Living on a Budget: Groceries $40 for 4

Groceries from Ingles & BiLo

It was a whirlwind of a week with the girls off two days from school, elections, and numerous unexpected activities.  Despite the busyness I was determined to give you a grocery update this week (thanks for bearing with me).  I even remembered to take pictures this week!

Jake has been in Charleston for some work meetings, so we are looking forward to spending time with him this weekend.  I did manage to get a lot of projects done (just not necessarily things that I planned to do).  Do you ever have weeks like that?  Here is my weekly update on our Groceries $40 for 4.

Ingles Groceries:

• $13.04 at Ingles for 2 containers Fresh Strawberries (marked down), 1 bag Lenders Bagels (sale), 1 (5 pound) bag Fresh Grapefruit (sale), 1 bag Fresh Bananas (marked down), 1 container Fresh Potatoes (marked down), 2 loaves Laura Lynn Bread (sale), 1 bag Fresh Spinach (marked down).  (Everything I purchased at Ingles was either on sale or marked down or I had a coupon.  All the produce was marked down some as low as 99 cents as you can see from the bright green stickers.)

BiLo Groceries:

• $2.48 at BiLo for 1 container Southern Home Butter Spread (This was on sale and it is about the only reasonable priced butter that we have found that is made out of soy instead of dairy since we have a family member not eating dairy right now.  I also received an additional 5 cent discount for bringing my own reusable bag.)

Groceries from KMart

KMart Groceries:

• $6.00 at KMart for 6 big bags Smart Sense Wavy Potato Chips (I cannot remember the last time I found plain potato chips on sale for $1.00 recently.  With all the upcoming events and activities these will come in really handy!  Actually, I purchased them on Thursday and that same evening I used up one bag when a group of friends came over at last minute.)

This week I spent $21.52  on groceries.   I went under on the budget this week, YAY!!!   I was happy to get some produce deals and stock back up on a few items we were needing to replenish in our fridge and pantry.  Hopefully next week we can come under budget and November will be a better month for us!

It is my goal to give you regular updates on this budget section so you can celebrate the good weeks with me and thump me on the bad weeks!  As always you are welcomed to join the journey with me.  I would love to hear your story and how you are doing too.  The purpose of our family doing this it to watch our grocery spending while allowing us to feed our family, enjoy life, share with others, and yet stay on track with our budget.

Living on a Budget is a series of ways our family uses a budget to help keep us accountable with our finances.  Life doesn’t always go as planned.  We have used some of the ideas I will be sharing for years while others are ones we are just starting to implement as we continue finding ways to be creative and have fun with what we have been given.  Having a plan in place allows us the freedom to be smart with what we have been given, get more creative when it is a tight (week, month, year or a season) and when necessary live a much more simplified life.  A budget helps us stay on track so we have more opportunities to enjoy the many blessings we have been given as well as share what we have with others.  There is so much more to life than having all the stuff.  We may not have the newest or greatest items in our house, we drive used cars, and wear hand-me-down clothing…..however, if our family is taken care of and have love for each other and others we have more than all the riches in the world.