I've always considered myself a bargain shopper. I never, well I should say rarely pay full price for things...except when it comes to groceries. I try and try to be a bargain grocery shopper, but I just don't put the time into it, or at least that's what I think my problem is. When Jeremy and I were first married I would get all the ads and have Walmart price-match everything I bought. I guess I had more time on my hands, and we had very little money!
Grocery shopping with kids has made it even harder. I'm in a hurry to get out of there, and I throw things into the cart without thinking about it. Then I can't figure out how my bill got so high! Well, one of our New Year's Resolutions is to be better with our money. I think we say this every year, but this year is crucial. We've gone from two salaries (really two and a half with Jeremy's part-time job) to one salary, and we are living in a house very comparable to what we moved from, but double the mortgage. Ick.
We've gone back to the cash system (Dave Ramsey), which we tried for a while, but didn't do very good. I am determined to be better, and if we don't have the cash, we don't get it. Last night I spent a few hours looking at all my coupons and online ads for our grocery stores. Generally I am a Super Walmart girl all the way. I know people have their opinions about Walmart, but for me, it is a one-stop shop, and generally it
is cheaper than other grocery stores.
However I noticed Schnucks doubles coupons if they are $.40 or less and you can only use up to 15 coupons. Our Shop-n-Save (right across the street from Schnucks) does $10 Thursdays, where if you spend $50 you get $10 off.
So I got up at about 6:15 thanks to Ansley, and once I got her resettled, I got ready and bundled up for the -20 wind chill outside. Jeremy stayed home with the girls while I ventured out. First I went to Schnucks and used my 15 coupons. I saved $15.00 here. Then I moved across the street to Shop-n-Save and saved $16.00 there. For all those mathmatecially challenged, thats $31! I know it's not that impressive, especially when I've heard people say crazy things like "I got $200 of groceries for $12.89." But it was a good start for me.
And for those of you who only check the blog for pictures of the kids, here is a picture of the girls. Notice Ansley's sweater? It cost me $2.98 at Target the other day! I also got Kennedy two pairs of pants that were $.98 each. I love those kinds of bargains! I also found a KB Toy store going out of business and got around $70 of birthday presents for Ansley for $30! Yeah for bargains!
Let me start out this post by saying I hate running. I despise it. I loathe it. I can think of a million things I would rather do than run. So, I have decided to take it up as a hobby. Why would I torture myself with something I hate so much? Was this some sort of crazy New Year resolution? Not really, although I have resolved to get healthier and lose my baby weight (all the way back to Kennedy...it never really came off 3 years ago). I have been using an elliptical in the evenings while I watch my favorite shows, and while I like it and it gets my heart rate going, I feel like I have had much more of a workout on those few times when I have tried giving running a shot. Plus, there aren't a whole lot of goals to set with an elliptical. Sure I can shoot for a certain number of burned calories, or miles in a certain number of minutes, but really, it's pretty boring.
