Tag: grocery shopping

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Every Day

Meal Planning

I never meal planned. I would just look in the pantry or freezer and determine what meat I would cook that night and add sides to it.

But in the past 30 years, I have come to enjoy meal planning. I do it on Saturday night for the following week. Before I even think about a meal, I check my calendar to see what appointments we have for the week and when. Then I plan my meals around those things. For example, I had a long dentist appointment yesterday and a long day out of the house so we went out to dinner. We hadn’t been out in well over a month so it was a treat. When I had kids at home, we planned meals around their activities. They played sports in junior high and high school so my crock pot got used a lot.


On Saturday night, I ask Hubby if there is anything special that he would like to eat this coming week. Sometimes, he will make a suggestion and sometimes he won’t.

Then I come up with 6-7 meals for dinners that I will make during the week. Each week I try to have at least one meatless meal. Because I knew we were going out to dinner last night, I penciled that in for Tuesday night. Next I checked my pantries, refrigerator, and freezers to see if I had the ingredients for those meals. I had all the ingredients this week so I needed no food at the grocery store to make them. If I did need an ingredient, I would put it on my grocery list. However I did shop for a few things this week. I purchased the liquid dish detergent pictured above at Walmart for $ 5.96(stockpiling for the winter). It is the cheapest dish detergent that we like. So I just buy it and pour it into a smaller bottle.  I also went to Dollar Tree and picked up 6 packages of Jennifer’s Garden Spring Rolls for a $1.00 each. We rarely buy food at Dollar Tree but when I find something we really like, I stock on it. When I saw these a while ago, I purchased one package to try. They are vegetable spring rolls. I deep fry them or air fry them.  They are delicious! My store doesn’t always have them so when I see them I snag a bunch. They will make a nice snack on Sundays during football season. I also picked up 2 lbs. of butter for $ 2.36 each at Aldi’s.

Here is our menu this week:


Sunday – Homemade chicken vegetable soup, crackers with butter
Monday – A repeat of Sunday night
Tuesday – Dinner out
Wednesday – Chicken with Orange Sauce on rice, green beans
Thursday – Hubby’s meat chili on rice, tomatoes, and cucumbers
Friday – A repeat of Thursday night
Saturday – Meatless spaghetti, side salad


I find that meal planning saves us money because our leftovers get eaten and I can work food that needs(think produce) to be used into our meals. We have very little waste in this house.

We always have many choices of breakfast food in the house – cold and hot cereal, eggs, bacon, sausage, ham slices and I make pancakes, waffles, various muffins and quick breads. This week I have been eating a bowl of plain yogurt, fresh blueberries, and granola sprinkled on top for breakfast every day. It’s easy to grab what we feel like eating when we get up.  Lunches are usually sandwiches, peanut butter on English muffins, salads, fruit, cheese and crackers or leftovers. Sometimes we even skip lunch if we know that we are having a heavier meal like stew for dinner.


So if you haven’t tried to meal plan at least your dinners, give it a try. It only takes a few minutes to do. We save money not running for takeout or going out to dinner two or three nights a week because I forgot to thaw something or I don’t know what to make. I keep my menu on the side of the fridge so we always know what we are having that day.

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Every Day

A Little of This and a Little of That

My son was visiting for 3 days. He had business in this area and stayed with us. We did go out to dinner one night but ate in the rest of the time. I enjoyed getting up in the morning to make him a nice hearty breakfast. We had lots of fun, laughter, and just generally a good time catching up on things.

Yesterday, my other son and grandson came for our usual Sunday breakfast. He brought a dozen donuts from Tim Horton’s which we all enjoyed immensely. I couldn’t even remember the last time I enjoyed a donut. We also got subs for lunch. This Mama was too tired to cook.

So today it is back to the usual money saving here. It is 8AM as I write this today. I already have a loaf of homemade banana bread in the oven. I had three very ripe bananas that needed to be used up.

I have made my grocery list for the week and plan on shopping later today. There are not a lot of things or deals that I need this week.  

Just a moment ago I cancelled Netflix. We weren’t watching it enough to pay the $ 10.99 per month. Some months we wouldn’t watch it at all. Plus I do not like some of their programming. So that is $131.88 annually that we will keep in our investments. We have Amazon Prime so there is plenty of movies, etc. to watch. Have you checked your viewing on Netflix to see if you are really getting your money’s worth?


I went and did my grocery shopping at Top’s and this is what I purchased this week: 


1/2 gal. milk – $ 2.39- Top’s Super Q which took off $.79= $1.60.  I bought the wrong milk. It would have been $ .88 if I had gotten Top’s milk. The cashier forced the coupon. It won’t be the first or last time mistake I make. It is not worth my gas to go back.


4 Arm and Hammer Baking Soda – $.99 ea. – $.50/2 MQ = $1.96 for all 4 or $ .49 each (Tip: Baking soda never expires.)

1- 128 oz. Tops Vinegar – $ 2.99 (clean with this and use it instead of Jet Dry in my dishwasher)

1 – 64 ct.  Pampers Wipes – $ 1.99 – $.50/1 MQ = $.99 (cheap cleaning wipes)

4- Bella Sun Luci Sun Dried Tomatoes – $ 1.49 each-
$1./1 MQ’s = $ .49 ea. or $ 1.96 for all. (We put these in our salads.)

1 – McCain Craft Beer Battered French Fries – $ 1.88 and I will get back $ 1.00 from Checkout 51.

2- Body Armour Drinks – $1.00 – $ .50/1 MQ’s = Both Free

1 – 59oz. Tropicana OJ – $ 1.49 with T Rex Monopoly ticket. (We don’t drink OJ so I will be making many, many loaves of cranberry orange bread this week.)


My total OOP was $ 12.95 including tax. I am getting $1.00 rebate from Checkout 51. My budget is $75.00 for the week so that leaves me $ 62.05 for the rest of the week.

We only have a little produce left in our fridge: grapes, apples, tangerines, some lettuce, carrots and peppers. So I will be going to the produce market soon to stock up. 

Besides all of this, I am washing 3 loads of clothes, sheets and towels etc. I am using the dryer since there are so many! 

BTW, I promised to tell you about the chicken that I purchased at Zaycon Fresh . I made stir fry with it the other night and the chicken is melt in your mouth like butter. It is so tender. I will be purchasing my boneless chicken breasts from them from now on. I am very happy! Yes, this is my referral link. I do not monetize my blog so anyone who is signing up new I would appreciate if you would consider using this referral link. No pressure meant! 


Feel free to leave a comment if you have saved any money this week.


I will be back soon to finish the 100 Frugal Things List.

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Every Day

Tuesday’s Shopping

I did my grocery shopping for this week yesterday. Here is what I purchased with my regular grocery shopping money:

– 6 Heinz Ketchup – $3.00 ea. = $18.00 minus B1G1F Q’s = $ 9.00 for all. I know I could get it cheaper at CVS last week. I did get 2 there but it was not worth my time or gasoline to go back for more. It is many miles to drive to it. This ketchup stockpile will last over a year.

– 1 Hellman’s Mayo- $ 2.49 with Tops Q minus $.50/1 MQ that doubled = $ 1.49

– 1 gallon of Milk – $ 1.59 with Top’s Q

– 4 Dixie paper plates (48 ct.) -$ 2.50 ea. = $10.00 minus $ .75/1 MQ doubled = $1.00 ea. or total of $4.00. I use these when we have company only for lunches and snacks.

– 3 Softsoap Body Wash – $ 2.99 ea. minus $.75/1 MQ = $ 1.49 ea.


– 1 Softsoap Hand Soap – $1.99 minus $ $.75/1 doubled = $ .49

– 1 dozen eggs – $ .79

– 5 lbs. of Smithfield bacon – on B2G3F sale = $ 17.98 for all 5 minus (2) $1.00/1 MQ’s = $15.98 for all or $ 3.20 each

Total was $38.53 including tax.

Since Easter is this Sunday and we are having family for dinner, I needed to buy a bottle of wine, a 6 pack of beer, and a Bunny Carvel Ice Cream cake. Holiday feasts do not come out of my regular grocery budget. We have a holiday budget for those special days. As you all have seen, I do not spend any extra for family meals or company most days during the year. But holidays are special and I like to splurge. 

My grandson asked me last weekend if we were having an Easter egg hunt. I told him of course we would. He is very excited! So I spent some money at the market and Rite Aid also for candy. I already had Easter eggs that I can fill from prior years and something that I can use for a basket for him to collect his eggs. Now if the weather would just cooperate. The money that was spent on these items also came out of our Holiday budget as did the Cheryl’s cookies that I sent to my granddaughter for Easter. 

We have a lot of company coming over the next 4 weeks. So if I don’t post on a certain day, it’s because we are very busy. I will do my best to post when I have something that I feel will help you.    
 
 

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Every Day

My Tiny Shop This Week

I had a lot of errands to run today in a place that is 26 miles round trip from me. So I did two stops to pick up food while I was out.

At CVS, I picked up 2 Heinz Ketchup for $ 2.50 each and used a B1G1F tearpad coupon. I paid $ 2.50 and got a $1.00 ECB. Great deal!

I am unfamiliar with the area that I have to pick up my Zaycon Fresh chicken. So while I was down that way, I did a dry run and found it. On the way I passed Federal Meats, a great deli and meat market. I had a B1G1F coupon for buy one pound of sausage and get one free(Entertainment Book). I purchased their homemade Hot Italian Sausage which the butcher wrapped in 2 packages for my freezer. It ended up being $ 5.99 for one pound. The butchers gave me the entire 2.17 pounds for that price.   

There will be no more grocery shopping this week. I will be concentrating on more organizing in my home.

Have you gotten any great deals this week?

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Every Day

Grocery Shopping This Week

I managed to get out and grocery shop yesterday even though we got a lot of snow during the night. The plows did a good job on the roads.

I went to Top’s to pick up some of their deals. As you know we have been eating Keto for a while. However, eating bacon and eggs for breakfast almost every morning has gotten really expensive. So we are going to be having a small bowl of cereal for breakfast(yes breaking our Keto diet) every morning during the week. We will save the bacon, sausage, or ham and eggs for the weekends.

So I purchased 10 boxes of Special K in 2 different transactions. When you purchased in batches of 5, you got an instant $5.00 off. I also used $3.00 off 5 manufacturers coupons making each 5 a total of $ 4.45. So I spent $ 8.90 on cereal or $ .89 a box.

I picked up two packages of Smithfield breakfast sausage for our family breakfasts on Sunday. They were $3.00 each but I had two $.75/1 coupons that doubled making them $ 1.50 each. 

The spaghetti sauce was free after $.50 doubled coupons.  The 5 bags of Mama Rosie’s cavatelli and ricotta were on B2G3F sale. I had a $1./2 MQ so total for all was $ 4.98.

And lastly the Annie’s Mac and Cheese were $ 1.99 each minus $.50/1 MQ’s so $ .99 each. My grandson loves these so they are handy for lunches when he is here. I also had a $1.00 off Monopoly Q good on my next purchase.

My total OOP was $ 17.86. I had already spent $ 4.03 on a newspaper and a box of Tylenol earlier this week. So I have spent $ 21.89 for the week and will not be buying any more until next week. 

I planned on picking up the Top’s Pi deal for the chicken pot pie but they were out.


The last few weeks I have not really spent much on groceries because I am so stockpiled. But that is a good thing because I am been spending the lowest prices in my area to do that. Instead of buying what we need for just a week, I make our meals from the stockpile. Then I look for the best deals on the foods that we eat during the week and add them to our stockpile. It works well for us and saves us a lot of money.  

Did you get any great buys in your grocery shopping this week? Feel free to share with us in comments. 

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Every Day

How Is Your Sunday Going?

Mine is wonderful! It is a beautiful cold, sunny day. I was up at the crack of dawn this morning enjoying my coffee and then going out to run errands while everyone else was sleeping. Seriously there was no one on the roads. 

I stopped at Top’s to fill my gasoline tank up using my $ .60 per gallon discount paying $ 2.08 a gallon. I ran into the market just to get a Buffalo News so that I would have an extra set of inserts.

Then it was off to Rite Aid to pick up a prescription and a 100 ct. bottle of Tylenol on sale for $ 9.03 and  I used my $ 8.00 RA Bonus Cash that was loaded to my card to defray the cost to $ 1.03. 

So I spent $ 4.03 including the newspaper out of my  $ 75.00 grocery money so far this week.

Last stop was at Burger King to purchase 2 Sausage, Egg and Cheese Croissan’wiches and 2 Hash Browns. I had a BK gift card in my wallet that I thought only had a couple of dollars on it. It paid for breakfast and still has $ 9.77 for next time. That made me happy!

After breakfast I had to quickly get my beef eye round roast into the crock pot along with some onion, beef broth, and an au jus packet. I will be cooking that all day to have sliced beef on a weck for dinner. I have made this recipe before and Hubby loves it. It is not very appetizing looking right now so I will take a picture after it cooks.

Then I checked my e-mail and did some computer work, one of which is this blog, while also watching the soccer on TV. 

So far so good. Now it is time to re-organize the stuff under my kitchen sink. I want less under there and more in my stockpile. I just need the essentials. So I am off to do that.

Here is the results from my organizing under my sink. Nice and neat and simplified. All I have to do is put the recycle bucket back on the left hand side in front of my grease jar. Right now it is soaking.


The rest of the afternoon was spent watching a few You Tube videos.

Dinner turned out to be delicious. Here is one of the beef on a weck that we had. 

The au jus that you see on the roll was so scrumptious. I have a crock pot full because I cooked the eye round roast in it. Eye round is a tough meat so it needs cooking in the crock pot to tenderize it. It was melt in our mouth good.  

The au jus is so good that I am going to use it for the base of a crock pot beef barley soup for tomorrow night’s dinner. Hubby and I will team up tomorrow morning to make that from scratch.


I am tired tonight. I feel like I am in a fog. Perhaps the daylight saving time is affecting me. So I am off to bed early.


Did you all have a good day?

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Every Day

Monday’s Shopping

Tomorrow is Senior Citizen 6% discount day at Top’s but it is supposed to be nasty weather. So I decided to go today instead. 

Bananas were on sale for $. 49 a lb. The mushrooms were $1.34 and were needed for dinner tonight. Hubby is grilling a 1 and 1/2 inch thick NY strip steak( from my freezer) that we are going to share. I love sauteed mushrooms on my steak. I will be baking some potatoes and making a salad.

The Rana Fettucine($2.)and the Bob’s Red Mill Unbleached All Purpose flour($1.99) were on sale but after MQ and store Q they were free. The milk was $ .99 with store Q. The yogurt, the 16 oz. Muuna Cottage cheese, the Sure deodorant and the sun dried tomatoes were  free after MQ and store Q’s.

The bacon bits and Very Berry Cheerios were full price. Those were a miscalculation on my part. I had no idea we were out so I couldn’t wait for a sale. But when they go on sale again, I will stock.


The ice cream($ 5.99) was on B1G1F sale. The Lean Cuisine was on sale for $2.00. My total OOP was $ 18.16. I may make one more trip this week to get some more of the free items if I have time. I have a $75.00 per week budget for groceries so I have $ 56.84 left for the rest of the week.

Did you get any good deals this week? Please share with us.

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Every Day

I Am Loving Walmart

Today I went to Super Walmart to do my weekly  grocery shopping. I only got the few things that we  really needed. I am pretty well stocked on just about everything else.

Because my regular supermarket, Top’s is so expensive except when items are on sale, I have decided to shop more and more at Super Walmart and Aldi’s.

This week I only needed the above items and I was so surprised at the prices which I have put on my lowest price list that I am updating with current prices. This is what I purchased:

– 1 Mylanta – $ 6.97

– Romaine Hearts(bag of 3) – $ 2.28

– 1 Cucumber – $ .54 

– 1- 2lb. bag of Wild Caught Salmon – $ 7.52

– 2.33 lbs. of Bananas – $ 1.03

–  1 Equate Nasal Spray – $ 1.88

My total OOP was $ 20.22. That leaves $ 54.78 left for the rest of the week.


I was so happy to find this frozen salmon there. I have been paying a whole lot more for it elsewhere. I like these portions for lunch or dinner and sometimes with breakfast. They had the cheapest price I have found for the romaine lettuce and cucumber. 

I also purchased the above pictured 4 packs of dish towels to replace some of the ones that are worn out. They have improved these towels so that they are thicker and more absorbent. They cost $ 4.97 for each pack for a total out of our Other Budget of $ 10.74 including tax. We use brown to dry our hands in the kitchen and green to dry dishes and pots and pans. 

I know some people hate Walmart but we all have our likes and dislikes. Right now it is working for me. 

Do you shop at Super Walmart for any food? What is your favorite item that you always buy there? Mine has great produce. When Aldi’s produce is looking a little old, I always know that SW will have good looking produce. I also know that I can get produce reasonably priced at Niagara Produce but today I wanted one stop shopping.  

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Every Day

This Week’s Shopping and Solving a Dilemma

I hope you all had a good weekend. We spent ours indoors watching the Olympics. With the exception of Hubby snow blowing the 11 and 1/2 inches of snow we got, we never went outside.

Today, I did the weekly shopping. I put my $75.00 in my wallet and spent almost all of it. I spent $72.32. I was totally out of bacon so I picked up some regular and some turkey bacon. I always need to keep breakfast things for our Sunday family breakfasts. I am needing more for this weekend but more about that later. The hash browns are also for this weekend along with the ice cream and Hershey’s syrup.

Our ground turkey was gone. It was on sale but only at 33% off which is not a great price so I only bought 2 lbs. However the sirloin tip roasts were on sale for $ 3.99 a lb. so I purchased one to cut up for stew meat.

I purchased one extra newspaper because there were 3 inserts this week. I always need Half and Half. So I got 2. The Kleenex, oatmeal, veggies, and Kikkoman sauces were great prices after sale and coupons. So they will go in my stockpile. The soy sauce sale was just in time because I only had about 1/2 inch in my last bottle.

I only spent $38.00 last week so I have $ 37.00 that I could spend if I do need something since I have lots of company this coming weekend.

Yes, my son is coming out on a business trip on Friday or Thursday evening depending on the weather. He is bringing my granddaughter and they are staying until Monday. We are so excited. We didn’t think that we would see them for another month or so.

And my grandson is coming at 11AM on Saturday and staying until noon or so on Sunday. That was a previous date that we had on our calendar. So that left us with a bedroom dilemma. We only have three bedrooms. My granddaughter will stay in one and my son in the other spare room. 

My grandson likes to stay up all night talking and my granddaughter likes her sleep. We tried sleeping them in the same room once and that did not work out well.

So my son is bringing my grandson’s air mattress and sleeping bag. But where can we sleep him? We can’t do the great room because we adults will be up in there until midnight. There is no room in our bedroom.

So Hubby and I thought about it and this is what we came up with. We will put him in our office. It’s pictured above. Excuse the mess but Hubby is cleaning it. We will move the writing table over in front of the windows and take the chair out and that will give my grandson a large spot in the middle of the room for his bed. 

However we have French doors on that room and they are not great for the privacy that a young man needs. Remember that large roll of paper that I purchased to wrap presents a long time ago. Well, Hubby cut two large strips of it and taped it over the windows using painter’s tape so that it wouldn’t hurt the paint on the doors. 

All we have left to do is find our extra nightlights to put in that room for him.

He should be very comfortable sleeping in there for one night.

The grandchildren are very excited that they will get to spend time with each other for a day. They don’t see each other very often.

And of course, Grandma has to spoil them while they are here. That is what the ice cream and Hershey’s syrup is for. I will bake some brownies and make brownie sundaes for dessert on Saturday night. We will top them with whipped cream and maraschino cherries. I am also considering ordering pizza and wings for dinner that evening. It will be easy for me and the kids and we adults will love it.       

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Every Day

Rest Of This Week’s Shopping

I won’t bore you with most of the details but here are the rest of the shopping trips that I made on Sunday and Monday.

Sunday’s Tops trip I saved $26.01 and paid OOP $23.41. I also bought a Buffalo News to get another set of inserts. But the News has gone up to $3.00 so I don’t know how often I will do that. They have to be good coupons for things I need. I already saved many more dollars than the cost of the paper on another Top’s trip, Walgreen’s trip and my CVS trip.

This shop was another Top’s trip(2 Palmolive and 4 Almay Eye Makeup removers) where I used $10.00 in coupons and paid OOP $ 13.79. The CVS trip was the rest of the items which I paid $ 1.59 OOP. I used $10.00 in ECB’s and  and Q’s for the Wet n Wild eyeliners, toothpaste and the Gold Emblem snacks. I got $ 8.00 in ECB’s back. The Walgreen’s trip was 2 Elvive Shampoo and Conditioner and the Russell Stover. That total came to $3.95 after Q’s.

Rite Aid was $50.00 from my Other budget for the 2- $25. Domino’s cards which was a bonus cash deal. All candy I posted today is for the grandchildren to put in their cute little  Valentine mailboxes. The candy came to $ 3.46.

Aldi’s was $22.44 OOP. I am getting ready for the Super Bowl. We are also trying 2 different ham products to see which we like better. BTW, the apple sausages are terrific cooked up in a skillet with fresh apples slices and a little cinnamon.

Last shop was Save- A-Lot where I stocked up on 5.87 lbs. of Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts at $ 1.59 a lb. Great price for here. I paid $14.27 for the chicken, 2 lbs. of carrots, a huge cabbage, and 8 lbs. of Russet potatoes. Hubby has asked for corned beef and cabbage this week. Since I have one I bought at rock bottom price last March, he is getting his wish.


I had $ 14.40 left in my grocery budget last week when I added $ 75. on Sunday. I now have $ 6.49 left for the rest of the week. However, I do have a $25. Walmart E-Gift Card that I earned from Ibotta. Since I earned it with groceries rebates, I will use it for groceries. So when I feel better, I will be using that to stock on toilet paper, ground turkey and possibly beef, half and half, etc.

I do have some Ibotta rebates to submit. I think it is like $2.50 that I will get back. 


Our Other budget has $ 63.07 left after being funded for only two weeks. I did not fund it for the week I was in Florida.


I am so glad that I do not have to run out the door today. My cold seems to be getting worse instead of better. It’s in my chest now. Fortunately, I have a check up with my doctor later this week so hopefully he can give me something or tell me what will get rid of it.


I will be back later this week with the Frugal Things We Have Done the past 10 days.