The kids both packed lunch again today. My daughter scoured the cupboards and came up with a can of vegetable soup. That thing has been hanging out for awhile. I was glad to see her eat it up. My son brought some of his leftover spaghetti-o's. I had the rest of the leftover beef tips and gravy over some rice.
The kids only had a half day of school due to parent teacher conferences. Seeing as there was a break in the snow storm this afternoon, I decided to try my hand at grocery shopping while taking along both kiddos.
My pre-challenge weekly average was $175 at the commissary. Today I spent only $12.03 on toiletries and cleaners. I spent $69.73 on food. I had a great surprise when I got to the deli. They had samples of a new flavor of ham: rosemary ham. They also had mesquite turkey. Mmmmm. The kids both liked the ham so I looked up at the sale board to see if possibly it was on sale. Man did I luck out. The lady told me that she had ordered three packs of the rosemary ham. However, they had shipped her three cases! Their mistake meant that they had ham to get rid of. Instead of selling it for almost $9 per pound, it was on sale for $1.99 per pound! Score! I spent $2.25 on impulse items. Not too bad for having the kids with me. They talked me into getting lunchables for them. However, we did compromise. Instead of them getting the big kits that come with drinks, candy, and sides costing around $2.60-$3.00 each, they got the small packs. My daughter picked chicken nuggets for 75 cents and my son picked a snack pack of crackers, cheese, and ham for $1.00. The other impulse item was something that I had been hearing about lately due to St. Patrick's Day: Irish soda bread. I've never had it and wanted to try it. There just happened to be one loaf of it on the clearance rack for 50 cents. Looks like today is the day for trying it out. I spent $7.26 on gossip magazines. Last week, someone suggested that I buy subscriptions to my favorite magazines versus buying them each week. I looked into it. It would be way cheaper to get the subscriptions. I just can't bring myself to pay that much all at once though. For now, I will keep getting them weekly. Maybe sometime down the road I will switch to subscriptions. After they added their surcharge and took out my coupons, I paid $89.50 out of pocket today. That is a savings of $85.50.
Our pre-challenge weekly restaurant average was $80. We went out to an Irish restaurant and also to our friend's restaurant this week. Yikes. We spent $86.59 which is over by $6.59. Something put my challenge into perspective this week. There was a helicopter crash in Afghanistan and we were worried sick that it had been one of our friends. Kind of made us realize that if we want to go out and enjoy a lunch with our family, then so be it. I don't have to save x amount of money each and every week. We are allowed to splurge. We are allowed to still enjoy our time together. This is just a way for us to change our "usual" eating behavior.
The kids did amazing at packing lunches this past week. They had their best week yet. They saved $18. After adding up our savings and subtracting our restaurant overage, we still managed to save $96.91 this week! I can't believe it after going out twice AND having the kids with me to grocery shop. This brings our grand total to $2,660.75 in 154 days!
Today marked a milestone for me. My blog has been viewed in 17 countries. The latest to view was Mexico which then gave me inspiration for dinner tonight. Remember when I made pulled pork chili and my hubby said that it tasted taco-y? I decided to use that to my advantage. I had half a block of cream cheese. I spread that in the bottom of a pie plate. Then I covered it with some leftover pulled pork chili that I took out of the freezer. I sprinkled on some nutritional yeast (adds some cheddar cheese flavor while adding super nutrition!), then I topped it with some shredded pepper jack and mexican cheese blend. I baked it at 350 until bubbly and then stuck it under the broiler for a few minutes. Next up was tacos. I made some local ground beef taco meat. I had black olives leftover in the fridge. I chopped up some onion and lettuce. We also topped the tacos with sour cream, guacamole, mexican cheese, and taco sauce. Ok, so the next item doesn't really go with the theme. I was anxious to try the Irish soda bread. We warmed it up and put a little butter on it.
The verdict? I LOVED the pulled pork chili taco dip. I think I may use the rest of the chili that I have in the freezer as dip. My hubby said it was good and that we should make it again. I think the real testament to the dip is that after he ate it he still had no clue what it was made out of. Yay for the chili successfully hiding! The soda bread had mixed reviews. I think it would have been better had it been fresher. It was a little dry. It was a strange texture. I couldn't quite figure out if it was a dessert, dinner bread, or what. I don't think I would buy it again. My hubby said sure buy it again. I asked, "really"? He said that it isn't something he would ask for but if I bought it then he would eat it. Ha. Ok, so no more Irish soda bread for us.
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