Monday, April 18, 2011

Meal Planning


Have you already cut coupons from yesterday's paper? Do you have a meal plan? If not, put the scissors down and walk away.

It's super important that you have a meal plan for the time period you will be shopping for. I used to plan just for a couple days, or at most a week. Today, that's different. I plan for at least two weeks, keeping in mind that store sales are usually once every quarter. (MEANING, if there are things today that I KNOW I will need in the next few months, I'm going to stock up. This is called stock piling. AND no.... I'm not talking about purchasing 120 tubes of tooth paste, because like I've said before, that's ridiculous.)

What I am talking about, though, is picking up canned fruits or vegetables when they are on sale. The past few weeks there have been sales on Bird's Eye veggie steamers. Some stores have had them 10 for $10. Using the coupons that you are able to print off, you can get them as low as $.50 a piece. Not bad, right? Keep in mind that most stores that offer B1G1 free or Buy 10 for $10 you are NOT obligated to purchase 10 or get two. The B1G1 will be rung up as half price. It varies from store to store. I'm also talking about cereal, lunch meat, bread, milk, yogurt, cheese. ANYTHING that you can possibly think of that you will need as it is on sale AND you have a coupon for it. (Do you know that you can freeze milk, yogurt, and cheese? That is something I JUST found out.)

Right now there is a Catalina coupon for Hamburger Helper. You save $.75 on three. A lot of stores have sales on these right now. I can't remember what my actual cost was for them at Target last week, but with coupons, I know I saved quite a bit.

The important thing is to plan your meals, then shop your flyers. I plan to help out as much as I can with getting you access to deals in the paper (that is why I asked who my audience was from before). Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner.

So do you have your meals planned yet? Get busy. We will work out the brands that you will you by Wednesday.

be blessed

t

Here is a little teaser of what I did purchase at Walgreens yesterday. I actually MADE money by purchasing these Nestle Cafe single coffees. Tomorrow I will tell you how.





As always, please leave a comment of some sort so I know who my audience is. If you would like to see certain deals for certain stores, I won't know unless you tell me. ALSO, don't forget about the drawing if I reach 100 followers. No one is paying me for this. I just want to know my writing/couponing experience is also helping someone else.

2 comments:

Jessica said...

Love that you are doing this blog! =) I, too, plan meals out for 2 weeks in advance. I sit with the kids and their school lunch menus, and we decide what sounds yummy for the next few weeks for dinner. Then I make sure that we don't mirror for dinner what they had for lunch, so there is always a little variety for them. Also, I plan for the sales on the household items such as bathroom and kitchen necessities (bags, filters, paper needs, dog food etc.) I only allow myself to buy WHATS ON MY LIST and NOTHING else. I have saved over $100.00 every two weeks by doing this! Fantastic!

Also, I'm sure you already know... but when you freeze your milk , make sure to pour about a cup or so out of the container before you freeze it. The containers expand when frozen, and once thawed... they leak everywhere! =) Lesson learned the hard way. =(

Again... love following this part of your blog. You. Are. Wonderful!

Blessed Be!

J

t said...

Thanks for the tidbit!! I did not know that. AND unfortunately the devastating storm that came through on Saturday did something funky to the power, and we lost our second fridge/freezer, so I will NOT be freezing anything extra until we have another one to use.

I'm super glad you like what I'm doing. It's awesome to see you save money! Where do you do your primary shopping?

be blessed!

XOXO

t