Three Grocery Goals to Save Time and Money

... ever do your year end receipts and discover that all you've done all year is spend money?
and money

and more money?

And what's worse is that you can't exactly figure out WHAT on this green earth you spent it on? 

I hope you don't know that feeling. It's not pleasant. 

But it does motivate me to make a few spending goals.  So here are a few grocery goals for our year:

1) Limit all grocery shopping to $400/month and stay consistant.

(this includes food, liquor, toiletries, cleaning supplies... everything but pet supplies.) I'm thinking I'll have to do the cash system to pull this off. That credit card is just too doggone handy...

2) Limit time spent on couponing. 
       
I love hunting for coupons, and pouring over flyers, and browsing stores for deals. I really do. And I could do it full time. For a couple of weeks before Christmas, I was heading that way. Hours were spend daily on this too-fun hobby. 

But that's not my purpose. I'm a mom. A homeschooling mom! I seriously need to invest my time wisely. So, my goal is to spend three hours weekly. I don't know if I'll get there, but it's the goal. I'll have to work at it. I mean, just today I spent 2 hours. It goes so fast! 

3) Menu Plan from the pantry and freezer
       
Planning meals saves money, but planning from what I already have saves even more. Instead of spending grocery  funds on the weeks menu, I can spend it on the good deals and on stocking the pantry. The change in focus and immediacy I think will save extra money.

I've refined the meal planning process, so it's become much easier. Monthly or weekly planning isn't as important to me as planning from what we have. 





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