer cooking (posts coming later today)
Spent:$69.59
Saved:$19.25



I went to sprouts to get my organic chicken (I like theirs better than Krogers) and I took advantage of the sale on blueberries, peanuts, and french bread!
Spent: $58.35
Saved: $2.33

Total Spent: $152.31
Total Saved $79.23

Weekly Savings:5/23-5/29

I made through the week with out going to the grocery store! Which means I made our goal of staying (almost) on budget for the month despite all the "illness" foods we needed to purchase.
Since I did not shopping I have no picture for you today, but I have some big trips planned this week so I am sure I will have some next Saturday!

Total spent for the month: $288.28 ($3.38 over budget)
Total saved for the month: $133.84

Weekly Savings: 5/9-5/22 (2 week edition)

So will all of my running around for Hubby's Doctor appointments and his surgery, I did not post my weekly savings last week. I am posting my spending/saving totals this week because posting here helps me stay accountable to our grocery budget! My spending is a bit out of whack, because we needed some specific foods for my husband we we all know how expensive things can be when you "have" to buy something right then rather than wait for a coupon or sale.

This is the second time that illness has impacted our grocery budget dramatically in the last few months so I am going to try to lean something from it this time and stock up on some of the foods that we need ahead of time to avoid this in the future. I can only predict this a little because every illness is different, but I am going to do my best to create and "illness stockpile!"

Anyways, on to the spending/saving...(I did not get a chance take pictures of my trips the last two weeks, because it just wasn't a priority)

Total spent (2 weeks): $216.19

Total saved $115.86

We are now $3.28 over our monthly budget of $285 so I am going to have to see if I can stay out of the store for a week or not! Wish me luck!

Weekly Savings: 5/2-5/8

Sorry the post is a day late, I spent yesterday in the hospital with my husband. We are home right now because it has been deemed a "non-emergency" after 12 hours of tests with instructions to go to the back to doctor on Monday for more tests. I would appreciate it if you could keep us in your thoughts and prayers!

Anyways...here are the savings I had last week, nothing to amazing mostly things we needed:

Target:

Total Spent: $9.96

Total saved:$0.50

Kroger:

*not pictured pace salsa and dishwashing detergent

I used some $1 off coupons for various magazines to get the smart balance pasta free

Total Spent: $62.51

Total Saved: $17.98

Weekly Savings: 4/25-5/1

I did lots of shopping this week! But I think I did really well!

To start, I got back $10 in rebate checks from Clorox and $14.97 from parenting magazine (for my diapers.com purchase) Since I never count rebates as savings until I cash them they will be added into my savings this week

Rebate Savings: $25.97

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On 4/25 I went to Walgreens to roll the $30 in RR I had from last week and to get some things we really needed:

I used all $30 of my RR from last week.
I spent $2.91
I saved: $90.63

(Plus I got back $24 in RR!!!)

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On 4/27 I went back to Walgreens to roll some of the $24 in RR and to get some more soda for my hubby:

I used $13 of my RR from earlier in the week
Total Spent: $1.06
Total Saved:$26.07
(Plus I got back $10 in RR!)

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On 4/27 I also went to Brookshires to take advantage of an awesome pasta sauce deal:

Total spent: $0
Total Saved: $14.40
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On 4/30 I went to Target:

I got some Bounty with a manufacturer and store coupon plus I got a $5 GC back for buying 2.
I also bought a large package of napkins but that did not make it into the picture some how! We try to use cloth towels rather than paper and I just bought some cloth napkins so we will start using those too, but we do still use paper towels ever now and again. These should last a long time though!
I also bought bananas -regular price
Organic Strawberries were $2.99 lb -$1 store coupon
Organic potatoes were $3.99/5 lb bag
Smartones (for hubby's lunches)- $1.82-$2 each -$4 coupon when you buy 10
Total spent: $46.14
Total saved:$21.82

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This morning we went to the farmers market to make our first purchase of local grass fed beef and chicken:

This purchase is not really about savings, in fact I worked really hard all month to save some extra in our budget to afford this purchase and I think it is well worth it!

We bought 4 packages of pastured bone in chicken breast (about 1.6 lbs each)
1 lb pastured ground beef
2 dozen pastured eggs
1 jicama (this is not local- I just wanted it since I never find them in the grocery stores!)
1 lb unsalted peanuts (I am going to try my hand at homemade peanut butter)
1/2 lb slivered almonds (for making granola
The meats and eggs were $51, the jicama was $2, and the nuts were $9
Total spent $62
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Total spent this week:$112.11

Total saved this week: $178.89

Total Spent For the month:$284.44 (Just under our $285 budget!)

Year to date Savings:$1181.28

Weekly Savings: 4/18-4/24

I forgot to post my shopping trip last week because of my trip to Baltimore. It there were no spectacular deals, in fact I threw it together very last minute so my savings were not very good at all.

Spent: $75.78

Saved: $11.08

Also while I was gone the hubs when to Walmart to pick up a few things (most of them we already had but he couldn't find! I'm sure some of you can relate...but I can't complain because he did watch the kids for 4 days while I did my thing!)

He spent: $9.78

This week I went to Kroger:
You can read about the deals here!

Spent: $67.54

Saved: $28.02

I also went to Walgreens this week to score a years supply of Vitamins and some ink. You can read about that here! The ink is not part of my grocery/household budget so I am not counting that in the amount spent/saved here. (I also got back $30 in RR that I will be rolling and spending in the next 2 weeks!)

Spent: $0

Saved $30

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Total Spent Last 2 Weeks: $153.10

Total Saved Last 2 Weeks: $69.11

Total Saved Year to Date:$1002.38

Weekly Savings: A Day Late!

I was at a family reunion yesterday so I am a day late in posting our weekly savings, but here it is:

I ordered some Organics Raisins (pictured above) from amazon. They would have been $12.80 with Subscribe and Save, but I used swagbucks, so they were free! I don't think the picture does them justice, the bags are huge!

I didn't get a picture of the rest of our groceries this week, but we spent $19.23 and Saved $5.29

Total Spent for the week: $19.23

Total Saved:$18.08

Garage Sale

I normally only post my shopping trips for household and grocery items since that is what goes into my weekly savings totals, but I had so much fun hitting our neighborhood garage sales this morning with the kids that I had to share what I scored!

I got this precious doll cradle for $4! It also included rails to turn it into a crib!

I got this coat and matching snow pants, pair of pjs, cotton skort and matching top and denim skirt for $6.50! The summer stuff is for right now, but the coat and snow pants are 3T's which will not fit her next winter so they are really for the season after that-talk about planning ahead! But with our warm winters it is so hard to come by snow pants and warm clothes at a reasonable price, and we need them for when we travel up north to visit the in-laws. This past winter I bought my daughters snow pants used off of ebay but that still cost me $15 just for the pants and since kids grow so fast they only last one season, so I think it is worth buying ahead when I find it and storing it!

We got all this play-doh stuff for $3! It includes a Hair Cutting set, a Race Car set, a Mr and Mrs potato head set, the extruder, a rolling pin that makes fruits and veggies, plus tons of cookie cutters!

We got these musical instruments to add to our collection for $11! Both electronic ones work perfectly and the sax matches the guitar I bought at goodwill a while ago for $2! I am really excited about the Keyboard because it has tones of features these generally run in the $30-$40 range and given how musically inclined my kiddo is he really "needed" one!

We are working on the full band...we have a flute, a sax, drums, a tambourine, a piano, maracas, guitar, microphone, xylophone, and violin plus the Mozart music cube which they often play their instruments to. Since a few have been given to the kids and the rest have been purchased at good will or garage sales we have spent a grand total of $14.50 on the whole set!

I got this Melissa and Doug dress up puzzle, the veggie puzzle, the letter magnets (in the bag), set of 15 Melissa and Doug animal magnets, and set of 15 Melissa and Doug dinosaur magnets, plus the stethoscope for $7

Total Spent: $31.50

Weekly Savings: 3/28-4/3

Last Sunday I made one more trip to maximize on Krogers March Mega Event. (you can see the match ups here - but this event is no longer going on)
In addition to those items I purchased:
Riceland rice - free after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Mahatma rice - $0.09 after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Starkist tuna -free after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Oscar Myer Bacon- $1.50 each after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Newmans Own Organic Popcorn -$0.69 after $0.50 coupon doubled (3/17 RP)
2 Success Rice -$0.99 each after $0.50 coupon doubled (1/31 RP- exp 3/31) - I will submit the receipt for the $5 rebate on the Princess and the Frog Movie I bought
*I also had several free item coupons (oreo caksters, degiorno pizza, kashi crackers) sent from Vocal point and Psst.
*plus some groceries with out coupons that we needed for next week like organic milk, bananas, bread, and Gatorade

Spent: $30.07 plus I got a $1 catalina for the Bacon
Saved: $73.88

Last Sunday I Also went to cvs to buy pullups:

I used 2 $3/1 coupons here

plus the $2/$10 CVS coupon

for a total of $10.80 and I got back $5 ECB!

Spent: $10.80 plus I got back $5 in

Saved: $8.00

My husband and myself had to make several quick stops this week for a specific item here and there mostly related to my son's being sick with a virus and pneumonia. Since his tummy hurts he only wants/needs very specific foods so those trips don't have pictures here are the totals:

Spent:$14.53

Saved: $6.03

I also I realized last week after I posted that I hoped to used our balance for the month to buy some organic beef that I forgot I had spent $13.99 at Toys R Us on and 18 pack of Organic Horizon Chocolate Milk Singles. So that plus our spending this week actually puts us a little over budget this month, not under budget like I had hoped. All the little trips for things we don't normally buy is what did it, but they were unavoidable so we will just work had next month to stay under budget buy $11.88 and try to work our organic meat in the budget next month too!

Weekly totals:

Spent:$69.39

Saved:$90.91

Monthly Total: $296.33 ($11.33 over budget)
Monthly Saved:$287.29

Kroger Shopping Trip 3/28

Since I was feeling great yesterday, and the hubs was home to take care of the kids I took advantage and tried to make one more trip to maximize on Krogers March Mega Event. (you can see the match ups here)
In addition to those items I purchased:
Riceland rice - free after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Mahatma rice - $0.09 after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Starkist tuna -free after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Oscar Myer Bacon- $1.50 each after coupon(Internet Printables - no longer available)
Newmans Own Organic Popcorn -$0.69 after $0.50 coupon doubled (3/17 RP)
2 Success Rice -$0.99 each after $0.50 coupon doubled (1/31 RP- exp 3/31) - I will submit the receipt for the $5 rebate on the Princess and the Frog Movie I bought
*I also had several free item coupons (oreo caksters, degiorno pizza, kashi crackers) sent from Vocal point and Psst.
*plus some groceries with out coupons that we needed for next week like organic milk, bananas, bread, and Gatorade

Total Spent: $30.07 plus I got a $1 catalina for the Bacon
Total Saved: $73.88

Weekly Savings: 3/21-3/27

Well, as I am sure those of you who follow the blog already know...this week is not going to be so hot in the savings department because sometimes life gets in the way!

We started last Saturday with a near emergency room visit for my daughter's fever which we were finally able to bring down, then I was sick by Wednesday, then my son was sick and nearly had to go the the emergency room last night with his fever, and my husband also came home from work sick yesterday! I think we are recovering now...but I have said that 3 times previously so I suppose we are all just waiting for it to happen already!

We were all actually feeling great on Tuesday when we went to Target...

Spent: $21.03

Saved: $28.87

There were sever other trips throughout the week, most involved Gatorade (which it pained me to pay for, but you do what you got to do) sprite, pedialyte, straws and medicines (not included in this budget) plus various "bland foods" as ordered by the doctor.

Spent: $41.95

Saved:$8.04

Total Spent: $62.98

Total Saved:$36.91

*We only have a few days left for March and I am not sure if I will need to go to the store again or not before the end of the month. These are our current totals, our monthly budget is $285 for grocery and household expenses. Whatever we have left for the month I will use to purchase some organic meat!

Monthly Total: $226.94

Monthly Saved:$217.35

* Updated* Weekly Savings: 3/14 -3/20

*I have updated the post because I forgot to add that I got back $41 in rebate checks! That will go into my savings category because I do not count rebate checks as savings until I receive them just in case something goes wrong, and they don't come!*

Time again for my weekly savings, we really only "needed" a few staples ($19.63 of my purchases were the "staples") but the Kroger mega sale was too good to pass up so I took advantage of some great deals. I hope you guys scored some great deals this week too!

I went to Krogers on 3/18 for the March Mega Event!

I spent $34.55 on all the groceries pictured above

I saved $96.95!!!!

That night I went back for a few more deals!

I spent: $1.67

I saved: $29.61!!!

Total Spent: $36.22

Total saved: $167.56!!!

My Kroger Shopping Trip: 3/18

I went to Krogers today for the March Mega Event! I spent $34.55 on all the groceries pictured above and I saved $96.95!!!!

My favorite deal this week is the Annies Mac and cheese for $0.50 each, but I am also pretty proud of the free Ronzoni! I will probably donate this pasta because it is an enriched white pasta and we are trying to reduce "white" foods from our diet, but it is great for donations!

Stay tuned for the updated Kroger post with the complete list of match-ups for the mega event!