I did my first $100 a month grocery shopping on Tuesday. Many items were crossed off the list before I made the trip to the shops. Unfortunately butter and cheese took up a huge chunk of the budget. I'll have to be careful about how we use it. I have about $26 left for the next 3 1/2 weeks which includes $5 from selling a bottle of Miracle Spray. Hopefully I can find a few fruit and veg bargains. I did see that a silverbeet plant in the garden is still producing smallish leaves. I'll be adding them to a few meals.
Here's what else we got up to -
* Baked and sold lots of raspberry and white chocolate muffins plus chocolate muffins with extra goodness to a cleaning client.
* Sold a bottle of Miracle Spray to a friend.
* Darren emptied a compost bin onto one of our veggie garden beds. This has topped up the level of the dirt. We haven't bought mushroom compost for the veggie garden in over 5 years.
* Saved more bread crusts and dried them ready to make seasoned bread crumbs when my container gets low.
* Bulk made salmon patties and froze enough for another 5 meals ( made from 2 tins of salmon ). I bulked out the meat with mashed potato, seasoned bread crumbs and finely grated carrots.
* Wrote another cheap menu plan to help feed us for $100 a month.
* Planted lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower and silverbeet seedlings.
* Baked four loaves of wholemeal bread with extra goodness.
* Cut up a few old socks to use as garden ties.
* Made mini garlic breads and froze them from a leftover bread stick.
* Fed the compost bin every few days with kitchen scraps.
* Jessica did another wardrobe cleanout and gave me a few tops she no longer needed.
* Saved the washing machine rinse water and shower warm up water to reuse in the washing machine.
* Made choc / orange biscuits from dough in the freezer.
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| choc orange biscuits |
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| salmon patties ready to cook |
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| Salmon patties for the freezer |
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| mini garlic breads |
Wendy, I really enjoy reading about your frugal ways. Your posts are inspiring and give me new ideas to try in my home.
ReplyDeleteThankyou Patsy. I'd love to see your frugal list sometime soon.
DeleteHi Wendy and you did really well with your budget and you are right that butter and cheese are one of many big price items in the grocery budget. I am glad you had rain after you planted your vegetable seeds as that will give them a good start.
ReplyDeleteWe are in the process of setting up our garden beds here as we have frosts we have to build an enclosure with shade cloth over the top to stop the frost hitting them and the heat also in summer. So far all 10 garden beds have been filled with amended soil and topped up once they settled. The drip irrigation frames for each bed have been put together using mostly reused drip irrigation and pvc pipes and some fittings from our previous gardens. To complete it we just need to connect the water to them and we can start planting :).
Our savings last week added up to $41.68.
In the kitchen-
- Cooked all meals and bread from scratch.
Purchases -
- On specials we purchased 5 x 500g of frozen peas, corn and capsicum, mandarins, kiwi fruit and bananas saving $11.68 on usual prices.
Finances and eBay listings -
- We paid an extra month of mortgage payments off our home loan from a bonus pay I received saving interest and time on our loan. We have almost made double payments since the start of our loan in January :).
- Other items purchased from my bonus pay were a few curtain rods, ends and curtain rod holders we needed for the home so I can hang the curtains I am making to replace blinds that no longer work.
- Listed 10 items on a free listing promotion on eBay saving $16.50 on usual listing fees.
In the gardens -
- Put all the drip irrigation frames for 10 garden beds together. We still have to link up the main watering pipes to each garden bed.
- We reused 13mm pvc pipe,some t-pieces, elbows and our drip irrigation pipe from our last gardens saving about $30 over buying more.
- Both of us trench composted more vegetable/fruit peelings into another vegetable garden bed.
I hope everyone had a wonderful week last week and will this week too :).
Sewingcreations15 (Lorna).
Keep going with those extra mortgage payments. I remember the joy of seeing our mortgage balance go down. It's short term pain for long term gain.
DeleteYou really make your $ stretch a long way, Wendy. I can't fathom a $100 month shop!! I haven't got as much as I'd normally have in my veg patch this season but I have been using what is there this week:
ReplyDelete* made an impossible pie using perpetual spinach, silverbeet, spring onion and parsley from the garden.
* have used ends of large spring onions in place of regular onion in dishes as that's what in garden
* used homegrown bay leaves in a stew and made homemade dumplings. Extra serves to freezer.
* planted lettuce and kale seedlings
* made homemade sausage rolls and froze many of them for future meals
* made homemade pizza, including bases, to use up scraps of this and that from crisper. Enough left over for lunches next day.
* mended pocket on my son's school shirt
* turned off all unnecessary lights every night
I also turn off appliances like microwave, toaster, wash machine, oven/cooktop and tv when we are not using them.
Have a lovely week.
Meg:)
Meg, did you enjoy the homemade pizzas ? I think they are far better than anything that can be bought.
DeleteLoving your posts and very eager to continue learning how you manage on a tighter income and to see your new menu plans. Our income has been slightly reduced these last few months and will reduce even further next month with a change in husband’s job. Thankyou Wendy!
ReplyDeleteMiriam
I'll be posting more cheap menu plans shortly.
DeleteYour cookies and salmon patties look marvelous.
ReplyDeleteGod bless.
Thankyou. They are very tasty.
DeleteWell done on a fabulous week. Cheese is very expensive and unfortuntely, the store brand ones are not as flavoursome as the big brands. We still buy the store brands though!
ReplyDeleteSend some rain our way. We are on Level 1 water restrictions. We have a tank but it needs rain. Thankfully it is just for the garden.
Prayers coming your way for rain xoxo
DeleteI love the look of those biscuits. Yum.
ReplyDeleteYour desire and drive to live frugally are amazing. I have to agree with you that butter is an expensive item now. I buy big blocks of cheese and ration it. Cheese is a major downfall in our budget. I a hoping that next year my citrus fruit for me.
God bless.
Butter has doubled in price since 2015.
DeleteHi, any suggestions on us equivalent for lectric soda? I can't find here would washing soda work? Katie
ReplyDeleteYes washing soda is the same as lectric soda.
DeleteWow Wendy you really are pulling out all stops for keeping the budget down. We decided to have a treat this week and go to a local Pub for the raffles. We had 2 beers each, shared a bowl of Nachos, bought some raffle tickets and Bluey played some Keno. When we left we worked out that we had spent $80!!!!!!!!!!!!! This little outing will have to last us a while. We are back to making sure we spend as little as possible and get as much as possible from what we do spend. I have to admit that it was really nice to go out, even if it was just to the Pub.
ReplyDeleteWendy I have no idea how you do it!! $100 wouldn't cover us for half a week. However we don't have a stock pile yet. We live in a small rental while our house is being built. Can't wait to see your $100 menu plan.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much Wendy for postine your bread recipe. I will make this once I have used up existing supplies bought for my bread maker. Regards Robyne S.A
ReplyDeleteHi Wendy
ReplyDeleteCongratulations on sticking to your budget.
Have been using the one kilo margarine from Aldi $1.69 for my baking to save on groceries.
Have been doing this for many years. Our cheese is cut up and some grated,then frozen and used sparingly. This way we can stick to our budget.
We are now empty nest pensioners so every little bit of savings helps
Julie
Dairy & meat are the big budget killers for us as well. Our kids (two teen boys) are at summer camp, so we've been getting by with a much lower grocery budget. We've also been squeezing in date nights, which while not frugal for a meal out, don't require a sitter.
ReplyDeleteWe've done a few gift card deals, price matched various things we needed, and tried to avoid food waste. The basics!
Oh goodness! Thanks for that info Sonia. What is it in the margarine?
ReplyDelete