Cut the Grocery Bill!

Last night at my cousin's surprise 30th birthday party (Happy Birthday Chris) I chatted with a few gals about couponing and cutting grocery costs. I have tried the whole coupon thing and it just never works out for me. My best friend Kristin is crazy about the coupons... she has a special coupon book she stores them all in and she is pretty darn proud about it! I would be too! My sister says that she tries to challenge herself to only spend X amount of money when she goes to the store each week. Well, the past couple of weeks I have definitely been in a cooking/grocery shopping rut. I feel like it has been weeks since I shopped for one full week. I have been stopping at the store a few times a week and spending way too much money.

I decided after our chat that it is time to get my butt in gear and start to SAVE money. We definitely could use the extra cash. So for now on my grocery shopping day will be on Monday... the start if the work week. I am going to challenge myself to spend only $70 a week. This is including food, toiletries (not including diapers because we get them shipped every couple of weeks), and dog food. One way to cut the cost is to plan ahead! I need to plan what we will be having for dinner the WHOLE week. CHECK! I did that tonight. Next is to make the grocery list and only get what we NEED. This week I looked at what we already had in the freezer and pantry and will be using a lot of these items for our dinners. 

We have a Super Wal-Mart about 5 minutes from our house. Perfect!!! Another way to save cash. The only thing is we like Boars Head lunch meats. So I will have to make a stop at the Shop-rite to pick up turkey for lunches. That's an inconvenience to me!! I HATE taking Weston to multiple places in one day. He gets very antsy shopping and lately has been having total meltdowns. Embarrasing. I think I will call ahead and have the deli prepare the meats and then Chad will swing by and pick it up on his way home. 

Tomorrow is my first day on the $70 challenge. We will see how I do since usually our grocery bill is always over $100. I can do it. I can do it!