Friday was a BIG errands day and between me and my husband, we got a lot accomplished.
I hit up both Walgreens and CVS, which fortunately are right across the street from each other. At Wags, I had a $6 register reward in my pocket, and used that, plus $13.83 in cash (including tax), to walk away with:
- 4 12-packs of Cottonelle
- 8 boxes of granola bars
- 1 bottle of Finesse shampoo
- the $6.99 homeopathic cold medicine
- and a handful of pencils (they have these on a clearance shelf at $.05/piece – making them a perfect “filler” when I need one.) Oh, and I’ve still got $3 in Register Rewards for the next time!
Retail value: $63 + tax!
Next stop was CVS, where I got two Reach toothbrushes and 2 bottles of Sauve children’s shampoo – our go-to-brand for the kids. My out of pocket was $1.53 including tax + I paid with a $4 ECBs – and earned another $4 ECB. Retail value: $8.
I also went to Walmart and got a bunch of stuff for our Sukkot meals and DS’ birthday party. I still need to get more fresh produce (I like to do that closer to yomtov), but otherwise we should be set… famous last words. My total was $80.59, including tax.
BTW, I promise that I don’t routinely buy Kool-Aid and popsicles! DS turns 6 TODAY, so those are for his bday party at school.
I only used two coupons, but I relied on my price book to get the best non-sale price on our Sukkot essentials.
Plus, I used price matching to save us another $15 – and spare me from having to run around to four more stores. The peppers, for example, were $.50 each, the bag lettuce was $1.50 and I had a $.75 off coupon making it just $.75, and the apples were $1.49 for a 3-lb bag (matched to Aldi). Once again, price matching at Walmart was very simple – I definitely recommend it!
One of my favorite finds were these little spice pouches, for just $.56 each! I needed whole cloves, allspice and star anise for my crockpot apple cider. The traditional brands were $4 and up – but just across the aisle, I spied these guys. HUGE savings!
Last but not least, my hubby did the Costco run, which was the costliest of all our stops (isn’t that always the case?!). We needed a ton of chicken breasts and ground beef, plus both of our kinds of cheese (Mexican blend and mozzarella). I don’t have a picture, but his total was $129.13, including tax (ouch). Fortunately, he paid with that $72.27 rebate check I mentioned earlier, so our out of pocket total was just $56.86.
Friday Total: $152.81
Retail Value: Approximately $298.00 ~ Savings = 49.5%
Monthly total to date: $206.14 / $500
How’s your chag shopping going this month? Are you on target to stay within your budget? Or do you need to tighten things up a bit and make some mid-month course corrections?
Wow! I can’t believe you got those spice packets for so cheap! Were those at Wal-Mart? I need a lot of spices for my Sukkot dinner and I hate going broke on spices.
Hello, I read your blog few times in the week! And I find your savings amazing! really , it’s great. I live in Nigeria, and here almost everything is imported from US or UK or other countries. The good in this is that I could find tonzzz of stuff with the hechsher. But it’s at least two to three times the price of NY. Let’s say a ceral box would be 6 to 8 dollars.
And there is no sales and coupoun
I still appreciate reading your blog , and I sometime order stuff (Gap, Snapfish…)that I ship to my family in NY and I will be picking it up when I go there. 😉 Thanks for your tips!!!
Mara, Badia spices are almost always cheaper. at Publix here in FL they’re housed with the mexican foods, which makes it annoying to compare prices, but they almost always win. And usually by a lot! we use Badia chili powder, garlic powder, oregano all the time
Mid-month correction: spaghetti and meat sauce will be the protein for one of our Sukkot meals… because after Rosh Hashanah, we just need Sukkot to be as frugal a chag as possible. And who doesn’t like spaghetti and meat sauce in the sukkah, really?!?!?!?
Badia spices are the best. Lots of good values to be found in ethnic grocery stores and/or the Latino food aisles of regular grocery stores.
Caroline: We also went overboard with RH and need a super-frugal sukkos. So we will probably do something similar (maybe a shepherd’s pie with ground meat) and lots of vegetarian meals!
We’re also potlucking a lot, which helps, and Friday lunch is a pareve salad-oriented meal. Another thing that helps: I like to distinguish Shabbat and Yom Tov from the rest of the week/year by having many side dishes, so I feel that having a wide variety of frugal stuff replaces the need for 2-3 fancypants (expensivepants) dishes.