Publix Penny Item

Week 1 Day 4 of the ALL YOU Grocery Challenge

Publix is my favorite grocery store, especially on Wednesday! Every Wednesday, our local Publix has an item that they have on sale for a penny! Usually, the penny item is their brand of an item. Recently, the penny items have included cheese, toilet paper, juice, glass cleaner, and pasta sauce. Each week there is a coupon somewhere in the middle of the Wednesday paper. If you take the coupon to Publix on Wednesday, then you can get the mystery penny item. I usually cheat and find out what it is before I go in... Southern Savers posts it every week. The only catch is that you have to buy $10 in groceries before coupons.

Awesome! Any item you can get for a penny is great. Even if I know I won't use the item, I pick it up and put it in my box to donate.

Today's penny item was apple juice.

Total: $19.54

Saved: $13.85

Spent: $5.69

-Robin

CVS Deals

Week 1 Day 4 of the ALL YOU Grocery Challenge

This week is a great week at CVS, especially if you need diapers. Here is what I bought:

1 box Huggies #4 diapers (82 diapers) $19.99

2 Colgate toothpastes $2.99

1 64 oz. 100% Welch's grape juice $3

Used:

$3 Q for Huggies

2 $1 Q for toothpastes

$2 Q for Welch's

$5 off $25

$11 ECB from past purchases

Paid with a gift card that I had bought for $5 off $25 or $.20 off every dollar spent

Received $15 ECB back (I got an extra $1 for my greenbag tag)

With all discounts and new ECB received considered:

Spent: $2.15

Total for grocery: $.80 for the juice

Total for personal: $1.35

Wow! A great way to start off the grocery challenge!

-Robin

Picking and Freezing Fruit

Week 1 Day 3 ALL YOU Grocery Challenge

One of the things that I love the most about summer is the fresh fruits and vegetables that we get from a local farm. This year, we have already enjoyed picking strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, and tomatoes.

We always pick lots of berries when they are in season and store them in our freezer. They all freeze very well and are good for up to a year. Our girls especially like them for smoothies, pancakes, or to put on cereal. They are also nice to pull out and make a yummy cobbler in the middle of winter! We have found that we eat more fruit when it is readily available to us in the freezer. Fruit is also best when it is picked local and in peak season. Another great benefit is that fruit is much cheaper in season. With 2 toddlers in the house, the amount of savings that we get from picking and storing fresh fruit at the peak of the season is almost immeasurable... not to mention the environmental benefit!

Blueberries and Blackberries $3 per lb

-Robin

*Note- We have an energy star freezer that we keep full at all times. Keeping a freezer full saves on energy costs. We have not noticed an increase in our energy bill since getting a separate freezer.

Eggplant Mozzarella

Week 1 Day 2 ALL YOU Grocery Challenge

We recently bought eggplant at a local farm 3 for $1! I was so excited to make one of my favorite dishes... eggplant mozzarella. Our family loves this dish. It is super easy to make.

Eggplant Mozzarella

1 medium eggplant
1 egg
bread crumbs
flour
vegetable oil
pasta sauce
fresh mozzarella

Peel (optional) and slice eggplant. Dredge in flour. Dip in egg. Roll in bread crumbs. Fry in oil until golden on both sides. Place in casserole dish and put sliced cheese on top. Cover with pasta sauce. Bake on 350 degrees until cheese is melted.

Served with whole wheat pasta ($.34).

Side salad of vidalia onions, tomatoes ($.59/ lb picked), and cucumbers (from our garden)

After purchasing all the items on sale with coupons, buying eggplant for $.33, and making your own very inexpensive pasta sauce... this meal cost approx. $2.50. Plus, we ate the leftovers for lunch the next day. $1.25/ meal

For more great recipes Menu Plan Monday recipes click here

-Robin

Freezing Milk

Week 1 Day 1

I am super excited to start the ALL YOU Grocery Challenge with cheap milk. I felt so lucky a few days ago to snag 9 gallons of milk at our Harris Teeter for the sale price of $2.47 each. There was no advertised limit! $2.47 is about the cheapest that you can get milk these days in my area. I remember, not so long ago, that you could buy it for $1.99 regular price. Since those days are over, I have found that freezing milk is a great way to shave a couple of bucks off the grocery budget.

Milk reg. $3.36
Milk sale $2.47

Savings per milk $.89
Over the 3 weeks that the 9 gallons of milk will last for my family $8.01 savings!

-Robin

All You Grocery Challenge

My family and I are getting ready to embark on a new challenge! We have decided to participate in the ALL YOU Grocery Challenge. The challenge is to spend no more than $25 dollars per person over 12 months of age per week. So, my family will try to keep or grocery budget to less than $100/ week for the next four weeks. This should be relatively easy for us. I started couponing about 10 weeks ago and on the average spend less than $50/ week for all of our grocery, personal, and household needs. I have done this by using my favorite blog Southern Savers to look up coupon matches for the weekly sale flyers. Using this technique, we have saved lots of money and I am excited to share how we save money and make healthy meals. I hope you will join us for the next 4 weeks!

-Robin

Friday Finals

Hi everyone! I have been away from blogging for awhile. My husband and I welcomed our third little girl into the world in January. With a three year old, two year old, and an infant in the house, I have never been busier! It has been lots of fun and I am soaking in all the sweet and wonderful moments.

Over the last six weeks, I have started a new challenge for myself... COUPONING! I never knew that you can save a TON of money couponing... when you do it correctly. I have been following a great blogger and couponer named Jennie. Her blog is Southern Savers. If you don't already follower her blog... I highly recommend that you do! She does many of the grocery store ad coupon match- ups in the south and all of the drugstore ad coupon match- ups! I am so grateful to her and her hard work each week. She has helped me to take my grocery bill down to ONE THIRD of what was!

Southern Savers does a Friday Finals post each week. This week I am so excited to be participating!

The picture above is from Monday's shopping trip to Harris Teeter. I normally don't shop at Harris Teeter, but I had to participate in Super Doubles!

My grand total was $153. I paid $49 and sent in for a $10 rebate from Kraft. I'm super happy to only have paid $39 for my order!! The order included shrimp, chicken, hamburger, milk, bread, fruit, cheese, etc.

I hope this post encourages you to try couponing. Not only does it save money, but it makes shopping more fun!

-Robin