Groceries for 8/31

Publix
Total Before Savings & Coupons: $126.64
OOP: $74.58
Savings: 41%

Bi-Lo
Total Before Savings & Coupons: $66.44
OOP: $36.52
Savings: 45%

Piggly Wiggly
Total Before Savings & Coupons: $38.73
OOP: $24.09
Savings: 38%
**Screwed up at Piggly Wiggly because I forgot how many Greenbacks I had and bought something I shouldn't have.

Total for the week: $135.19. More than I wanted to spend, but I am still building my stockpile.

Friend Making Monday

I saw this over on Amber Filkins's blog. Thought it was cool, so I decided to give it a try. I am super nosey too about other peoples lives too!!!

1. Do you cook every night?

Most of the time I do. Sometimes I have no desire to and we eat out or make something simple like frozen pizza

2. What kind of laundry detergent do you use & why?

I was using Tide with Bleach powder but now that I am a 'frugal' shopper whatever is on sale.

3. Do you do laundry everyday or loads at a time?

I do loads at a time. Laundry day used to be Tuesdays, but now seem to be Fridays.

4. How often do you eat out every week?

I would say 1 to 2 times a week, sometimes more or sometimes not at all. I am trying not to eat out much anymore but can't refuse a coupon to one of our favorite restaurants.

5. Where do you usually eat out?

This has changed as of lately mostly because its just me and the kids. So McDonalds, Ci Ci's and Chick-fil-a. None of these are my favorite, they are my kids. My favorites is Outback, Red Robin and Texas Roadhouse.

6. What is your favorite retail store?

It was Wal-mart but I am starting to learn I spend more money when I shop there. So now I don't have a favorite.

7. What is your favorite thing to drink?

Ice Tea w/ Lemon & Stevia

8. Do you take vitamins? What kind?

Yes, I take One A Day ( I got them free from my Bayer rep) When they run out, probably whatever is on sale)

9. What percentage of the household chores do you do?

100%

10. Do your children do chores? (Or will they, did they, etc)

Still working on that one. Need to find a good chore chart. Anyone have a good suggestion???? Please comment w/ one.

11. Do you go to church?

Yes

12. Do you have a housework schedule?

No but I want one. I was keeping up with doing chore on certain days but it was all kept track of in my head. I would love to come up with a household book.

13. Do you keep a working budget?

I am in the process of doing this now. I am taking Dave Ramsey's FPU class. I am in week 2.

14. What do you do at night as a family?

Eat dinner, give baths, read stories, watch TV.

15. How do you prepare yourself for a new week?

I didn't know you could prepare yourself!!! Maybe that is why I am always overwhelmed.

16. What do your mornings look like?

Not pretty!!!! My kids hate waking up. So usually I force everything.

17. What time do you get up in the morning?

6:15 during the week and whenever on weekends.

18. What time do you go to bed at night?

Most of the time 10 to 10:30. Weekends 11 or sometimes later. Been known to stay up till 12 or later watching some good show.

19. How do you manage all of the paperwork that floods into your household? (bills, school work, magazines, ads etc)

Not well because I CAN'T stand clutter. I have been known to throw something or recycle something away because I can't stand seeing it sit there. I am trying to deal w/ my problem but its not easy.

20. How do you keep your house organized? (calendars, charts, etc)

This a work in progress. I have a place for my grocery list, magazines, each kid has a shelf for school papers, I use a mom's planner, my son's therapist have a spot to keep their stuff. I haven't figured out a way to organize my coupons yet. They are driving me crazy!!!

Menu Planning Monday

This is my first Menu Plan Monday. Got the idea from Organizing Junkie's blog that I follow. I am trying to plan dinners of what is on sale this week to keep my budget low this week. It would be nice if I could aim for about the same as last week around $50. Not sure if I can meet that again, two weeks in a row. I want to always plan 5 meals then have a leftover buffet one night and pizza the other.

Monday

Ranch Chicken & rice

Tuesday

Sausage, Corn, & Potato skillet

Wednesday

Baked Ziti

Thursday

Leftover Buffet

Friday

Grilled Cheese Sandwiches & Tomato Soup

Saturday

Pizza

Sunday

Pork Roast, pototoes & carrots

CVS for 8/30

Total Before Coupons/Sales: $77.98
OOP: $38.23
Savings: 51%

Guess I could have broken this down farther and spent less out of pocket but my mind wasn't working that day and I wanted to keep my ECBs for the next week. Still did pretty good though.

Free Fisher Price Precious Places DVD

Head over to HERE to register to get your absolutely FREE DVD from Fisher Price. Shipping takes about 12 weeks. Click on "Order Your Free DVD" button towards the bottom and proceed to the checkout page. Hope your little girl enjoys!!

Pastisio (or Greek Lasagna)

1 lb ground beef, browned
1 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
8 oz can tomato sauce
1 t. dried oregano
1 t. salt
1/2 t. cinnamon
2 c. elbow macaroni, uncooked and divided
1/4 c. butter
3 T. all-purpose flour
1/4 t. pepper
1/4 t. nutmeg
2 c. milk
2 eggs
1/4 c. grated Parmesan cheese

Combine beef, onion and garlic in skillet; heat until onion and garlic are tender. Stir in tomato sauce, oregano, salt and cinnamon; simmer for 5 minutes. Set aside. Spread one cup macaroni in a greased baking pan; cover with meat sauce. Top with remaining macaroni; set aside. Melt butter in a saucepan; whisk in flour, pepper and nutmeg until smooth. Gradually pour in milk; heat until thickened. Remove from heat; whisk in eggs and Parmesan cheese. Pour over macaroni; bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.

Applesauce Meatloaf Recipe

This is my absolute favorite meatloaf recipe!! Delicious!!

1 lb ground beef
3/4 c. applesauce
1/2 c. bread crumbs
1 t. salt
1/4 t. seasoned salt
1/2 c. onion, chopped
2 eggs, beaten

1/4 c. ketchup
1/4 c. brown sugar
1/8 c. mustard

Mix the first 7 ingredients together; spoon into an ungreased loaf pan. Set aside. Combine final 3 remaining ingredients, ketchup, brown sugar and mustard; spread over meatloaf. Bake for 1 hour at 350 degrees.

Thoughtful House on NBC Dateline

on Sunday at 7pm EST. Set your DVR's to record or make sure you are able to watch. I know I will be watching.

To find out about Thoughtful House and Dr Wakefield go HERE

Part 2 Menu Planning Challenge

Here is part 2 to the menu planning challenge over at the Happy Housewife. To find the challenge go HERE.

The 2nd part is to come up with 5 more meals to go along with your 15 dinners you already listed. And to come up with a list of side dishes to go along with those meals. Here are mine.

1. Bacon, Egg & Cheese Sandwiches
2. BBQ Pork Roast
3. Family Night Noodle Bake
4. Lemon Garlic Tacos
5. Baked Ziti

Side Dishes
1. Homemade Mac N Cheese
2. Baked Potatoes
3. Creamed Corn
4. French Fries
5. Mashed Potatoes
6. Some packaged noodles
7. Rice a Roni
8. Couscous
9. Green Bean Casserole
10. Salad

HUH???

I went to my first college algebra class today. I don't remember a lot of what was "review" problems. It has been 17 years or more!!! So instead of struggling along or flunking out of this class, I decided to drop back one level in math to Intermediate Algebra. I am just not ready for college level algebra, I have forgotten too much! This means I won't get to take Calculus next semester, I will be taking College Algebra, then maybe taking Calculus over the summer. :(

This week's groceries

I went a different route this week. Decided to pick Publix & Bi-Lo as my 2 grocery stores to shop. Wrote a list of what was on sale at both stores and gathered the appropriate coupons. I also wrote down what we were out of and needed at the store. I planned my menu and based some meals off what was on sale. So didn't even come close to exceding my budget of $100 for groceries this week. The total was $56.67!!! I can't believe that I bought groceries for this amount for a whole week and my car trunk was full!!!

Publix
Total Before Coupons & Sales: $83.56
Total OOP: $44.94
Savings: 46%

Bi-Lo
Total Before Coupons % Sales: $16.76
Total OOP: $11.73
Savings: 30%

Shopping for Today

Went to the gym this morning, so in the way home I drove by Publix, Piggly Wiggly, and Food Lion. Decided to go ahead and shop these 3 stores that were on the way home for the sales I was interested in.

Publix
Total Before Coupons & Sales: $50.76
Total Out of Pocket: $28.92
Savings: 43%

Piggly Wiggly
Total Before Coupons & Sales: $30.15
Total Out of Pocket: $17.48
Savings: 42%

Food Lion
Total Before Coupons & Sales: $84.89
Total Out of Pocket: $48.74
Savings: 43%

Kroger
Total Before Coupons & Sales: $88.55
Total Out of Pocket: $45.82
Savings: 48%

TOTALS
Total Before Coupons & Sales: $254.35
Total Out of Pocket: $141.25
Savings: 45%

I was $41.25 over my goal. :(

First Day of School!

It's the first day of school for the kids today. They both did fairly well with waking up and getting ready. They both made it there on time.

CVS $5 off $25 coupon

There is a new $5 off $25 purchase coupon available for CVS. Head over HERE and watch a video about their Ready Fill program.

Extreme Couponing

Due to the need to pay off some bills, I have decided to start extreme couponing. I was told this needs to become a necessity or a hobby for it to become successful. If you google couponing or extreme couponing, you get TONS of websites with useful information or not so useful. Here are some that I have been using.

www.southernsavers.com
www.cellfire.com
www.pgesaver.com
www.shortcuts.com
www.hotcouponworld.com
www.vocalpoint.com
www.coupons.com

Here is a blog that I read that is a good place to go when starting out.

I have decided to start a goal of spending only $100 a week for groceries eventually decreasing to maybe $75 a week. I am planning to start my shopping on Friday. So I will post my results then.

Crazy!!!

I went to register for classes at Midlands Tech today. It was late registration day. I had previously tried to register on the last day of normal registration to be told that I couldn't get into MAT 130 Calculus because I didn't have the prerequisite. So I had to email the department head over the weekend to get into a different math class. So I got up to Midlands early today. It was a NIGHTMARE!! I was send out of the registration line 3 times because I didn't have something that I needed. So $1,000 and some change later, I am now registered for Fall semester that starts on August 24Th.

Part 1 Menu Planning Challenge

Over on The Happy Housewife, there is a 3 part menu planning challenge. To read it go HERE. Challenge 1 is to make a list of 15 different dinner options. You can ask family members to give their favorites to help make your list. Giving that my husband is not here, I asked my 2 kids. Of course since they are 6 and 4 their reponses were vague. I got a lot of ice cream, candy, popsicles and you know that stuff you made the other day!

So here is the list I came up with.
1. One Pot Spaghetti
2. Tacos
3. Sloppy Joes
4. Applesauce Meat Loaf
5. Taco Soup
6. Grilled Cheese & Tomato Soup
7. Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup
8. Tater Tot Casserole
9. Pastitio or (Greek Lasagna)
10. Steak on the grill
11. Chicken sandwiches
12. Pizza
13. Pork Chops
14. Country Fried Steak
15. Pot Roast

I will post recipes for some of them when I get a chance.

Change of Plans

I am going to Midlands Tech for 2 semesters instead of USC. I am going to take a Fiction class & College Algebra this semester and then Calculus next sememster. Then hopefully off to USC in the fall of next year. Not what I had antisipated but oh well.

Cute Picture

I love this picture of Kyan. We opened presents at home after the party was over. I love this expression on his face!

Happy 4th to my Favorite Boy

I can't believe that my baby is 4 today. Party went well. I will post pictures later once I get them downloaded to my computer. He had a blast and loved all his presents.

Loving my new lens

I got a new lens for my camera off Ebay. I got a Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II

I LOVE this lens. I still have no idea what I am doing with it but my pictures are looking a lot better.

Twitter Moms: The Influential Moms Network

Got Denied

I have been trying to apply to USC since the beginning of summer to finally finish my last two years of my bachelor's degree. Well after complications with my transcripts, I finally got my letter in the mail on Saturday. I was denied!!! WHAT??? According to USC, I don't have a 3.0 or higher and I have never taken a college level Calculus class. I can understand not admitting me to the School of Business because of the Calculus class but to deny me from the school all together. Not sure where they are getting I don't have a 3.o or higher, according to my transcripts I have a 3.59.

Of course when I went up there today to talk with someone, NO ONE from admission is there until Wednesday. :(

Watched The Secret Life of Bees on DVD last night. Pretty good movie. I had read the book by Sue Monk Kidd first. It did follow the book pretty well.

Watched a good movie last night

I watched Bride Wars last night. Pretty cute movie.