CSA (Janssen)

I've mentioned on my personal blog that I've signed up for a CSA this year (if you're not familiar with the CSA format, it stands for Community Supported Agriculture and you pay an upfront cost to get a box of fresh (possibly organic, depending on the CSA) locally grown vegetables every week).

We subscribe to Johnson's Backyard Garden (which is an organic farm) and it costs $300 for ten weeks. We have some friends that we split it with (which also means we can split up the weekly pick-up), so it's $15 a week. It's a LOT of produce - we really have to work to get through it all.

Do I think it's worth it?

Depends on what your goal is. If it's to spend the least amount on food you possibly can, it's probably not worth it.

On the other hand, if you're trying to increase the amount of vegetables you eat, want to support local industry, and don't want to pay the really high sticker price for organic produce at the grocery store, this is a great way to go. For me, I've decided that it's worth a slightly higher price to eat better and put a fairly large percentage of my grocery budget into my local economy.

I feel like I've been able to keep our grocery bill fairly stable even with this addition, because I now plan my meals around our vegetables, rather than meat. Instead of vegetables being a side dish, they are part of practically everything we eat.

Plus, we've now eaten a ton of things I'd never tried before and very likely would never have purchased on my own (bok choy, rainbow chard, kale, escarole, fennel, etc). 

Anyone else do a CSA?

Trolling the Aisles of Your Super Market

Maybe coupon shopping just isn't your bag.  Maybe you hate even the idea of paging through the newspaper ads and cutting out coupons, or worse yet, printing out coupons online and using your valuable paper and ink!  If this is you, here is an easy way to still pick up some great deals at your grocery store without the scissors or newsprint stained fingers.

Each week during your weekly shopping trip, take an extra 10 minutes and slowly walk down a couple of aisles looking for those lovely $1.00 sale tags -- or 2/$1.00 is even better!  My personal favorites to comb on a regular basis are the personal hygiene and cleaning supplies aisles. You'll be amazed at often your favorite deodorant, toothpaste or window cleaning spray are on sale for only $1.00 (which is typically much less than half the regular price).

If I didn't walk down these aisle WHEN I DON'T NEED these items, I would end up paying full price just a few weeks later -- when I'm desperate.   We've all been there before!

My second little piece of advice is to buy 12 of these items when they are on sale for $1.00.  Instantly you have a year's supply of this product.  Easy Peasy.

Remember, the most expensive item is the one you HAVE to buy right now.  I think it's a cosmic law that nothing is ever on sale at that moment.

Cooking Once a Month (Carole)

The title says it all.   This is a method of cooking that I've done off and on over the years.  It can also be done on a weekly basis quite successfully.

List out 28 meals that your family likes and that you're comfortable cooking.  Make up a shopping list so you make sure you have all your ingredients.  Then spend most of one day getting each main dish as close to the cooking stage as you can:

1.  All basic/raw ingredients mixed together and frozen in the baking dish
2.  All canned and/or dry ingredients assembled in a ziplock bag ready to be quickly assembled on the day you need them.
3.  A combination of #1 and #2

Take some time and figure out how much of each recipe can safely be prepared ahead of time, so that on the day you want to fix it, most of the work is done.  The goal is to have 28 recipes READY TO GO.  Just like last week's meal idea, this system allows you to buy items in bulk and use them up quickly.

Try doing it with a week's worth of recipes first, to get the hang of it.  I remember the first time I did this, it took me about 7 hours to assemble everything for one month's worth of meals.  The second time (using the exact same recipes), I did it in a little over 2 hours.  You do get the hang of it, and you'll figure out some speedy tricks.  I also simplified many of the recipes.

If choosing  your own month's worth of recipes seems like too much effort, you can get the book, Once-a-Month Cooking, that gives you all the info you need -- that's what I did in the beginning.  She has good recipes and many good tips.

Check to see if your library has it in stock.  I bet they do!  You'll love yourself night after night when you quickly feed your family another healthy, home cooked meal.

Balancing Your Life (Merrick)

With the start of the new year, I'm sure you all have many new years resolutions. This year, I decided to tone down my usual new years resolutions craziness and focus on the essentials. My main goals are to simplify and balance my life. I never want to be one of those women who is doing the laundry or cleaning every day of the week, or going to the grocery store every other day to pick up a few things. I want each day to feel individual and special, and be able to have time to do the important things, like playing cars with my little boy.

So let me tell you about a few things I'm doing this year, although not all of them specifically deal with saving money (but I'm saving my sanity here, and that is worth something!!):

I make bread every Tuesday -- I bake it, cut it up, put it in a bread bag, and it's ready for sandwiches and toast all week.

I clean the house every Thursday -- this includes cleaning both bathrooms, dusting, mopping, sanitizing doorknobs and countertops, and any small organizing jobs that need to be done.

I do the laundry every Friday -- this includes sorting, washing, drying, folding, ironing, and putting away ($$ saved by not running the washer/dryer every day!)

I go grocery shopping every Saturday -- this includes planning my weekly menu, clipping coupons, and then going to my regular grocery store (Smiths), Sam's Club for bulk items, Rite Aid for toiletry items, and Sunflower Market for specialty items. ($$ saved by not running to the store every day!)

In the interest of full disclosure, I babysit my neighbor and have art class on Monday's and Wednesdays, which keeps me busy all day. So I keep those days free of house duties.

Also, we do many small household chores on a daily basis -- take out the garbage, run the dishwasher, clean the counter tops, pick up toys, etc.

By dividing up my week in this way, my life is suddenly more balanced than it ever has been. My laundry basket is full, but I'm not stressed about it because I know it will all be washed and put away today. We are running out of milk, but tomorrow is shopping day so why waste my time by running to the store today (especially when I'll probably come home with $20 worth of groceries!) -- we'll just have toast for breakfast. And each of these daily duties only takes me an hour or two of hands on time, so I have plenty of time for other things during the day.

When you have specific days dedicated to your various duties, you can better commit to each of them and perform better at each of them. You're probably not going to save much more money if you spend hours clipping coupons every day -- you're just going to hate couponing.

So do yourself a favor and bring a little balance into your life this year. Everyone, including your wallet, will be thanking you.

Homemade Baby Food (Merrick)

Two months ago I started my baby on solids. We did rice cereal for the first month and then moved on to pureed fruits and veggies. My friend had some left over Gerber baby food from her son, so she gave it to me and we have used that for the last month. And all the while I thought that after all that free baby food ran out, I would probably just continue buying it from the store because it wasn't that expensive and was convenient. That is, until my friend mentioned that as babies get older they eat about five jars of food per day, and it was costing her nearly $20 extra on her weekly grocery bill. And that's only for one baby.

So I did a little online research, scoured the baby isle at the grocery store, made some homemade baby food, and then came up with this little comparison.

Gerber is the cheapest at my grocery store (Smiths). The cost for 5 ounces of baby food (for my son's age group) is $0.95. These are several of the options they offer at my store, so I made each of these from fresh produce and here are the price comparisons*:

Bananas
- Homemade: $0.19 for 5 oz.
- Store Bought (Gerber): $0.95 for 5 oz.
- Savings: $0.76 or 80%!
Pears
- Homemade: $0.34 for 5 oz.
- Store Bought (Gerber): $0.95 for 5 oz.
- Savings: $0.61 or 64%!
Green Beans
- Homemade: $0.61 for 5 oz
- Store Bought (Gerber): $0.95 for 5 oz.
- Savings: $0.34 or 36%!
Carrots
- Homemade: $0.42 for 5 oz.
- Store Bought (Gerber): $0.95 for 5 oz.
- Savings: $0.53 or 56%!
Sweet Potatoes
- Homemade: $0.27 for 5 oz
- Store Bought (Gerber): $0.95 for 5 oz.
- Savings: $0.68 or 72%!

So although another mouth to feed will certainly increase your weekly grocery bill, making your baby food can make the blow a little lighter. Also keep in mind that different stores have different produce costs. If I had a bigger freezer to store a lot of baby food, I would go to Sam's or Costco and buy produce in bulk, and then these prices and savings would be even better.


Now you do have to take into account the cost of your time, because time is money! If you are incredibly busy and you're straining to make time to do this, then $0.95 is probably worth it to you. And there is nothing wrong with that.

However, let me tell you that the amount of work that I put into making this baby food was minimal (the amount of mess, on the other hand...that was not minimal). I have a vegetable steamer, so all I did was wash, peel, and chop the produce, throw it in the steamer for 15 minutes until it was soft, then toss it in the food processor with a bit of water. Once it was pureed I poured it into ice trays (that I got at the dollar store, 2 for $1), froze it until they were hard, then put them back in the freezer in labeled baggies.

Total hands on time for each item was probably five minutes. So easy.

This coming week I'm going to try making it from canned fruits and veggies to see if it cuts down on the preparation time (since many items probably won't require steaming), and see how the price differs from fresh produce. So stay tuned for a post about that next week!


*this comparison chart involved some math, and I'm an artist. Don't judge too harshly if there are some calculation mistakes..

What Would You Do With a Windfall? (Carole)

Many years ago I had a good friend.  She and I lived in the same small town and had children who were just the same ages.  We became exercise partners and often spent entire days at each other's apartments while our children played.  After a year or so, we were both on the verge of buying our first homes.  I was aware that before she was married she had been involved in two accidents and had received two different insurance settlements adding up to a whopping $50,000!  In my mind, they had it made, since we were scrimping and saving to get our own down payment together.

But one day she mentioned that they were going to have to borrow most of their down payment from her parents.  She was unbelievably embarrassed to do so, because now her parents would know that she and her husband had blown the entire amount!   I don't know how they spent all that money.  I do recall they had a ski boat and an old truck to pull it with and their kids had a lot of cool toys, but beyond that I couldn't see where it had all gone.

I've often thought of my friend during these past 25 years.  What COULD they have done with that much money that would have been smart?  In reality, the possibilities were endless, but here are three super frugal choices.

1.  Bury it in their backyard or put it in a safety deposit box.  In 5 years they would still have had their $50,000.

2.  Put it in the bank.  In the mid 1980's an average money market account earned 7.71% (these were the high interest Jimmy Carter years -- great if you had money to invest, horrible if you needed to borrow it) and at the end of five years they would have had over $73,000.

3.  Buy a house.  In the 1980's, $50,000 would have been a hefty down payment on a starter home.

What would you do if you suddenly found yourself with a large amount of money right now?

Saving Tips for Travel (Carole)

This week we're going to respond to the request by Diana Banana to tell our favorite tips for saving money while traveling.

First, I've already written about how we fly free with Southwest Airlines by using their credit card through our office.  That is probably the biggest money saver we've ever done.  Check it out and see if it could work for you.

Second, because we live in a big city (and it happens to be a vacation destination) we have often headed downtown to a local hotel for a couple of days -- this works especially well for anniversaries.  Saves us both time and gasoline.  It's kinda' fun to play tourist in your own hometown.  Also, we can usually get a deal on a hotel and many shows because we are locals.  I don't know if that translates to other states, but it would be worth checking into.  Nevada residents can save up to 50% on many shows and hotels.  We also use personal contacts to get reduced hotel room prices or free upgrades and free show tickets.  We've seen Blue Man Group, Lord of the Dance, Mystere, Celine Dion, Lance Burton, Hans Klok, Donny and Marie Osmond, and Penn and Teller all for free because we knew someone who works behind the scenes.  These people usually get a few free tickets every month -- if you ask, they can be yours.

Lastly, the most typical way we save money while traveling, is to eat lunch and dinner from the grocery store rather than at a restaurant.  We have a typical menu for both breakfast and lunch that includes cold cereal, milk, yogurt, bananas, sandwich fixings, chips, juice and cookies.  (All of the perishables are kept cold either in the hotel fridge or in a garbage can filled with ice kept covered in the tub.)  Saving the total cost of both breakfast and lunch each day makes going out for dinner not seem so expensive.  And since we could never be mistaken for "foodies," we tend to choose reasonable establishments for our late meals.

How do stretch your travel dollars??

Substitutes (Merrick)

I think I would consider myself an adventurous cook. I'm not one of those people that tries a new recipe every night, but I do like to experiment every once in a while. Many times, these recipes call for ingredients that I don't typically use, and then, unfortunately, don't use again. For example, I tried some new recipe recently that called for cake flour. I bought a small-ish box, use a cup or two for the recipe, and since that time that box has sat in my pantry, untouched. Bad news.

Well if I'd been smart, I would have searched online for cake flour substitutes, because I would have found out that I could use all-purpose flour and cornstarch instead.

Although I don't spend a lot of money on ingredients that I'll never use again, I do spend some occasionally and looking back I feel like it's wasted money. Especially if there is a perfectly good substitute.

I have several cookbooks that have a page or two in the back dedicated to ingredient substitutions. I'm sure you do too. So next time you have a recipe that calls for some unusual recipe, don't waste your money; use a substitute.

Eating On a Dollar A Day (Carole & Janssen)

I'm out in Boston with Janssen and her sweet new baby.  Plus her little family is days away from a move across the country.  We're a bit busy, to say the least!  So, rather than writing a post today, we're sharing a very interesting Time Magazine article, and the accompanying  blog, about 2 people who are feeding themselves on $1 per day.  Maybe a bit extreme, but it will get you thinking about your own food budget in a whole new way!

You'll quickly notice that they eat vegan.  

Time Magazine Article
http://www.dollaradaybook.com/blog 


Hope you're having a happy, happy day!!

Time Well Spent (Carole)

We've all heard the saying, "Time is Money."  When it comes to saving money, nothing could be more true.  This is just a short little post to remind you that -

the faster you're living your life, the more money you're probably spending

Because it takes some time to:
 *  Write up a budget
 *  Plan a menu
 *  Cook your own  meals
 *  Look for and use coupons
 *  Become familiar with the usual prices of things
*   Comparison shop
*   Do your homework on the best brands
*   Shop at more than one grocery store
*   Try a DIY project
*   Home repairs

Are you living your life too fast to be frugal??

It's difficult to remove yourself from the frenzied pace of modern life.  But try to slow it down, think things through, consider your options before you buy something, take a few deep breaths and spend your hard-earned money wisely.  Your savings can be enormous.


Photo courtesy of FreeFoto.com  

Grocery Shopping (Janssen)

About a year ago, I wrote about grocery shopping on my personal blog and a bunch of people commented saying things like, "Um, you guys must not eat anything." I don't really know what to say to that - I feel like we eat a pretty normal amount. We have a full dinner nearly every night, we have people over for dinner, and we pack a lunch every day. I cook a lot. We eat primarily healthy food.

All of which is to say, you may read this post and think, "You only buy two items a week. No wonder your budget is low." And if you think that, I simply don't have an explanation.

Anyway . . . .

When I go grocery shopping, I make a list that looks like this (it's the same one my mom has done my whole life):

I star things I have coupons for and write the brand after it if it matters and if I'm going to two grocery stores, I write down what store I'll be buying things at. Very high-tech.

And then I just do not buy things that are not on my list. Period.

I cannot emphasize strongly enough how important it is to get to know your store (or stores). Ask friends or neighbors about any money savings tips they know - two of my favorite money-saving tips came from people I know.

One of my friends mentioned that if you used the self-scanner (a little hand held scanner that you can use to ring up your groceries as you go (I love this thing because I know my exact total before I even get to the checkout lane)), you got extra discounts that showed up only on the scanner (I also found out later that they are tailored to the things you buy, so I often am able to use those discounts).

My co-worker also told me about the reduced produce shelf and where to find it in the grocery store. I owe my $1.29 and delicious pineapple this past week to her. Not to mention all the times I've bought other ludicrously inexpensive produce from this cart. I do many of my side dishes this way - I just anticipate buying at least one or two items that I'll use from there.

Melanie asked about using coupons and how she's found them fairly unhelpful so far. Personally, I do not use a lot of coupons. I don't take the newspaper, but I  religiously check coupons.com and am able to make that work pretty well. I scan through it every few days and see if there is anything I'm interested in. The main ones I use are for meat (chicken sausage, pepperoni, etc), cheese, sour cream, yogurt, cold cereal, chocolate chips, diapers, and sugar.

Once I found out that my store doubles any coupon under a dollar automatically, I had a better feel for how coupons could save me some substantial money. I also watch for sales to correspond with my coupons. If cereal goes on sale and I have coupons for it, I'm suddenly paying less than half than I'd pay for a smaller box of the generic brand. That's hard to beat.

Here's a picture of my receipt from this past week - the only thing that's not listed on here that I bought in this is the gallon of milk I bought at BJ's (the east coast equivalent of Cosco) and the additional boxes of cereal I bought a few days later:

I got a discount on my chicken and cream cheese (thanks to the scanner), I had a dollar off coupon for being willing to do a blind taste test of fudgesicles (would YOU have said no?), my reusable bag coupons, a diaper coupon, coupons that doubled for chex mix (a little gift for Bart) and my four boxes of cereal and $1 coupons for both of my yogurt packs.

This was, of course, a particularly good week for me - I'm not usually saving more than 50% on my groceries. But this week chicken was on sale for $1.79 a pound (Sherry informs me that is not a sale, but, let me tell you, in Massachusetts, that is a freaking STEAL. I have never once seen it go that low in the year we've lived here), plus my scanner gave me an extra 10% off. Cereal was also on sale for $1.50 a box and with the coupons I'd printed off a few weeks earlier and was just holding on to, I got those boxes of cereal for 40 cents each.

This coming week, I know that the yogurt I like most is going on sale and so I'll buy more than I usually do (and I've been hoarding coupons for this product for several weeks anyway). When one of my stores sent out $1 doubler coupons a few weeks ago, I bought four boxes of it (each of which have 4 yogurt cups).

At the end of the day, my main strategy is to just not buy things I don't need and to take advantage of sales, coupons, and discounts whenever I can.

Other grocery shopping secrets?

Making a Menu (Janssen)

When I sit down to make the menu for the week, I ask myself a few questions:

• What do I need to use up? I poke through my fridge to remind myself what I have that hasn't been used yet - half a bag of spinach, perhaps or two leftover chicken thighs in the freezer or ricotta cheese or buttermilk. The internet is brilliant for this kind of thing. There is no use buying a bunch of new food and throwing away your perfectly good food from last week.
• What is on sale? I will admit right here how deeply pathetic I am and say that Wednesday, the day the grocery store fliers come, is - I kid you not - a highlight of my week. I look through to see what's on sale and see if I can work those into my menu.
• What will we actually eat? Haley commented on my last post that she doesn't like to buy ho-hum foods just because they are on sale, or she'll be tempted to go out to eat instead. I absolutely agree - I never ever buy something just because it's on sale. I really enjoy cooking, so making new interesting things is a big part of my motivation to get dinner on the table and having it be something appealing is vital as well. We're not eating hot dogs just because they are on sale or I have a coupon (although, at nine months pregnant, I have to say hot dogs appeal to me in a way they never have before. . . .).

As I mentioned before, I use Google Docs to make my menu. I like it because it's free, it's accessible, and I have a running record of my menu. I can also copy and paste them each week into a new menu and reuse any meals I didn't get around to making. You can see below my running list of menus for the last six weeks or so (and my favorite document of all, "Dishes to Try").

Every week, my menu looks like this: one main dish, and two side dishes for seven nights of the week.

At the end of the week, as I'm making a new menu, I go to the previous week's menu and choose "Make a Copy" and save it with the dates for the coming week:

 
Then I delete the dinners I made, leaving any that I haven't made and still plan to and start filling the new one in:

And now I can start thinking about what to fill in with. If ground turkey is on sale, we might have meatloaf or spaghetti pie. If I have leftover croissants in the freezer, we might do some sort of sandwich. I check out my "Dishes to Try" document and see what's there that I've been wanting to make. I ask Bart if he has any requests. I Google recipes that use feta or artichokes or whatever ingredients are nearing death in the fridge.

And I make my grocery list as I choose meals, so I know that I have all the ingredients for every meal. 

The days of the week I have a meal for aren't necessarily very firm - I might make what it says on Tuesday on Friday, but if I do have an item that needs to be used up ASAP, I will generally put that early in the week so I think about it sooner, or if there is a day that I know will be particularly crazy, I will put an easy or crockpot meal on that day.

I also do very easy side dishes - I buy a lot of lettuce and we have salads many nights (as you will notice). I throw whatever vegetables or fruit we have sitting around in with it and make a salad dressing to go along. I often will write on my grocery list "Fruit" or "Vegetable" and then choose one of each off the reduced produce section (when I bought 6 oranges for $1.29 a few weeks ago, we had. . .a lot of oranges that week) depending on what's available.

Any suggestions? How do you do your menu planning?

Keeping Groceries from Eating Your Budget (Janssen)

There are some categories in your budget that you could cut out (you could live without a cell phone or without the Internet or without any entertainment category or go without buying new clothing for a year), but groceries, unfortunately, is not one of those categories, at least not in my experience.

And so, because I don't want lots and lots of my money going to groceries, I put forth a fair amount of effort to keeping my costs low. Our budget for groceries is $200 a month (just around $50 a week).

• I grocery shop every single week. I know some people (like Merrick) do two week trips, but that has not worked for me. It is easier and less stressful for me to go every week and know that if I can't afford something one week, it's only one week until I go again. Also, then I can get through my produce without throwing it away or running out of stuff too early. Figure out what works for you and then stick to it.
• Find out what kind of deals your grocery store offers. Shortly after we moved to Massachusetts, I started doing some reading about couponing and store specials and I was so sad not to live in Utah or other states where I was reading about these amazing deals or programs my stores didn't run. But over the last eight months, I've made a real effort to figure out what my store policies are and now I feel like I'm getting some good deals. I know that they double all coupons under $1.00. I know that there is a reduced produce section (a huge tray of various slightly bruised or very ripe produce for $1.29) back by the deli. I know that if something rings up for the wrong price, I get it free (if I ask). I keep learning ways to save at my grocery store that I was missing before.
• I am militant about that budget. If we run out of something, that's too. dang. bad. Bart can live for three days without eggs. I can do waffles for dinner if I suddenly realize my spinach for my quiche has gone bad. No syrup? Put some jam or applesauce or powdered sugar on your pancakes. Running out of something is not a reason to go to the grocery store. I make one midweek trip to the grocery store for bananas but I do not buy anything else. Nothing.
• Read your store circulars. I get the circulars for three different grocery stores, all of which are within about two miles of my house. I have one store that I generally shop at, one that I NEVER go to, and one that I go to on occasion if they have enough good items or coupons to make it worth my while. Use this to plan your menu.
• Make a menu. I cannot say this with enough emphasis. If you are not planning out what you'll be eating every night, you are very likely going to have a hard time sticking to a grocery budget. I make my menu in Google Docs so that I can access it from anywhere, so that it's on file for me, so that I can share it with Bart if he wants to know what I'm making for dinner, and so that I can copy it every week and copy the things I didn't make (I almost ALWAYS end up with one meal I didn't actually make because we had leftovers or decided to have waffles instead or Bart had a work dinner or something).

Next week I'll talk in more detail about how I make my menu and what my grocery shopping trips look like (complete with coupons). What do you do to keep your grocery costs low?

Easy Coupon-ing (Carole)

I've meant to share this easy way to coupon for quite awhile, but somehow other topics kept stealing my attention.  So here we go!

There are some wonderful websites out there that bring the world of coupons right to your door.  These are not crazy buy-coupons-on-Ebay sites.  (And isn't that illegal anyway??)  These are websites that keep track of what coupons are showing up in your mailbox and in your local Sunday newspaper and telling you when to use them at your local grocery stores for maximum savings.

Bless the men and women who scour the sale fliers and match up the weekly specials with your saved coupons.

I learned this easy system from my good friend Johanna.  She's a genius.

She suggests, to get the most bang for your buck:
1.  Sign up for as many local Sunday newspapers as there are people living in your home.  Remove from each paper the Super Shopper  (SS) ad section.  Write on the front of each SS the date with a large marker.  File these by month (June altogether, July altogether. . .)

2.  Remove the Red Plum (RP) ads that come in your mailbox usually on Tuesday.  Also mark these with the date with a large marker and file them with the SSs.  You can use a file drawer with hanging folders, or any other method that works easily for you that separates these 2 kinds of fliers by month.

Now just ignore all these collected fliers, until the website tells you to go find one of them.  They may sit filed away and un-used for a few weeks.

Now comes the fun part.

Go to the website The Obsessive Shopper.   Wednesday is the best day, because that's when the new deals come out for grocery stores.  This site is set up for Arizona, Idaho, Eastern Washington state, Las Vegas, Northern & Southern California and Utah stores.  The stores listed are the major grocery stores in those areas.  There is a National section too, for those of you who do not live in the above mentioned areas, but it only lists coupons and sales at Wal-Mart.  Not terrible, but not great.  So sorry.  I bet there are other websites out there for your corner of the globe that do this same thing, and you and I can continue trying to find them!!  Let us know if you locate such a site and we'll spread the word.

Now back to The Obsessive Shopper.

1.  Click on your location
2.  From the "Select Your Store" drop down menu, pick a store.
3.  Always begin by selecting the "Start" button at the top.
             *This will shade all the rows in the list gray; any rows shaded gray will NOT print.
4.  To automatically select only 4&5 star items (the best "stock up" items) click on the red star in the top left corner of the list.  This will pre-select all 4&5 star items, turning their rows white
            *When you find an item you want to put on your list, click directly on the row and the shading will return back to white.  All white rows WILL print.
5.  Be sure to click on the top row (where all the descriptions are) so it turns white and also prints (including any other row that includes specific information about a promo).
6.  When you are done, click on the "Shrink" button at the top of the screen.  This will "hide" any gray rows from your printer.  If you want to go back to the complete list, click "Un-Shrink" to have all rows return.
7.  When you are done, click "Print Now" at the top of the screen.
8.  After you print your list, go back and link to all your printable coupons to print (usually you can only print 2 copies of printable coupons from any one computer -- but if you have more than one computer in your house, you can print 2 from each computer)
9.  Now, looking at your printed list, go to your filed-away fliers and clip the suggested coupons (SS = Smart Shopper & RP = Red Plum) by the dates listed.

Most items in a store go on sale in a 7 - 15 week cycle.  The key of coupon-ing is to save the coupon until the item goes on sale.  This is what this system helps you with.  Best case scenario is to buy enough of the sale item to last until the product goes on sale again in a few weeks or month.  That's why you want multiple copies of the newspaper.  With the same reasoning, see if your neighbors or relatives will give you their unwanted copies of Red Plumb.

Give yourself time to walk through this system slowly.  The first time seems confusing, but it will become very, very simple in no time at all.  You'll be whizzing through in less than 10 minutes by the 2nd time.  Get out there and SAVE!



 

Returns (Janssen)

Yesterday, my husband and I went grocery shopping. Because of a mix-up on cereals that were included in a certain promotion and a mis-scanned item, I realized after we got home that I'd paid $6.69 more for the four boxes of cereal than I should have.

After mentioning it approximately 100 times to my husband over the course of the afternoon, he offered to go back to the store, explain the mix up and ask for a refund. He had me tell him exactly what we'd paid for what products and then wrote a side-by-side list of what we should have paid, then clipped the receipt, the weekly ad, and the coupons to it.

Ten minutes later, he was home, with $6.69 in his wallet. How can I not love that man?

I know that some people absolutely HATE to return things or ever venture near the "Customer Service" desk. Not me. I am an avid reader of return policies, and my combined hatred of clutter and spending unnecessary money means that I am more than willing to return almost anything.

At the grocery store, I watch them ring up every item and I hold them to the posted store policy of giving you free any item that rings up differently than advertised or marked on the shelf.

If I buy a box of crackers that I open and discover it is stale, you better believe I'll drag it back to the store on my next trip and ask for a refund.

If I buy a shirt that I discover doesn't fit or I suddenly realize I will never ever wear since taking it off in the dressing room, I'll return it.

I'm nice about it, but if the store policy is to correct mistakes, take back inferior or unwanted products, or comp mispriced items, you better believe I'm going to take them up on it.

Is that too much for you or am I in good company?

How Much Does Your Lunch Cost? (Janssen)

The other night at dinner, I was telling Bart about the teacher lunches that are provided at the two elementary schools I work at. This is a new program this year, so many of the teachers were really excited because you could buy a non-chicken nugget lunch for only $3. I commented to Bart that $15 a week for lunches still seemed quite expensive to me, since if we both spent that, it would be 60% of our weekly budget.

Last year, in an effort to be healthy, Bart and I gave up fast food. The on-campus Wendy's had been an easy option if we were too tired or too rushed or simply didn't feel like making lunches on a school day. With the dollar menu, it felt like a pretty cheap way to go ($3 or $4 for a full lunch). When Wendy's was no longer an option for us, we were extremely committed to making sure we had a lunch every single day.

As we discussed this, we wondered how much we actually were spending every day on lunch now. Our main priorities when it comes to lunch are as follows: easy (no way are we assembling 7 part sandwiches in the morning when we're rushing to catch the T and beat traffic), cheap, and nutritious.

Here's what lunch looks like for us at the moment:

• Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches on homemade wheat bread ($0.30 - ten cents for two slices of bread, ten cents of peanut butter and ten cents of jelly)
• One yogurt ($0.25 cents each since I have become a rabid yogurt coupon collector and I wait for them to go on sale and buy many at once because in my experience it takes yogurt AGES to go bad). 
• One apple ($0.38)
• One banana ($0.27)

This puts the total for one lunch at $1.20, for a grand total of $12 a week for the two of us. Not bad - here in Massachusetts where Wendy's doesn't have a dollar menu, but instead a VALUE menu where everything runs about $1.29, you couldn't even get one carton of chicken nuggets for that cost.

We have experimented with a ton of different lunch options - string cheese, granola bars (both store bought and homemade), cookies, muffins, vegetables, pretzels, etc - over the last 18 months since we devoted ourselves wholeheartedly to homemade lunches. Some are too expensive, some are too unhealthy, some are too much effort to make in advance.

Our current combination though appears to be just the right amount of food for us - we eat it all, rather than leaving the apples uneaten while devouring the chocolate chip granola bars moments after arriving in the office.

What do you eat for lunch? Any idea how much it costs?

Recipe Wednesday - Beef Stroganoff (Carole)

It's nice to have a sense of what your at-home recipes cost to cook -- and we are here to help!  You typically save about 80 - 90% by cooking dinner at home instead of going to a restaurant.  Now that feels great!!

Beef Stroganoff

(Cost for entire dish = $5.67)

Serves between 4 - 6 people.  Depending on the people.

2+ lbs beef roast  ($4.27)

1 Dry Onion Soup mix ($0.90)

1/4 cup water

1 cup sour cream ($0.50)

Cut the roast into 2 inch pieces, place in a crock pot on low.  Add onion soup mix and water.  Cook for 6 - 8 hours, stirring occasionally and adding small amounts of water if it gets dry.  10 minutes before serving, stir in sour cream and let heat through.

Serve over rice, potatoes or pasta.

These ingredient prices are so low because I watch for in-store sales.  The meat was $1.89/lb (nearly half price) and my local store almost always has store brand sour cream for $1.00 for a pint.  I usually buy the store brand of soup mix which is about half the price of Liptons.  

And I LOVE my crock pot.  It works all day and has dinner ready and smelling divine when I'm ready to feed my hungry crew.  

Savings in the Laundry Room (Carole)

So, here's another set of easy ideas for saving money -- in your laundry room.

Do you use the right amount of detergent when you do your laundry?  If you use a liquid detergent, it seems obvious to fill up the cap to the top.  Not so.  If you read the side of the bottle, it will tell you to look closely at the cap and you'll see that there are faint lines inside that indicate the amount you should use for a small/medium load and a large load.  These lines are unbelievably hard to see.   I had to feel for them with my fingers so that I could mark the outside of the cap for this photo.  You will notice that both of these lines are significantly below the top of the cap.  By filling your cap to the top for every load, you are using more than double the amount recommended for a small/medium load.  This also means you are not getting your full loads/bottle for your money.  Instead of the advertised 40 loads, you are getting about 20, doubling your cost to wash each load of laundry.

The same is true for those of us who use powdered detergent.  The lines on the scoop in the box are much easier to see, but probably just as ignored by most of us.  Again, filling the scoop up to the top with detergent uses about twice what the manufacturer recommends in their directions on the side of the box.  Congratulations!  By using the right amount, you're suddenly going to be getting twice as many loads of laundry from your detergent purchase.  That could add up to about $100 saved per year -- and that's before coupons.  In addition, if you have a High Efficiency washer, your washer is made to rinse clothes until the soap is gone from the fabrics.  Using too much detergent means your washer will rinse and rinse and rinse to get all that extra soap out . . .  your energy prices will really climb!

For years I have ripped my dryer sheets in half before putting them in the dryer.  This one step saves me 50% on dryer sheets every year.  When I'm feeling REALLY frugal, I rip them into thirds.  Trust me, there's plenty of "stuff" on the half (or 1/3rd) sheet to stop the static in your dryer.  Suddenly your little box lasts twice or three times as long.  The savings just keep on comin'!

Lastly, doing your laundry before noon or after 7:00 PM will significantly reduce your electricity costs.  No kidding!  All electricity does not cost the same.  Check your electrical company website for their Time of Use rules.  Electricity costs a lot more from Noon - 7:00 PM (peak use hours) when everyone in town is using it too.

A Cautionary Tale:  

Frugal and Cheap are different animals.

Last fall, I  bought a dozen bottles of a liquid laundry detergent on sale -- and I had some coupons.  I was so proud of myself!!  Month after month I've delighted in bringing down a new bottle when the old one was empty, knowing how little I had paid for this detergent.  This was not an off-brand or a store brand, but it wasn't one of the big names either.  However, a few weeks ago, I was visiting my parents in Idaho and did some of my laundry while I was there.  My mother had her big box of Tide sitting on the washer, so I used it, of course.   I was amazed (and embarrassed) to see how noticeably whiter my socks came out of the wash.  Hmm.  I'd saved a few dollars and ended up with dingy laundry.  Not a savings, in my book.  Now, I'll watch for sales and coupons and go back to a product that cleans better.  Cheap is getting the best price, no matter what.  Frugal is getting a good product for the best price.  Very different.  

Anyone else have some good laundry ideas?

Saving Money on Meat (Carole)

It goes without saying that it is a good idea to stock up on any grocery item when it goes on sale. 

But how do you know when the sale is really a sale??

It’s important to know the usual cost of things that you buy all the time, so you can tell when there is a deal to be had.  Recently I started keeping track of the price of four cuts of meat I buy over and over again.  This is POWERFUL information! 

I write the week’s prices in my purse calendar, that way it’s easy to make a quick comparison when I’m standing in the meat section with a sale sign staring me in the face.  Meat prices go on sale every few weeks (another Loss-Leader), so if you don’t know your usual prices, you have no idea if now is the time to buy a lot or not.

The four meats I track are : hamburger, roast, frozen, boneless skinless chicken breasts, and pork loin roast.  Since these are the only 4 meats I cook with,  they’re all I track.  I try to keep my life simple. 

Last Monday I was doing my weekly grocery shopping and saw that the expensive (less fatty) hamburger was on sale for 10 cents less ($1.89/lb) than the cheap, fatty hamburger!  Because of my tracking, I recognized the bargain!  I bought three large packages of 3 lbs each, re-divided it into 1 lb packages at home and stored them all in my freezer.  Now all the hamburger I will use for the next couple of months will be at this lower price, no matter what the price is at the store the night I actually cook.

Here are some additional meat buying tips: 

Hamburger:  In case no one has ever told you. . . you can rinse high fat hamburger (after it's cooked) in a colander in your sink with hot water  and it becomes nearly fat-free -- no need to buy the expensive hamburger.  Unless it’s on sale.  Coupon Mom also points out in her book that when you buy hamburger in the Styrofoam container with the plastic wrap in the 1 lbs. package, it will always contain MORE than one pound of meat -- have you noticed this?  This is your grocery store’s version of Super Size Me.  It is a marketing device to sell you more hamburger than you think you're buying.  She recommends dividing that 1.3 lbs package in two, freeze one and use less than one pound in your recipe.  You’ll save both money and calories. 

Roasts:  I used to be a big stew meat purchaser.  I like to make chili, stew and beef stroganoff, so it seemed like a no-brainer to buy my meat all cut up and ready to go.  Until I realized that stew meat cost me over $4.00/lbs, while a regular roast is often below $2.00/lbs.  Turned out I was the no-brainer.  Now I buy a whole roast and cut it into bite-size pieces myself and save 50% -- it takes about 3 minutes. 

Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts (frozen):  My store sells 3 varieties of frozen, boneless/skinless chicken breasts.  After all these years, I finally noticed that even though the bags are all the same size, and typically cost the same amount, they range from 2.5 lbs – 4.0 lbs of chicken per bag.  How have I never noticed this before??  That means that the “chicken tenders” are $2.52/lbs while the “chicken breast with rib meat” is only $1.57/lbs.  Guess which one I buy now?  Saving myself nearly $1.00 per pound.  I also zip past the unfrozen chicken breasts in the meat section.  Often they are on sale.  If they were to ever fall below $1.57/lbs, I would know to buy them.  Your very best deal, however,  is a whole chicken at $.99/lbs on sale (which happens about every other week!).  Put a frozen, whole chicken in the crock pot in the morning (with a bit of salt, pepper and paprika) and you’ve got your own roasted chicken for dinner that night for about 4 dollars – and enough shredded chicken left over for another meal or two during the week.  Your kids will love pulling apart the wishbone after it dries out and guaranteed you’ll feel like Martha Stewart.

Pork Loin Roast:  Buying the non-seasoned pork roast, is obviously your cheapest option.  Marinating or seasoning your own pork roast is so easy, and so inexpensive.  You'll save a couple dollars per pound just by using your own pepper and salt.  You can cook this delightful cut of meat in the crock pot all day, or broil it in the oven in about 15 minutes at night.  Yum.  I often use this cut when I have company.

Keeping track of the cost of the particular cuts of meat you use will pay off in HUNDREDS of saved dollars every year.   And your home freezer becomes your own private, frugal butcher shop! 

What to Buy at Sam's Club or Costco (Carole)

I've become a pretty decent coupon shopper over the past year and have saved hundreds of $$.  Yippee!  However, I continue to ask this burning question,  "When it is cheaper to shop at places like Sam's Club, Costco or BJ's Wholesale Club?"  Maybe you've wondered the same thing.  Luckily for all of us, Stephanie Nelson, in her very informative book The Coupon Mom's Guide to Cutting Your Grocery Bills in Half: The Strategic Shopping Method Proven to Slash Food and Drugstore Costs, gives a thorough list of items that are consistently less expensive at club stores.  (pages 110-114)  I thought you might like to know too.

Dairy Products:  eggs, butter, cream, half and half, individually wrapped cheese sticks, egg substitute, both block and grated cheese, milk and gourmet cheese (this last one is usually 1/2 the price of a regular super market).  Mrs. Nelson recommends buying the less expensive block cheese, grating it yourself, putting it in zip-lock freezer bags with 1 TB of flour and shaking it around -- to keep the cheese from sticking together -- and storing it in your freezer.  Also, milk is often a loss-leader at your grocery store and goes on sale about every other week.  So, you can probably buy milk a little bit cheaper, most of the month, at your local grocery store.

Fresh Produce:  Prices are almost always better at the club stores, but the amounts are huge.  Decide if this one works for you.

Baking Ingredients:  flour, sugar, chocolate chips, spices, yeast, real vanilla, evaporated milk, vegetable oil and nuts.  The club cost on all of these items is about 60% less than at the regular grocery store.  Again, large quantities, but these items all store nicely.

Fresh and Frozen Meat, Chicken and Fish:  According to Stephanie Nelson, "Not only is the club price lower, but the grade is also higher."  Well.  Who knew?  Better product for a cheaper price!  You can re-wrap the meats in smaller portions and freeze them if you need to.

Bakery and Deli:  Club store sheet cakes give you about 50% more cake for the same price of a grocery store cake.  The same is true for "bake it yourself" pizzas, pies, muffins, pastries and bagels. 

Plastic Bags, Garbage Bags, Foils, and Plastic Wraps:  Coupon Mom says club stores sell Zip-Lock baggies cheaper than even the dollar stores!  Again, club stores sell BIG amounts of these household items.  My girls will remember the LARGE roll of clear wrap I purchased at Sam's Club when they still lived at home.  In fact, I believe my 14 year old son wasn't even born when I bought it.  I just replaced it at Christmas.  That is a BIG roll and some serious savings! 

Batteries:  Enough said.  Good quality batteries should last from 3 - 5 years just sitting in a dark, room-temperature place like a drawer.  No need to keep them in the freezer.

Frozen Juice, Fruits and Vegetables:  Often these are 1/2 the price of grocery store items.

Household and Paper Supplies:  Here she recommends always buying the club store brand.  If you insist on a particular name brand, then you are better off watching for sales and using coupons at your regular grocery store.  Club stores do not take coupons.

Armed with this valuable information, you can see that a monthly (or quarterly) trip to a club store is well worth your time and money!  I would highly recommend reading this book,  or you can log onto the free website, http://www.couponmom.com/ and figure out her system on your own.  I'll be writing more about this book in the future -- Stephanie Nelson is one smart (and frugal) cookie!