This Week on the Dining Table

It's the "On the Road Again" Edition.............

We are settling into the Shit Hole Motel here in Coastal Maine.
I guess I am just getting too old to travel anymore......

Moving on......

Onward to the meal planning!

Here's what was planned last week--

1. Sunday--Take-Out Chinese
2. Monday--Chicken Parm, Tossed Salad or Leftover Asparagus
3. Tuesday--Chicken Pot Pie
4. Wednesday--Quiche, Tossed Salad
5. Thursday--Tuna Noodle Casserole
6. Friday--Verde Salsa Chicken on Tortillas
7. Saturday--No Clue?

And this is what actually happened--

1. Sunday--Take-Out Chinese
2. Monday--Leftovers
3. Tuesday--Chicken Pot Pie
4. Wednesday--Quiche, Tossed Salad
5. Thursday--Chicken Parm, Wax and Green Beans, Chipotle Noodles
6. Friday--Tempura Zucchini
7. Saturday--Don't know what Daughter fixed yet*will update this later

6 meals cooked at home, 1 of them nights of leftovers and 1 night of Take-Out.   Daughter made the quiche on Wednesday and the pot pies were emergency provisions from the freezer after I had my abscess excised and I didn't feel up to cooking from scratch.

As for my grocery spending..... I spent a total of $574.57 on July's groceries.  I have negative $124.57 left of my $450 food budget for the month.
Let's just move along....nothing to see here.  ;-)


Leftovers going into this week........asparagus, quiche, chicken parm.

Here is this week's "food plan"--Daughter is in charge of food while we are gone.

1. Sunday--Pizza(home made with Boboli crusts)
2. Monday--Kielbasa on Rolls, Onions, Veg.
3. Tuesday--Tuna Noodle Casserole
4. Wednesday--Salsa Verde Carne Burritos
5. Thursday--Leftovers
6. Friday--Beef Pie
7. Saturday--Take-Out of some kind

This week will see 5 new meals cooked and 1 night of  Take-Out and 1 night of Leftovers.

What we need to buy for this menu.....milk and fruit maybe.  I have everything here to make her dishes but will leave some grocery $ too.

What is getting fixed and served at your house this week?

Was last week's plan successful, did you go off plan or did you not even plan what was going to be eaten last week?

Any great deals on food at your stores this week?

Sluggy

2016 Food & Toiletries Spending.....July Update

* I've closed out the July books a couple of days early as I am done shopping.  Anything bought in the next 2 days will come out of August's funds. *

Onward to July's food spending report.......

Here are my FOOD BUDGET spending totals for JULY 2016.

I have posted July's totals on the Total Grocery Savings for 2016 Page located HERE and have updated the Yearly Totals there.  I am listing subtotals for each store I purchased from in July.  If you aren't interested in that much detail, just skip to the bottom for the Totals Sum.  My spending includes Food, Toiletries/HBA, Cleaning Products, Paper Goods & tax where applicable. We are a family of 5(5 at home this month). No kids under 20.

******************

BAKERY OUTLET
OOP  $11.93
Value  $35.72
Savings 66.60%

BOYER'S MARKET
OOP  $39.50
Value  $77.17
Saved  $37.67
Savings  48.81%

DOLLAR TREE
OOP  $11.18
Value  $18.18
Savings  38.50%

FOOD LION
OOP  $24.93
Value  $36.55
Saved  $11.62
Savings  31.79%

MAINE SOURCE
OOP  $52.29
Value  $89.46
Savings  41.55%

RITE-AID
OOP  $0.00
Value  $19.29
Saved  $19.29
Savings  100%

SHURSAVE MARKET
OOP  $85.78
Qs/Ads $144.54
Value  $230.32
Savings  62.75%

WEIS MARKETS

OOP  $348.96

Qs/Ads  $376.40

Value  $673.94

Savings  55.85%

*********************
My best 3 Store Savings Totals were Rite-Aid at 100%, Bakery Outlet at 66.60% and Shursave Market at 62.75%.  My WORST savings rate was at Food Lion at 31.79%
I shopped at 8 different stores this past month.

TOTAL Out of Pocket..........$574.57

TOTAL Coupons & Store Sales Savings...$489.95

TOTAL Value of Items Purchased............$1064.50

TOTAL Savings of...................................46.02%

TOTAL Value of Items Purchased w/R-A.....$1082.79
TOTAL Savings including Rite-Aid shopping....46.94%


This closes out the July food/toiletries spending.

THOUGHTS & COMMENTS for this month.....
I went into July wanting to do a $450 food budget for the month.  I ended up going over by a whooping $124.57.
Ouch.

Again I am still trying to find the spending sweet spot.  Some of my spending in July was due to picking up good deals which we'll use later on in the year and there were many good deals to be had since July 4th was this month.  I picked up more meats/proteins for the freezer than I used in July so the freezer is fuller at the end of the month than it was at the beginning.

At least my savings rate is up again to 46.94%(only a bit of that was due to Rite-Aid shopping)while in June it had dropped to 39.80%.

The monthly food spending savings percentage went up by 7.14% in July to 46.94% compared to June's 39.80% savings average.
I'll take that savings rate all day long!

With 7 months accounted for, I have spent a total of $2379.22 on food/toiletries so far in 2016 which averages out to $339.89 per month spent.  This is $39.11 higher per month than the average in June was.
But then again, I am feeding 2 extra people this year so that increase is not so bad.


LOOKING AHEAD To August 2016.........

I will continue with my usual shopping ways in August....buy loss leaders or great deals which we can use, use a few coupons, cash in points for gift cards or buy discounted gift cards to food stores when possible.
I am going to give myself $500 for August.  Not sure if this amount will work for August as Hubs and I are going away for 9 days and I'll need to leave some cash here for the kids to buy groceries and you know they won't be as careful with their purchases as I am.  ;-)

If you have other ideas or guidelines you follow please leave a comment and share yours with us all.

*  How much did you spend on food/toiletries in July?
*  Do you track your yearly food spending?
*  What was your savings percentage buying on sale and/or with coupons vs. buying at regular retail price last month, if you track that sort of thing?
*  What are your methods for keeping your food spending in check?

Is anyone out there up for tracking expenditures and trying to spend less but still eat well?


Sluggy

So Over These Career Politicians

The full Hillary Clinton story, not the fairy tale glossed over version Bill Clinton delivered in his speech the other night.

HERE

As with everything, take it with a grain of salt but there are large nuggets of truth in this rebuttal.

Why is this country so concerned with voting a POTUS with "darker than white" skin, or this year, a vagina?

Why are we not asking the REAL questions, examining candidates policy stances on real issues such as mass surveillance, fiscal policy or transparency in campaign finance, congressional reform?
You know, the stuff that actually affects us, the people's lives directly?

At least one person, other than the politicians, is making money off our country's horror show......

Vivienne Westwood's new t-shirt speaks the truth, though I'd never pay $180 for the honor on owning this rag.
But if someone gifted me one I'd wear it fiercely! ;-)

Sluggy

More Rite-Aid from My Trip to VA Last Week

Since nobody can copy the deals I did I'll not go into massive detail here.
I still had 2 Mentos BOGOF Qs and a $1/2 Colgate toothpaste to get free stuff so we stopped at a Rite-Aid in Delaware, along the way to Virginia and I got this.......

This particular store only had the spearmint flavor mints so I didn't get them(seeing as a detest spearmint anything).
But I did pick up 2 tubes of toothpaste and with the sale, coupon, points earned they were free.
I gave them to brother and his wife when we got to Virginia.

Then the morning we waited 3 hours for them to return from grocery shopping I went up to a nearby Rite-Aid to see if I could track down an acceptable flavor of Mentos........

They had the Wintergreen variety which I had wanted all along!
I had to add the candy bar to the transaction because of the order in which this cashier did things.

Usually they scan your card, then the register asks if you are using points(I say yes)and then cashier rings up your items and lastly your coupons.
Total after coupons should have been(for just the mentos)$3 + tax and I would have earned $4 back in points(2 x $2 on the Mentos).
Not this time!

The cashier scanned my card, the register asked if I wanted to use points, and then the cashier scanned in my coupons, the both of which rang up as $2.29 off-the regular retail on the Mentos.
She lastly rang in the mints which scanned in on sale at $1.50 each.
So $6-$4.58=$1.52 + tax.
Huh?

Seeing as you can't use Plenti points if the purchase is UNDER $2 I now had to add that candy bar.
If things had been rung up correctly, in the correct order my transaction would have been $6-$3=$3 + tax, and no extra items would have been needed

So I paid .92¢ for the candy bar(20% wellness discount)and my grand total for all was $2.34 + .17 tax=$2.51
Instead of using $3 in Plenti points I used $2.51 but still earned $4 back in PPs.
So this transaction gave me .49¢ more back in points and a free candy bar to boot.  ;-)

I ended up giving the candy bar to my son for his birthday, because I am generous that way.......lolz

Sluggy

In Other News......

Hubs picked the first zucchini of the season 2 days ago........

It went from 5 inches long to 12+ inches in 2 days!
I forgot how fast these babies grow with the optimum weather.

If I am feeling up to it mr. zuke will be starring in a Blueberry Zuke Cake very soon.  8-)

Sluggy