I wanted to give an update after I received advice from so many of you a few months ago. Previous post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Frugal/comments/aeuuxr/help_me_rfrugal_500_on_food_were_only_10_days/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Quick recap: My husband and I were eating out every day of the week, some days multiple times, and really just throwing away our money. We often spent a grand a month on food for just the two of us. When I posted last, someone helpfully told me there was no helping us since our habits were so bad. We finished January at $1,100 for groceries and take out.
After reading everyone's advice, we put some changes into action immediately. The most important piece was to get in the habit learning that the grocery store is where your food comes from. So for the first two weeks I'd often find myself strolling through the freezer section to find something to pop in the microwave that night. That got old fast.
I started giving the grocery list and meal planning more attention. We started buying and prepping two meals a week, lunch and dinner, usually on Sunday. We filled in the gaps with our guilty freezer foods (digourno pizza convert here). Rather than buy desserts to satisfy my sweet tooth, I started baking. I learned how to "shop" my pantry to save money. I've started helping my husband out in the kitchen, even if its just the side dishes. I still can't remember the coupons for the life of me.
A few people said my goals were too vague-- "What does 'be better' mean?" So I got specific and made some ground rules. I knew restaurants and take out were our poisons, so I wanted to carve it out of our daily life, but not never eat it again. So my rule was this: We can order/go out only the last week of the month, and only if we were on target with our grocery budget that month.
I allowed exceptions too: special and social occasions don't count. We still celebrated our 1st wedding anniversary in January at a nice restaurant. When we visited my sister's for my mom's birthday, we brought the subs. When I had a friend over and forgot to plan for a dinner guest, we ordered. I don't consider the social events to be massive budget busters because we tend to be antisocial hermits for the most part.
I set a $500 monthly grocery budget (which includes toiletries), and generously penciled in another $100 for outside food. Still a lot, but I didn't want to fail straight away. Baby steps.
1st month we spent $567 on food. Still a lot, and I'm sure some of you are rolling your eyes, but it was almost half of the month before and I was feeling proud.
2nd month was $606, and I was disappointed we missed the mark. For those first 2 months I noticed that I wasn't paying much attention to the budget for the first two weeks of the month and then it was a challenge for the final two to stay under budget. Instead of our second meal, we had peanut butter sandwiches for lunch for the last two weeks of that month, but still didn't quite make it.
I had to redeem myself. For the 3rd month I made a new goal: shave $75 from the grocery budget. For the first two weeks we went vegetarian to save money. We made sofritas crunchwrap supremes, and black bean burgers, and chinese tofu and broccoli. When we went out for that month, IHOP for dinner had never felt so decadent. We finished the month at $477 total, or $123 off our previous budget.
I feel pretty comfortable saying we broke our bad habit. And hopefully we can continue to make more progress bringing this bill down as we go too. Baby steps. It's been a fun challenge, and I've enjoyed it so much I've even established a few other budgets to help us become a little more frugal.
Thank you again, r/frugal, for all your tips and encouragement!
May 02, 2019 at 07:12AM
