Thursday, January 28, 2016

The Bare Essentials Challenge: This Week's Grocery Shopping Trip


As part of the "Bare Essentials" Challenge, I knew that I would have to post up pics of my grocery shopping to help keep myself accountable for what I'm spending.  I normally try to shop for the following week on Friday, but this week I had to run in to Palmer to drop a time sensitive piece of mail off at the post office, so to get the most out of my gas and time I just picked up groceries while I was there.

I'm aiming for 50.00 or less spending on groceries per week during this challenge, so we'll see how I do as time goes on.

How I do my grocery shopping is this.  I'll figure out what I need/want to get between Fred Meyer and Carrs (our Safeway affiliate) because they are within a block of each other where I shop.  I then sit down with the ads for both stores, figure out what sales, if any, will help me out for that week and then I'll cost out sale items line item wise on my shopping list, estimate my regular shopping items (usually at non-sale prices just to be safe) and allow myself wiggle room in my 50.00 for milk later in the week and such.

So, between the two stores, what I got is above.

To break down what I bought...

Fred Meyer:

The Uncle Ben's Flavored Grains and the popcorn were free with E-Coupon freebie downloads (thanks again for the freebies, Stephanie!).  The cat food I needed, but I found that a couple types were on discount for .34 a can.  So, I bought a couple more cans than I had scoped on my shopping list, which still wasn't bad.   The Pringles are normally 2.00 or more per can pretty much everywhere anymore, but they were on sale for 1.79 a can, so I got two to put in my son's school lunches next week instead of Cheetos for a change for him.

All totaled I spent 6.26 at Fred Meyer.

Carrs:

My son has been blowing through Coke the last bit because he's always demanding fresh, so I end up buying a ridiculous amount of soda, a good portion of which goes down the drain.  Carrs has Coke on sale this week that if you buy 5 2-Liter bottles you get them for 1.49 per bottle.  For Alaska this is an excellent price.  I had originally planned to get 10, but decided against it as I didn't feel the need to stock up ridiculously on Coke.  I found, though, when I went to check out that the two "odd man out" bottles I got actually did ring up for 1.49 too along with the other five.  It was a cool find.

The ginger ale was .99 for the bottle after E-Coupon.  I've been battling a sore throat this week and my husband fought a stomach bug one day, so we drank the bottle of 7-Up I had in the pantry.  I bought the ginger ale to replace the 7-Up.  I actually bought this separately from the rest of my groceries, believe it or not, and used my very small amount of pocket change (now 1.25 left.  This is what is left of the birthday money my family sent to me that I kept 10.00 of for personal use.  I'm ridiculously scroogy when it comes to cash) to pay for it.  I felt less guilty that way as I really didn't feel like it was part of regular groceries, but more of a luxury item.

The Doritos I had a personalized price on for like 3.32 per bag.  Still kind of ridiculous for chips, but my son will eat them, so I just choke on the price as I put them in the cart.

The diapers were 9.49 after a 2.00/1 E-Coupon was applied.  Noticed the price on diapers went up and adjusted my mental cost book accordingly.

The flavored water was kind of depressing as I had an E-Coupon to get the water for free at Fred Meyer.  I checked three different stores and none of them carry it anymore, so I ended up buying it, like usual at Carrs.  I put these in my daughter's lunch instead of juice boxes as they keep her better hydrated.  3.49 for the six pack.

The eggs were a really cool circumstance.  I have found that the Jumbo eggs at Carrs are MUCH better at staying fresh than the large eggs and they are really reasonable in price, if you can find them in stock.  They are normally 2.49 a dozen, but as I was checking out a cashier was walking by to put some cheese back someone didn't want and it had a coupon stuck on it for 1.00/1 Lucerne product on it.  Without saying a word to me, she double checked the coupon, tore it off the cheese bag and stuck it onto my eggs.  That was so very cool of her that I can't even begin to say how awesome she was for doing that.  I'm going to be sure to get her name totally right the next time I go in and write a nice letter to corporate about her.  She's always a wonderful cashier that goes above and beyond the call of duty :).

So, to make a long story short (too late, I know) I spent a total of 36.43 at Carrs (plus the .99 I spent out of pocket change, but I'm not counting that on the groceries) after taxes.

Total for the week so far:  42.69

This should give me enough left to get two gallons of regular priced milk later in the week and still be right around 50.00 total for the week.

13 comments:

  1. Has your family been in Alaska for a long time? Iimagine that prices are different there than the rest of the U.S.

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  2. My husband's been up here his entire life. I moved up here about 15 years ago.

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    1. And yeah, our prices tend to be higher due to longer shipping times.

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  3. Looks yummy! Our Fred Meyers has Tillamook cheese for $5.49 so I've got several. (2 lbs each) We got a $10 off $50 coupon for Safeway in the free ad that comes in our mailbox, so I may do some shopping there this week, but I haven't decided yet. I'm trying to use things from the pantry, freezer and cupboards, so am trying to keep my shopping down right now as well. I'm loving your $50 challenge and am going to try to join you.

    Hopefully, you can add some meat back into your "stash" one of these weeks, just so it doesn't dip too low. I know you have your menus planned and have the meat for quite a while.

    I think you are doing a really good job using what you have and meeting your children's needs. One thing I can be sure of--they won't look back and feel like they were "poor" or didn't have treats. Sometimes a bottle of flavored water or some chips can make people feel rich for a very small amount of money! (I get it about your son--he couldn't care less about the cost of chips, pop, or anything else--he just wants what he likes for dinner:) ) I'm mostly thinking about your daughter. It's really nice of you to get her a treat for her lunch.

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  4. One question, does your son drink anything like kool-aid or iced tea or is the flavor what he likes? I understand why you buy the pop, I have a love of diet coke but boy would that save you money.

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    1. I wish he'd drink anything other than Coke, but he won't even drink other flavors of soda. He just plain likes cola, unfortunately.

      I have a love of Diet Coke too, so I kind of understand him liking the flavor. His school is working on him drinking orange flavored drinks by introducing Capri Sun. I keep hoping that will become a preferred flavor because I could water down Tang powder or something to get the same flavor, but for a lot cheaper than buying Coke in bulk.

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  5. Do you enter the Coke rewards points? I'm a Diet Coke addict, so I'm pretty dedicated to entering all my points. Just before Christmas, they usually have 'sales' on stuff that you can buy with them, and I've been drinking free Diet Coke all month with coupons I bought with my points. I didn't get any great deals this week. I was in a hurry and needed to buy some already prepared things for my husband and daughter to eat while I am out of town visiting our college daughter. I did start using Ibotta, and due to some bonuses and Diet Coke deals at Target (where I used my free coupons AND got the Ibotta back), I've already accumulated $21 there. The rebates will go slowly after this, but at least it's something.

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    1. My rebates always seem to expire before I use them on My Coke Rewards. I get frustrated with the only being able to add to many points per week thing and by the time the next week rolls around I'm lucky if I have time to enter more points.

      And then there is the needing to keep the caps someplace out of the reach of my son so he doesn't put them in his mouth and potentially choke on them. I just got to the point that it just isn't worth it to horde the caps. Really glad it's working for you, though :).

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  6. My husband is also a serious diet coke addict. I wouldn't feel guilty about stocking up when it is on sale. That stuff lasts for a long time. My husband prefers the six pack of bottles because it doesn't go flat before he drinks it all. Whenever they go on sale (which used to be around $2 but that's become rare...more like $2.50 now), he goes and gets a whole bunch of cases. We've literally filled the trunk of the car with 24, or more, of those 6 packs. It then takes a couple months to go through, but at least it was on sale when he bought it!

    I'm a bit jealous of the free rice you received. My daughter refuses to eat plain white rice, so that flavoured rice is what I have to buy to satisfy her Asperger's needs. Wish we could get free stuff like that!!!

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    1. My son is the exact opposite. If I dare to even put salt in the rice he won't eat it. White rice only is what he demands. Amazing how different autistic kids are from one to another isn't it?

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    2. You might be able to keep a list of the coke caps (codes) some place in your kitchen so you can just jot them down and enter them as you can. Then no danger of putting caps in mouth. I got 3.00 off coke 12 packs around Christmas time and I just save my points up and use as I can. I just found your blog through beckyathome.wordpress.com

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    3. I nearly smacked myself on the forehead with this comment. Write them down. Duuuhhhh! I can't believe that I didn't think of that. I write everything else down. You'd think I would have thought to do that. I'll definitely try that. Thank you so much!

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  7. Your reply about nearly smacking your self on the head about writing the codes down made me smile. It's funny how sometimes I miss the most obvious too. Have a great day. Glad I found your blog.

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