five steps to saving our food budget this month

Last week I sat down to punch in some numbers on our expenses that I hadn't bothered to do for half the month. And like usual I spent way more than I thought I had. I had 53 dollars left in our food budget for the month of July. Fifty three dollars. And it was July 17th. (I find the graph of our spending on the tablet hilarious. We haven't seen the inside of a store in days.)

I was determined to not overspend this month. So I challenged myself. 

First Step:
I searched out all the ads and found which store had the best deal. Kents was my hero that day. 

* 3.99 for 5 dozen eggs - we love our eggs
* 2.50 for a gallon of milk 
* 8.99 for tillamook - we can never ever not buy cheese

My total at the grocery store to get us through until the end of July. $53.46. Boo Ya!

Second step:
No buying unnecessary foods. Goodbye adorable-small-prepackaged applesause, pudding, and fruit leather packets.

Third step:
Cheapest meals possible. Many of the ingredients for these we had in our freezer, fridge, food storage, pantry, or garden.

* BBQ chicken pizza
* Black bean pizza
* Omelets
* Black bean burgers
* Chicken Enchiladas
* Skillet Summer Vegetable Lasagna
* Crisp Bean Burrito
* The ultimate stuffed zucchini
* Tuna Sandwich
* Chili over potatoes
* Pancakes, Eggs, Hashbrowns

Fourth step:
Make as many things from scratch as possible. Bread and treats.

Fifth step and my favorite:
Eating from our backyard.

* we have had green beans with half our meals
* we pickled some beets
* I love walking outside and grabbing an onion or green pepper
* potatoes are our favorite 
* cucumbers for snacks
* stawberries for something sweet
* zucchini and yellow squash are taking over
* we had our first corn on the cob last night
* we are sort-of patiently waiting for our tomatoes. 

 Someday soon we will have cantaloupe and watermelon.

And a little later we will have an abundance of fruit off our trees. (plus cute pumpkins to decorate our porch with)

Hope I can do this.

Why did I bother posting this. Our posterity will totally 
be fascinated by this someday. Right?