My son decided to pack his lunch today. Good job starting us off buddy, saving $2. I gathered up my list and coupons and headed to the commissary.
My pre-challenge weekly average was $175 at the commissary. Today I spent $15.79 on toiletries/cleaners. I spent $3.38 on impulse items. I saw cottage cheese and it actually sounded good. Next I saw a four pack of biscuits that costed 20 cents less than one pack of crescent rolls. I like to use those biscuits for mini pizzas. I spent $77.76 on food. That includes a splurge for the kids. They did so great this week packing lunches/leftovers so I wanted to get them something special. What was it? Nutella. Surprisingly, I have never had it before. I also spent $10.16 on gossip magazines. After adding in their surcharge and taking out my coupons, I spent $106.65 out of pocket. That is a savings of $68.35. The kids packed their lunches for a total of 6 times saving us $12. I think this was their best week yet! My pre-challenge weekly average for restaurants was $80. This week we bought a pizza and I went to lunch with friends. I spent $18.76. That is a savings of $61.24. Our total savings for this week is $141.59. This brings our grand total of savings to $1,845.28 in 105 days!!
Today is also my 100th post. I wanted to do something special for today. My entire family has been so supportive in changing our lifestyle and really trying to stick with the challenge. Never did I ever imagine that we would stick with it past the original 30 days! So what could I do for dinner? What is the best part about going to a party? The finger food! I decided to make tonight's dinner finger friendly. Ha.
We started with an edamame hummus. I figured seeing as the kids love the cookie dough hummus so much that we should try to branch out. Edamame, peanut butter, lemon juice, salt, pepper, and water. I served it with pita bread and carrots. My daughter loved it. My son on the other hand said he didn't really like it. I didn't believe him. He "thinks" he doesn't like edamame and I know he was just thinking about edamame when he ate the hummus. Honestly, you could only taste peanut butter. Don't worry buddy, I have a trick for you....
Next, we got into cucumber sandwiches. I remember my mom making them on the little rye loaves of bread. However, instead of buying that today I wanted to use up the 3/4 loaf of bread I already had at home. How do you make it fun? Cut off the crusts and make cute little pieces of bread (I saved the crusts incase I need to make bread crumbs in the next couple of days). I beat together a pack of cream cheese, 1/2 cup miracle whip, and one packet ranch dressing mix. Spread the mixture onto the little bread, top with cucumbers, and some dill.
Our last item was a fruit salsa. Usually when I make this recipe I use peaches and papayas. However, at the commissary I noticed that papayas were $3.48 and mangoes were only $1.23. Looks like mango it is! 1 cup mango, 1 cup peaches, 1 tablespoon finely chopped red onion, 1 tablespoon honey, 1 tablespoon cilantro, salt, 1 tablespoon lemon juice, and pepper. Also, I usually put in some tomatoes and a splash of tomato sauce but my kids aren't too big on tomatoes so I thought I would leave this as more of a fruity/dessert salsa.
After we ate, I started telling the kids about what I all bought at the commissary. I told them about the nutella and that I also bought a new jar of peanut butter. They wanted to try them. I told them to close their eyes so they could "really taste" it. I gave them each a bite of nutella. They loved it. I said to close your eyes again so I could give them a bite of the new peanut butter. However, instead I gave them a bite of the edamame hummus because I knew my son wouldn't know the difference. At first, my son said he liked it. That little guy opened his eyes and saw a smear left on his hand and noticed it was the hummus so he changed his mind and said he didn't really like it. Not going to work son. Momma is going to win this. So I gave them another bite of nutella. Then told them I would give them a bite of the new peanut butter. Nope. I gave them the edamame hummus again and this time I put it in his mouth so he wouldn't see it. What do you know. He says he likes it. Ha.
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