I have made a last minute decision to go head strong into a spring grocery challenge for myself. Want to join me??
I am going to try to limit myself to spending no more than $40 all month on groceries. I have more than enough food to last. I know there will be some pre-Easter sales going on, therefore my reason for giving myself the grace of spending something! I will probably get eggs when the price is right (cheap). At some point I may need milk - but I have plenty of butter, cheese, and everyday goodies.
Why did I decide to do this? Well, I looked at the ads this week and honestly there isn't a thing that said "buy me". No sales worth going out in the rain and cold for. I need nothing. So why shop just to be shopping?
I love forcing myself to get creative and think outside the box. I love trying some new things.
We have pantry essentials, we have freezers that are full, and we have home canned goods - what else do we need? WE NEED TO USE IT!
We are blessed in so many ways.
So I am challenging you all. Limit yourself this month. Do a pantry/freezer no shopping challenge with me!
WHO IS IN?
Let's do it!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It's a great thing to do. We already did Low Spend January, and repeated it for February, so we are all done with clearing out the overstock. One thing that helped was putting items on the bottom shelf of the cupboard that needed to be done away with first. If we didn't use them in a short time period, we donated the items to a local food bank along with items that we knew we would never use. Then we moved some more items down to the bottom shelf and tried to use those up. It helped to have a smaller selection to choose from for dinners and made it easier to know that we'd never use an item that we kept passing up for meals. Six cans of ranch beans went to a busy single mom along with some other types of canned beans since we've learned to make dried beans into better meals. We're committed to buying less now, and less variety too.
ReplyDeleteGood job. I did a sort of "no spend January" as well. I just have quite the stockpile and I need to get outside of my comfort zone.
DeleteI don't want to get down to very little - as I like being prepared for that "in case" scenario (SHTF) someday.
But I do need to rotate and use older - so I can not feel badly about adding back in.
How wonderful to help the busy single mom and food bank. I bet she was so grateful.
We all need to take more time to be thoughtful of others that may be in need and perhaps not quite as blessed 'with supplies' as ourselves.
God bless
Love your pantry! I am not as stocked, but I do have things I need to use in my freezer. I know there are at least 2 turkeys that are 2 years old, so I'm going to let hubby smoke one if the weather ever warms up. I don't usually keep turkeys that long, so I hope they will be still be ok.
ReplyDeleteKathy they should be fine. I have a turkey and a couple turkey breast that old. Used one last fall that was 2 and it was perfect. Smoked sounds yummy.
DeleteThat is the upstairs pantry. Daily use, surplus is downstairs.
Good luck using stuff from the freezer. Let us know how the smoked turkey turns out!
I’ve found that when you challenge yourself and when you work with what you’ve got, there is a tendency for it to taste better!
ReplyDeleteI do believe you are so correct. We tend to get a bit more creative and that leads to flavorful food.
DeleteI also think we may take normal bland items and jazz them up more.
I love a good challenge!
I will try to join you, but it will be $40 a week (that's $10 less than I was originally going to do). I've got some canned fruits that really need to be used up, and way too much jam and jellies, will make up some presents for a bridal shower from those. And way too much beef in the freezer from last year's, will give some to my daughter who just bought a house. And there is some sort of freezer burn broccoli, can make that up and maybe see if the chickens will eat it. Flour to make bread in the bread machine and some flat breads from specialty flours that have been in there awhile. I told my husband, The Good Man, that we could cold frame some early greens so will see if I can make a go of that.
ReplyDeleteThen at the grocery store it is milk, soda for The Good Man, and ??.
ha Ha, on the chickens, we try all sorts of things to supplement their crumble and seed diet, it's winter and there aren't many greens and bugs for them. So we finely chop up our meat scraps, and veggie scraps. The other day they got some watermelon rinds, and always the cobs from corn. When there isn't snow on the ground, we get them out of their run and onto some green grass and they love stripping the blades of moisture, nutrients, and the occasional tiny worm, they also eat green grass and weeds too, and hibernating larvae.
DeleteYou go girl. Sounds like you have a good plan on using and gifting goods. Hope it works for you and you can get creative!
DeleteOh those chickens sure are industrious and clever. Amazing how they can eat things we would never think about. That's great that they are getting "treats" from your throw-aways.
Great job!
Hi, I agree with you. I have talked myself out of shopping so many times. I can't remember the last time I bought store bought cookies.
ReplyDeleteI'm doing pretty good on my eating from what I have here except for fresh veggies/fruit. But the grocery bill has been minimal lately.
YAY - great job. You know, things just taste better made from home. I haven't bought cookies in years - homemade are so much better.
DeleteI get fresh veggies that will last a while and when I run out of fresh fruit - we eat canned.
Got to love those little grocery bills!!!!!!
Great job.
Don't count me in, but I love these challenges. $40 a month will save you so much money, which is great.
ReplyDeleteWe've had so much rain that some roads are flooding. I was working yesterday and they called school off at 1 o'clock, so I got to leave early and then there was a two hour delay today due to flooding. Today the sun is shining and about 51 degrees, so it definitely cooled it off too. I hope you have a great weekend, Cheryl. :)
Sorry about all the flooding. it sure has been bad this past week for that in a lot of places. Hope you and yours stay safe.
DeleteWe are sunny and in the 40's today - I'll take it!
Have a good weekend.
I did one in January so I will just cheer you on!
ReplyDeleteI did too Marybeth. It didn't make a dent in things - so I figured "why not"?
DeleteMaybe it will offset a couple big expenses we will have coming up!
have a good one.
I've not done a lot of shopping recently because of my treatments, so I don't have a lot on hand, but I will be trying to use items from my freezer.
ReplyDeleteLaura of Harvest Lane Cottage
Well Laura you must have had a good bit on hand, to be using on it. That is great. You are a good example of why we all need a good pantry stock.
DeleteI sure hope the treatments are almost done. So good to see you stop by. God bless my friend.
Hey I would love to join this one. Just came home to no milk or bread, but I used the sour milk for biscuts and pulled meat from the freezer. I will have to get fresh things and dairy.
ReplyDelete