Goals

Anyone who knows us knows how much we love Dave Ramsey.  We love being in control of our money and we love being debt free.  When we lived in Korea we read and implemented the Total Money Makeover into our finances and ever since then I have considered us a pretty frugal family.  Well, it has come to my attention that, although we don't go out a lot, we don't buy extravagant things, and we are debt free, we are far from "frugal".  The realization came shortly after Clint came home from deployment.  Our grocery bill doubled!  I mean doubled!  We are spending close to $800 a month on groceries for a family of 4.  We eat pretty healthy and don't eat out very often, so I can see where some of that money is being spent.  But I read this blog post and I decided that there is a lot more we could be doing to save on our groceries.

A lot of my friends say they spend around $400 a month on groceries for the same family size as mine, but after reading the Blissful and Domestic blog, I've decided that my friends have no clue how much they are spending (save every single little receipt and add it all up friends, you're spending more!).  If this woman is homemaking everything, shops only once a month, and buys nothing in a box except crackers, and still spends $400 a month, there's no way that anyone who buys bread, cereal, granola bars, snacks, chips, etc, is spending that same amount.

So, just like the Total Money Makeover, I am doing to implement a plan in baby steps.  I'm going to work on one baby step each month until I've completed all of them and have cut our grocery bill back down to $400 a month.

First of all, here are the things Blissful and Domestic suggests:
1.  Bake all bread, rolls, buns, muffins, tortillas, granola bars, etc.
2.  Prepare a menu plan for an entire month.  Write it down, inventory your pantry, fridge, and freezer.  Then make your shopping list.
3.  Shop alone!  No kids allowed!
4.  Find store ads, coupons, etc.  Only clip what you need.  Don't clip a coupon cause it's a good deal if you don't really need the items.
5.  Don't buy and prepackaged snacks.  Crackers only!  No fruit snacks, granola bars, chips, etc.  Your kids can eat fruits and veggies for snacks.  This way they'll be hungry at meal times!
6.  Buy a month's worth of fruit and veggies and freeze the stuff that will go bad before you can eat it.  (She has a great blog post about what can and can't be frozen and what to eat first).
7. Freeze butter, milk, yogurt, cream and shredded cheese, lunch meat, bread, muffins, etc.
8.  Keep a list on the fridge.  When something runs out, write it down so it's already on your shopping list for the next month.

I am already menu planning and shopping for 2 weeks at a time.  I am also already freezing milk, cheese and bread.  I will just add to my list of freezer items next month.  So my first goal is to bake EVERYTHING.  I know how to make bread, but it seems like we go through it so fast it's hard to keep up.

NOVEMBER GOAL(s)
Bake 10 loaves of bread and freeze them!
Bake lots of rolls and freeze.
Learn to make tortillas, muffins, and granola.
Freeze butter, yogurt, lunch meat, and anything else you can think of on top of milk, breads, and cheese.
Freeze meal-sized portions of things like tortillas.

JANUARY GOAL(s) (Skipping December since we will be out of town for half the month).
No prepackaged snacks.
Learn to make snacks for kids at home (granola bars, fruit roll ups, etc).
Cut up fruit and veggies for snacks and serve yogurt/crackers.
Find healthy alternatives for Clint's and Morgan's lunches.

FEBRUARY
Meal plan for entire month and only go shopping once.
Chop and freeze fruits and veggies!
SHOP ALONE :)

Some of these things will be done sooner/later than I plan (I might only get through baking bread in November).  But I have a list of what I want to accomplish and I'm confident that I can do it.  One day of work will be worth a month of preparedness right?

I also want to start building my food storage.  But that's another mountain I'll have to climb another day LOL.