Boost Your Budget Pantry Challenge – Week Four
Boost Your Budget Pantry Challenge series and I feel I have learned a lot from the other bloggers participating and from trying to save money for my own family!! We're nearing the end of the
I am joining Shopper Strategy, Pary Moppins, The Frugalista Chick, Matter of Cents, Coupon Pals, Thrifty Divas, Frugal Mom of Two, How About Free, TheItMom.com, All The World Is Art, Sweeping The USA, Mommies Point of View, Mama’s Money Tree, Crunchy Frugalista, Fab Find Foodie, Making Time For Mommy, Adventures in Coupons, Full Price? NEVER!, The Frugal Navy Wife, Generations of Savings and A Savings WOW! and we’d love it if you’d join us as well.
Here's the plan:
During January we plan to challenge ourselves to eat from our pantries – to use up all that excess food sitting in the back of the cupboards, hiding in the refrigerator door, in the stockpile and from out of the freezer – and limit our shopping to as little as possible. This is not a “no spend” month, this is a “make do with what you have on hand and spend as little as possible” month.
Everybody’s personal goals will be different and we can each set our own rules – the point is merely to challenge ourselves and start off the new year with a boost to our budgets! We’re also giving away a $25 Coupon Clutch gift certificate each week to one participant who either leaves a link to a challenge post or a comment about their challenge goals. Won’t you join us?
Last week's winner of the Coupon Clutch gift certificate was Stacy from Adventures in Coupons!!
I have quite a different goal than most of my other cohosts as I had started January with no food in my pantry or fridge and have set a goal of only spending $400 (rather than $500) on groceries and attempting to build a stockpile this month and ongoing.
We didn't have to buy groceries this week because we ate from our fridge and freezer!! We did buy pull-ups and dog food because our children go through this so fast…haha…but I feel like this was our most successful week this month!!
We still ate out at Applebees on Thursday after our weigh-in ($30) and again on Friday at Ryan's ($22) and that is becoming a sort of tradition for us, but with the grocery budgeting going the way it is, it seems to be worth it. I've been trying to get Hubby to go to a different restaurant so we can use some of the Restaurant Coupons, but he's not a fan just yet. He thinks it will be difficult to find something that we can eat on our eating plan…but you don't know if you don't try!!
I'm a little afraid that we have to take our boy to Chuck E. Cheese this week because HE FINALLY POOPED IN THE POTTY (!!!!) but I can always find good CEC coupons at Shopper Strategy (because Denise is so cool )
Of course, we ate dinner at my dad's on Sunday as usual. We came home with a chicken breast (lunch for one of us) and some salad…oh, and a PopTart for the boy.
We will likely have to grocery shop a little this week. We have a little more meat in the fridge/freezer, the boy will need Apple Juice, the dogs will need MORE dog food, and we need laundry soap (I called it last week ).
I'm counting this as a good week!!
How are you doing on your pantry challenge goals this week? Remember to leave a link to your post or comment below about your progress in the pantry challenge and you’ll be entered to win a $25 Coupon Clutch gift certificate. One participant who either leaves a link to a challenge post or a comment about their challenge progress will win each week!
(Bloggers: if you wish to join us, we'll have a linky each week where you can link to your challenge posts. The linky will appear on the blogs of all of the co-hosts so your post will get quite a bit of exposure!)
I think a pantry challenge sounds like fun, though I’m so bad with keeping up with things.
Barb recently posted..Giveaway: Family 4-PK to Sesame Street Live (Corpus Christi TX)
It’s been interesting to say the least. Of course, I had nothing in my pantry when I started so it’s been more of a budgeting thing for me. HUGS TO YOU!!!
We just recently moved so our pantry and freezer are bare right now which doesn’t help the budget at all. Looking forward to reading about money saving tips on food shopping!
Melanie
Melanie recently posted..Little Angels by Roma Downey
Sometimes I think it would be easier to start with nothing and build it all up with all the money-saving tips!!
man let me tell you its hard to eat what you have and not want to go shopping for more!
Katie Smih recently posted..YesterYear Soap review and giveaway 2/8
I’m definitely more a fan of eating out…but my husband is a chef so he likes to cook at home.
This is a first I heard about the pantry challenge. What a neat idea. However, I am bad and only shop week to week and do not really have a stock up. This gave me something to think about. Thanks.
I hear ya!! Sometimes we shop day to day..that makes it hard to save money.
We’re moving in 3 months, so we’ve definitely begun to eat up everything from our pantry – it’s been saving us a ton of money!
Jenn/Organic Mama recently posted..Win a $100 prize pack from @SacredRoseTeas & @0rganicmama! #NewMeEvent #organic
I should do this. We’d be able to shop just for staples (meat, bread, milk) for a month!
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