Grocery Celebrations
We’re not really going to talk about the overall monthly grocery budget. That got totally destroyed somewhere along the way, I’m about $57 over, and dwelling on it would just feed into my bleeding money feeling I have going on. Instead, we’ll just talk about this week, which is my last August grocery shopping day. September will be another month and I can try to live within the monthly grocery budget better then.
This week, I spent a total of $66.42 on groceries, broken down into $56.29 at Aldi and $10.13 at Walmart. I (out of necessity) broke my own rule of not bringing people shopping with you that I talked about today in my guest post at Moolanomy, because my spouse had a medical procedure yesterday and can’t lift anything over 15 lbs and has to take it easy for a few days. I had to bring one of my kids along, but other than he ate all my Walmart free samples, he was fine and didn’t beg or grab at any extra stuff.
My weekly grocery budget is $75 so I came well under that (which since the monthly budget is shot, is very very good, I need all the help I can get). I spent a total of $2.59 on non-planned items, a loaf of italian bread for garlic toast tonight ($0.80) and a box of “Fruity Rice”cereal for my spouse ($1.69). That is only 4% of my total grocery spending so I came in at under 10% for that, which is also on target.
So I am happy! The blog is too cranky lately so it is good for me to tell you all what went right for a change. That end of month crunch really puts the squeeze on my psyche I think. I’m happy that I kept under $75 for groceries and I got a minimum of extras as well. Now I am going to go make a sandwich out of some of the italian loaf. Mmmmmm…..
~J
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August 26th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
Hi there. I came across your blog recently, and I love it. You’re the reason that I subscribed to the M-Network feed. This weekend, I read most of your archives. I really appreciate your honesty and candor here.
One thing I wanted to point out: in the past, you’ve written that your husband thinks your grocery budget should be higher (was it $85 per week?). Reading through your regular posts, I’d have to agree. You don’t seem to be constantly buying extravagant items or anything; you’re just getting the basic needs for your family.
Don’t beat yourself up if you raise this budget item. I’d say that groceries are one of the most important items on your budget. You’ve written that sometimes you wander about the house, looking for something else to eat at the end of the week. I do this all the time too.
So my thought is: bump your grocery budget up a bit, and make sure that you include in that budget $1-2 so you can treat yourself to iced tea or something else every once in while.
Good luck, and thanks for the blog.
August 26th, 2007 at 3:19 pm
Thanks for the comment!
I may raise it. This is all an experiment. Have I mentioned I am *so* not patient? I see every dollar I spend that I have some control over as a dollar not going to get rid of debt and I’m a wee bit addicted to the debt destroying. lol. I know it takes time and is a process and I *know* that and yet…. heh.
not patient. So. Not. patient.
Thanks for your insight and I am sure I shall ponder the raising of the budget some more, especially if September goes as spectacularly as August did ;). I should sort out what average I actually did spend in August….