Weekly Shopping: 12/7/08

 It occurred to me that I occasionally show you pictures of my best savings (which are usually separate trips), but rarely show you what a typical weekly grocery shopping trip looks like for me with my current budget of $57/week ($50 for groceries, $7 for diapers).  Well, here you go!

This trip is a combination of Acme and Giant (and there are a few items missing, but I wasn’t hauling everything back out to retake the picture) and includes a few splurges.  We don’t normally buy French Toast Sticks and no longer buy juice boxes (unless I can get them close to free) and there were a few items that my husband wanted for which I had no coupons.

At Acme (we needed cereal & milk and I stocked up on some snack items for my husband)

4 boxes GM Cereal (about $.80/box after sale & coupon)

5 Fisher Snack Mixes ($.50 each after coupon)

2 Breakfast Breaks (on sale for $1; used a BOGO coupon)

5 Checx Mix (free after coupons)

6 BC Frosting (free after coupon)

6 BC Cookie mixes ($.20 each after coupons)

Milk

Kozy Shack pudding ($1.00 after Avenu savings & coupon)

Total:  $11.29 (including sale prices, a savings of $74.41)

 

At Giant (just the highlights/great savings or this would take forever)

4 Fiber One Pop Tarts (only paid $.29 each for 3 of them)

4 Valley Steamers (free after coupons)

11 Joint Juice (free after coupon)

Muir Glen tomatoes ($.39 after coupons)

Duncan Hines Decadent Carrot Cake ($.09 after $1 coupon and Doubler)

Arnold Wheat Bread:  ($.89 after coupon)

4 packages tuna:  ($.55 each after coupon)

3 cans Mandarin Oranges:  ($.25 each after coupons and Doubler)

Dole Fruit Naturals:  ($.25 each after coupons and Doubler)

Colgate:  (free after coupon)

2 organic steaks:  ($2.15 after $1 Natures Promise coupon)

Total spent:  $42.92 (including sale prices, a savings of $76.67)

Total spent:  $54.91

I will need another gallon of milk and about another $2.50 in bananas so when you add in the $6, I will have gone $3 over budget for the week.  But like I said, I did a few “splurges” this week, so I’m not too concerned about that.

You’ll notice that the shopping trip is light on meat & produce.  For the meat, I hit some good meat sales a few weeks ago and my freezer is well-stocked with chicken.  We also try to get protein from many other sources like legumes, eggs, cheeses and nuts (less costly and less hormones in the food). 

As for produce, I am really the only person in the house who eats any “pure” fruits & veggies.  My children like only like applesauce, mandarin oranges & bananas and will NOT eat vegetables (although I sneak them in plenty of foods).  I have a TON of free Valley Steamers as well as frozen & canned fruits (packed in juice, not syrup) that I got practically free in another “stock up” trip.

So that’s it!  A typical weekly shopping trip for me when there are not any Catalina deals running or “super sales” at any of the stores.  When there are good sales, I have been known to dip in to the following week’s budget (I take my grocery money out 2 weeks at a time) if it means that I can do some serious stocking up on the cheap…and then we’ll eat from the stockpile/pantry the following week, just buying milk, bread & produce without going over the “2-week budget”.