Saving, stocking and couponing!

I will finish on our Christmas posts later. I wanted to share some of my new obsessions.

In late October, after looking at our budget, I started couponing again. This time I have taken it to a whole new meaning. I've made a game out of it and have a blast looking and getting good deals!
When Addie was born I KNEW I didn't want to go back to work so I played with our budget and started figuring out ways to save money. I have always cooked dinner, I really enjoy it. I used to make a huge spread every night. BUt when Addie was born I started making 1 meat, such as Country Fried steak, and the first night we will have mashed potatoes, then the second night we eat the left over meat with say green beans. Sometimes the meat will last us even 3 nights and we just add another veggie. Another thing is once a week we eat a "veggie meal". I had read that it is healthy for you to eat all veggies for one night a week and it also says you money, win win!
Graham used to go out to eat every day for lunch as did I when I worked, but now he takes his lunch and that has saved us $200 a month alone. Not to mention we both lost some weight ;) I make his lunch every night, usually a sandwhich, chips, pack of crackers, some fruit, and a little debbie. Sometimes he takes soup with him but he usually likes sandwhiches. Since most of these things have long expiration dates I stock up when they are on sale. Right now I have 14 boxes of little debbies, 10 boxes of the package crackers, and probably a month worth of chips! It was a challenge to find a place to store this stuff but I have 4 huge cabinets in my laundry room (which is right off of the kitchen) that works great! I stock up on alot of stuff when it is on sale. Box juices for Addie, gummy snacks, cookies, cake and cookie and brownie mixes (I have 15 or so right now), Sugar, flour, etc.
I used to shop only at Walmart, because let's face it it's easy to get everything you need there. But after looking at receipts I realized that I was buying atleast $20 a trip of nonsense (that's %$520 a year of nonsense!!). I took a normal list to food lion and shopped........then I took the same list to BILO. I saved pretty well at FL but saved over $80 MORE at BILO! So until we get a Kroger, or Publix close to me BILO is my store. Every Sunday I get my paper and look through the ads, I mark the inserts by date and file away in my folder. Then I start looking at my fav websites (time2save.blogspot.com, southernsavers.com and mycitymommy.com).
NOTE: I used to clip all the coupons and file in categories like, food, addie stuff, bathroom etc. But have found that filing the whole insert by date and then cutting before I go, is alot easier. And it keeps me from buying things we DONT use just because it's on sale and I have a coupon. Hey spending 50 cents can add up over a year.)
When I go to the grocery store I have an idea of what I want as far as meats, but then I do ALOT of B1G1 deals. When you do these deals plus manufacturing coupons PLUS store coupons, PLUS Bonus card........you get GREAT deals!! Sunday I went to the grocery store and got groceries for 3 to 3 1/2 weeks all for $150!!!!!! When they ran my bonus card it took off alittle over $100 then I had $50 in coupons. I was THRILLED!!!
Another thing I did when I started was CVSing. I stocked up on bathroom stuff for probably 9months or so. That's another post though, CVS is the easiest game of all! ECB are you friend and I get sick to think of all the ECB i have just thrown away in the years :(
So this year I am trying to get my groceries down to $200 a month(and thats a 4 week month). I truely think this is doable, it will just take some work! Being the financial lady that I am, I am also going to pay more attention to our investments (and Addie's too!). There were so many times we should have sold stocks last year that I didn't catch because I just didnt look. I have it set up to alert me when things fall to certain levels. Afterall, we have to grow Addie's funds so she will have a nice little nest egg when she moves out ;) 2009 we spent getting rid of debt and this year we are starting off by not buying things until we can pay for them! No way around it! If we are even just alittle short we will HAVE TO WAIT! If there is one thing Graham and I agree completely on it's money. We have hardly ever had fights about it. I joke and say that he is physco and won't let me spend anything but I am the same way to him. We have NO excuse to be in big time debt, we are only 26! I'm glad we got through the tightness of last year to pay off college credit cards, and another small loan.
NOTE: I don't count a house payment and a car payment because I figure we will ALWAYS have that!
Maybe this year we can live alittle more. Maybe go out to eat more than once a month ;)
If you have any tips on how to save pass them on!!