Just A Little Update

This week is our first week of school.  It is also my first week back to work for the school year.

 Boy the summer sure did fly right by. 

We accomplished many small projects, most of which I posted about in "5 Frugal Thing I Did Last Week". 

We also had our finished basement shower rebuilt and threw my parent in laws a 50th Anniversary Party complete with family pictures.  All of which we budgeted and paid cash for.  Go us!!

We have paid off over half of our car loan.  We are still on track to have it paid off by Dec/Jan.  I actually have a large chunk of money ear marked for the car loan in our savings account. It would empty the account though so I am not ready to do that. Now that I am back to work I will be building up the savings to $2000. Then paying the ear marked cash. That will leave us at just a little over $4000 to pay off between now and the end of the year. I think it is doable :)

I would not say this has been our most frugal summer ever but it has been much better compared to years past. 

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. I made these shirts for a cute one year old's birthday :)

  

2.  Was offered and gladly accepted a bunch of free produce from my sister and mom :)

3. I had $100 left in my $200 two week grocery budget!!

4. Found several seasons of a very popular television show at a yard sale for $2 each. These will become a Christmas gift. ( sorry can't tell you which show or for who the gift is for just in case the person reads this)

5. Ate all our leftovers. No food waste this week :)

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. I found Kid # 5 a messenger style zebra print ( which she is currently into at the moment) bag in great shape at a yard sale for $3.  Score on the book bag for school!

2. We ate at home everyday this week.

3. I made 2 loaves of banana bread, 1 Starbucks knock off lemon loaf and a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting ( kid # 4's birthday was this week )all from scratch this week using up items we already had.

4. We had a birthday party to attend for a cute 3 year old.  I made him a cape and a mask for about $8.  I had everything I needed for the mask but did have to buy the material for the cape.  The gift went over very well!

5. We got free movies at our local library.  We have been doing this once a week for a majority of the summer.  We also remembered to return them on time so we don't end up with late 

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. I taught myself how to sew button holes by watching YouTube videos. I then turned an old table cloth I had into a new shower curtain :) ( not the best picture but you get the idea )

2. We are going to a wedding tomorrow. I made the wedding gift using most of the items I already had. I did buy some glitter and ribbon. I will post pics after the wedding :)

3. I bought 2 Christmas presents on Amazon and used $15 in Amazon gift codes I had earned from my Reciept Hog app and Swagbucks. Spent $8 and some change out of pocket. Not to bad for getting 2 gifts :)

4. I got my hair cut and had a full punch card so I got $5 off :)

5. We ate all our leftovers :)

Inexpensive Meal-Beef Orzo Skillet

The other night we had this Beef Orzo Skillet for dinner. The cost of this meal was about $4.57.

 

Here is the breakdown:

 

Ground beef: $1.99 lb ( bought on sale at Kroger)

1 cup Orzo Pasta - $ .64

1 can diced Tomatoes - $.59

About 2 cups chopped Spinach - $.85

Minced Garlic and Italian Seasoning - around $.50

Chicken Broth - Free saved from cooking chicken in the crock pot from a different meal

 

Yum yum!  Not only was this an inexpensive meal but it tasted great too!

 

 

 

 

The Grocery Budget

For the last several months I have tried to cut our $400 a month grocery budget.

Ideally I would love to shave $100 off of it a month. 

 For the most part we are now feeding only 3 people on a regularly.  

Occasionally there are 4 of us but not to often.

I am hoping to start posting about some of the cheaper meals we have been eating.  We will see :)  

Over July 4th I made a pasta salad which had about 10 serving to it.  We ate 5 serving on July 4.  I mentioned in my last post about finding pasta on sale at Kroger for 50 cents a box if you buy 6.  I bought 12 and might go back for more :)

Anyway, last night we ate the leftover pasta salad which we had approximately 5 servings of.  We added 1 pound of grilled chicken breast to it.  

Here it is:

Here is the cost break down of the original pasta salad 

Pasta : 75 cents ( I used a box in half)

Carrot : .07 cents ( I used 1 which I shredded)

Green Pepper: 56 cents ( I used 1 diced)

Black Olives: 50 cents ( I used half a can which come whole and I sliced)

Caesar Dressing 85 cents ( I used half a bottle)  = $2.73 or about 27 cents per serving.

5 servings of leftover pasta salad - $1.35 + chicken breast I bought for $1.35/ a LB = $2.70 for dinner :)

*Note: For the pasta salad I used things I had on hand and other then the pasta which I bought at Kroger every thing else was purchased at Aldi

Chicken Breast - I posted about this deal here and I got it at GFS.

5 Things I Did That Were Frugal This Week

1. My hubby found 2 pairs of nice dress shoes, which he needs for work, both on clearence and spent less then $52 on both. Plus we walked from our house to the shoe store also saving on gas :)

2. I earned a $5 Amazon gift code with my Reciept Hog app :)

3. I had $50 left I my 2 week grocery budget even though I bought extra stuff for camping 

4. We turned off our air conditioning for the last 2 days since we are having mild weather.

5. I stocked up on pasta and hamburger yesterday at Kroger since they had good sales. The pasta was 50 cents a box when you buy 6. I bought 12. The hamburger was $1.99 a pound. I bought 10 lbs and may go back for more

 

Happy 4th of July! I hope to make more of an effort to blog regularly starting on Monday!