Have not forgotten this challenge

I have not forgotten my challenge, although I haven't been blogging about it.

I spent $538 in January, and $516 in February.  So far I am on track to spend less in March.

I only go shopping when absolutely necessary, and I try to have coupons at each shop.  I am getting milk and things from Boise Milk (who totally rock) and vegetables from Bountiful Baskets.  The nice thing about Bountiful Baskets is that I have to eat new things, things I wouldn't buy otherwise.  This week's adventure is bok choy. 

Anyway, the month's totals so far:
Spent $391
Saved $72

For the rest of this month, I will get a Boise Milk delivery this week and a Bountiful Basket next week.  I plan to spend at least $20 less than my usual, in order to meet my goal of gradually decreasing my spending.  It's a worthy goal.

I hate Daylight Savings, by the way.

Scored big at Albertsons

I bought a Keurig at Albertsons on Black Friday.  I got a coupon book with it that promised $70 worth of free stuff.  I put the coupon book away and didn't look at it for a while.
Thank goodness I got it out yesterday, because the coupons expired today!  I cut out all the ones I wanted, and I really decided to get everything I could.  They were all coupons for one free Essentials brand item.....pretzel bars, Dixie coffee cups, Keurig coffee cups, a can opener, oatmeal, and more.  I didn't get the socks (although I probably should have) and that's about it.

Thanks to those coupons, and the round up coupons that Albertsons is doing right now, I spent a grand total of $29.77 and saved $88.49, for 76%.  Awesome!  I'm excited!

At Albertsons, I also got Cheerios (usually $3.69, on sale for $2.50, and if you bought 5 the price dropped to $1.88, and I had three coupons for 50 cents off which rounded up to $1). I got Wishbone dressing for 50 cents, our butter spread for $1.99, Orville Redenbacher popup bowls, buy one get one free AND get 2 free 2 liter bottles of soda (we're having root beer floats tomorrow).

I got items for my girl's next care package (in blogs, I call my daughter the Ninja).  I am aiming to send one out by Monday.

I am so excited!  Now I need to go clean out the fridge, and then go get my Bountiful Basket (which has an item that is getting sent to the Ninja).  Then I may go to Costco if my nerve doesn't fail...


So far this month, I have spent $95 (Albertsons, Amazon, and Bountiful Baskets) and have an adequate supply of paper towels (subscribe and save from Amazon), Food saver quart bags (ditto), vitamins for the Man, and am getting fruits and veggies here in an hour.  I have a longer list for Winco later on today.

Spent:  $95. 
Saved: $123  for 56%.

Now that's what I'm talking about.

Week 4 Grocery Budget Challenge

I really thought I'd blown it yesterday. 

I had a small list of things to get, but I forgot my cash envelope.  Since we were in pretty desperate need of broccoli and things, I went ahead and shopped. 

I walked out of the stores (Winco and Albertsons) feeling like I'd made a big mistake.  Surely I overspent.  (Broccoli at $2.38 a lb, ouch).  No coupons.  It felt icky.

I was wrong.

I reconciled my accounting and found that I am well within the budget.

To recap, my budget for this month was $600. ($400 for the first payperiod, $200 for the second).  I am ashamed to say that even that overly generous amount was less than we'd spent in the past. 

In my head, I was hoping for a 10% reduction from that budget amount, or $540.  It was this amount I was sure I'd exceeded yesterday. 

Accounting for everything:  last week's Boise Milk delivery, this week's Bountiful Basket order, and what I spent yesterday, I am pleased to announce my totals:

Amount spent for the month:  $522.84
Amount saved this month:  $72.35
% saved this month:  12.16%
Total value of items purchased this month (amount spent plus amount saved): $595.19

Lessons learned:
Fresh produce (from Bountiful Baskets or Boise Milk) tastes SO MUCH BETTER.
I spent $99 at Boise Milk and Bountiful Baskets.  I'm content with that.  Last time I got a Bountiful Basket the strawberries were SO good, as were the bananas.  I love the milk from Boise Milk. 

NEVER go shopping without looking for coupons and taking the cash envelope.  The stress.  Totally NOT worth it. 

Costco has good coupons.  I am going to quit buying produce there (except for the celery sticks, love them) and maybe berries once in a great while.  I don't usually buy meat there, but will keep it in mind.  I need to cut down Costco spending by amount a third, and again I'll do that a bit at a time.  My goal for Feb:  spend no more than $155 at Costco (which is a reduction of about 10%).  This is about the amount I reduced spending at Costco in Jan - 10%.

Meat:  we can eat less of this now that the girl has gone back to school (she's not exactly a veggie eater and I hated seeing how little was on her plate so I would try to fill it with meat and starch).   I will only buy meat next month if a)we're out of whatever and/or b)it is such an amazing sale that I really can't pass it up. 

I would REALLY like to stop shopping every week, and just fill the weeks with produce from either Boise Milk or Bountiful Baskets, but I haven't yet let go of a)not liking certain veggies (Brussels sprouts, kale) and b)wanting to know exactly what veggies/fruit I am getting each week.  I will work on that this next month.

So: monthly budget for Feb:  $500.  (We need dog food and kitty litter this month, so I'm setting this amount. Plus this is pretty close to 10% less than Jan.) 

Onward.

Week 3 Grocery Budget Challenge

So, week 3 is starting for the grocery budget challenge!

So far I am on track.  I have done the grocery shopping for the next week.  I went to one store, Winco.  I spent $58.84 and got a bunch of things, including Cheerios on sale for 1.98 a box and a coupon for $1 off three.  I got some things for our food drive at work.  I love having this stuff to be able to give.

So, total for month: 
Spent $477.09
Saved $64.39 or about 12%.

Thing is, I am carefully planning each and every grocery shop, and using coupons at every shop, but it doesn't seem like I am saving all that much money.  I'm pretty sure my 2012 average was more like 20% or even higher.  I do shop at Costco, and I do get milk delivered twice a month and I get one Bountiful Basket a month, but it just seems like I should be saving more.

However, on the really positive side, I think I am going to adjust my month goal from $600 to $550 because we are doing so well.  I credit that to using cash and my trusty calculator at each and every shop. 

My grocery budget includes cleaning items, dog and cat food, kitty litter, and dog treats.  I know we have a very generous budget, and it also includes things I buy for care packages for my college age daughter.  It does not include food we order in (tonight we had pizza), but we have a separate budget for that. 

Life is good.  I am pleased with the spending much less that has been happening.  Onward!

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DietBet Update

One week into the DietBet and I've lost weight.  I am very pleased with my efforts.  I've lost 4 pounds.  Some of that is holiday bloat, I know, but I will take it.  Two more pounds and I'll have lost the weight I put on over the holidays.  Two pounds after that and I will win!  But I do have to keep it off until the final weigh in on Feb. 3. 
I have mainly been focused on the exercise so far.  I've been doing a 100 days challenge and intend to meet my goal of 30 minutes a day of exercise for 100 days.  I think I've already exercised more this month than I did last month. 
However, I am nearing a point where I will absolutely have to clean up my eating.  I've done a bit of that, not eating nearly as many sweets as I did in December, but I am going to have to return to eating more fruits and vegetables and even...shudder....keeping track of my food.
Fortunately for the frugal dieter, there's plenty of free websites that will help you do just that.  My all time favorite one is Sparkpeople.com.  It's completely free, and they have all the trackers you need.  In addition, they have a point system for trophies, and you all know I love me some trophies!  Plus I love to see how long I can do things...I have an 80 some day streak for drinking water.  Can't wait until my exercise streak is that long.
Joining Sparkpeople is free, and you can use my name for a referral (I just get the glow of knowing I've talked about this and spread the Spark.)  I am DixieStartsNew.
Onward!

p.s. Although I have a weight loss goal for the month through DietBet, I'd really like to lose a little more.  I think 10 pounds is reasonable.  That's six pounds to go in three weeks. 

p.s.2 One of my motivators this month, besides hopefully winning $, is a change in insurance at my work.  They give incentives ($ off your premium) for things like having a normal blood pressure, normal blood sugar, and not smoking (if you have hypertension and are controlling it with medication, you still get the incentive).  This year they are adding BMI and waist measurements to the needed incentive list.  At this point, I will not meet the incentive and I need to!  I have until mid March.

Grocery shopping for the week

I make a monthly menu.  And as I make the menu, I jot down ingredients that are needed for each meal that I generally wouldn't buy this time of year (for instance, bell peppers).  I have a magnetic pad on the fridge that serves as the shopping list, and I put the week's shopping requirements down on each page.  Usually I only have three or four things on each page for the week, and more often the list includes meat that I don't have.  I do stock up on things when they are on an amazing sale.  So I know, for example, that I have no need to buy chicken breasts any time soon. 

I am finding that one of the keys to meeting my grocery budget goals for the month is staying OUT of the grocery store.  And I have, last grocery shopping was 1/6.  I probably could've waited until today to do the grocery shopping for the week, but I was already heading out to the gym and the grocery store is on the way. 

Didn't have much in the way of coupons.  However, I bought stew meat, milk, chocolate milk, biscuits, crackers, and misc and spent $44.73.  I saved $11.42.

Today I am picking up some fresh produce. I ordered a Bountiful Basket earlier this week.  It's 20 servings of fresh fruit and veggies.  Spent:  $16.50. 
Check out Bountiful Baskets, they always have the coolest produce! And compared to the grocery store, it is far cheaper and FAR fresher. 

Total for the month: 
Spent:  $387.96
Saved:  $60.89 or 14%.
Budget amount for this payperiod:  $400.  Will make it, hurrah! 

Need to up the amount saved and decrease the amount spent.  It's a work in progress.

Onward! 

Week 1 Grocery Budget Challenge

I am all done with the stock up shopping (Costco) and the Albertsons and Winco shopping.  This is the big grocery shop for the month.  For the rest of the month, I'll get only what we absolutely need or what's on such a great sale that I can't pass it up.

I used only cash from the envelope for these shopping trips.  It was really scary going to Costco and paying cash!  But I used my calculator faithfully and had Costco coupons. 

At Costco, I bought Ziploc bags, cat food and kitty litter, berries, bacon, creamer, tampons, moisturizer, and tampons.

Spent:  $173.87.  Saved:  $17.50.  (In previous trips, I would've spent $200 and saved much less)

At Albertsons, I bought meat and salad dressing and the like.

Spent:  $61.04.  Saved:  $29.39.

Today, I hit Winco for the spaghetti sauce, tomato sauce, yogurt, and produce that made up the last of my shopping list.

Spent:  $55.62.  Saved:  $2.88.

Also bought milk, cheese, and produce from Boise Milk (LOVE their milk and the delivery is divine.) 

Total spent so far this month: $326.73.
Total saved so far this month:  $49.77, which is 15%.

Total left in the budget for this payperiod:  $73.27.

Budget for the month:  $600.  Unfortunately, this does represent a number that is less than we have been spending.  I am going to ratchet this down slowly.  Next month's budget will be 10% less, and so on until we are spending no more than $400 for a month's worth of groceries (cleaning supplies, food, kitty food and litter, dog food and treats). 

It is a work in progress.  But how glad I am to have started. 

Budget Envelopes

Payday was Friday and I spent some time yesterday and today putting money into my envelopes. 

We are doing the envelope budget system. I've read about this for years in various frugal living sites (here's a description of it:  The Envelope System). 

It's pretty easy:  you figure out budget categories (which we have been doing for ages), and put cash in the envelopes for those categories.

We aren't doing this for everything in our budget.  The house payment, utilities, car insurance, and the like are paid online like we've been doing. 

We have categories that are going into electronic envelopes also.  We are saving a very small amount each month, that gets transferred from my checking to my savings.  I am going to add the following to the savings account:  auto insurance (so we can pay in full every six months instead of monthly, and avoid a monthly fee), savings for car and motorcycle registration and motorcycle insurance, and savings for the sewer/trash payment that we make every other month. No more scrambling for these payments.  For the auto insurance, I'm putting into savings the amount I would be putting into the insurance payment.  For the car/motorcycle registration and motorcycle insurance, I just added the items and got a total, divided it by 12, and that's the amount that is going into savings.  The sewer/trash is easy enough, but putting aside $55 a month seems so much easier than paying $110 or so....for some reason. 

The items that are going to be paid with cash are:  groceries, gas, entertainment, health care, and clothes. 

I must admit that it has not been easy to pay with cash for groceries so far.  I shopped at two different stores today.  One of them was Costco.  Of course I spent the usual amount there, but having to count it out in 20's was a whole different experience than swiping the debit card. 

We bought gas at Costco also, and had to use the debit card.  I'll just repay my debit card with cash from the envelope. 

It is simply a way of being mindful, I think.  I had to keep careful track of what I was spending at the store so I could be assured that I had enough cash.

And it's kind of scary looking at my bank account that has been pretty depleted from the cash withdrawal. 

On the other hand, I feel all kinds of powerful.  And that, bottom line, is why I'll keeping doing this.

Onward!

Dietbet!

I am doing a 4 week diet challenge on DietBet.com

Haven't seen DietBet.com?   Do check it out.  It looks like a lot of fun.  I'll be updating regularly on my progress.

So, how it works:  You find a game on DietBet.com.  There's tons of them right now.  You sign up for a game and put $ in the "pot."  Then you take a picture of yourself weighing and a picture of the scale.  Then you lose 4% of your body weight in four weeks (or however long the game is).  Everyone who loses 4% of their body weight wins!  The "pot" is divided up amongst the winners.

While I chose a moderate game with a $25 contribution to the "pot," there are all kinds of games on the site. 

Here's the one I'm doing: Fitknitchick's DietBet. 

I tell you what, the only way I'm losing this game is if I don't lose weight.  If I lose the weight, I'll get my $25 back, and maybe a little more.  And the "pot" for the game I'm in is $4900! 

It feels very shallow of me to lose weight only for money.  But I'll take it.  I need to lose 28% of my body weight overall, and I aim to have 2013 be the year I finally do it. 

More to come on this.

Grocery Budget Challenge

I was all set to do a Grocery Budget Challenge with Fabulessly Frugal for 2013, since I missed doing it much in 2012.  Alas!  They are not doing it for 2013. 

What is a couponer to do?

Well, phooey, no chance to win free stuff.  BUT in the bigger picture, I really need to keep to a good grocery budget. 

So I'm doing my own grocery budget challenge, keeping track of what I've spent and what I've saved. 

I will commit to posting that information on this blog, just to keep myself on the up and up.  This information will be posted no later than Monday.  I usually shop on the weekend, so will probably get it done earlier, but Monday at the latest.

Here's a link to the last week of the Grocery Challenge, and they have a spreadsheet for keeping track of your expenditures.

What's your grocery budget?  I am aiming to cut mine by at least 25% this month.