March - $ 56.86 in un budgeted expenditures.
3/3/13 - Last year, our church burned down, leaving only a shell of bricks, the inside was gutted. We are re-building, and are trying to salvage 10,000 bricks from the old building in order to use on the face of the new one. Our way of maintaining part of the old building. Towards that end, on Saturdays, for a couple of hours, some of us meet up and "Brick Bash" i.e., remove the mortar off the old bricks. With safety glasses, chisels with hammers, files, and hard bristle brushes, we have been chiseling, grinding, and sweeping away the old mortar so that we can re-use our old bricks. I went and bought a large metal file, safety glasses and some chisels in order to entice a few more ladies to join us on Saturdays. At Lowes, I spent 48.75.
3/26/13 - today was a kind of crazy day. Since I was out of snacks in the car (baggies of almonds, an apple or two, and occasionally some jerky live in the van) and I had several errands to run after I picked up the girls, I gave in to ease and convenience and fed my kids crappy food from a drive through. Of course, they responded by practically throwing me a ticker tape parade, but I was kicking myself for allowing the car rations to run so low. Long story short, I spent $8.11 for a happy meal, a grilled chicken snack wrap, a 99 cent cheeseburger and a 1 dollar sweet tea. $8.11 could have made a perfectly acceptable and nutritionally dense meal for the entire family easily. ugh...
Grocery totals for March and April: My goal is to maintain our Paleo adjacent eating, and to keep it under the SNAP guidelines each month. For our family of 4, that amount is $668.00 per month.
March grocery totals = $706.02 (overage of $38.02 - yikes!!- to be taken from $265.51 rollover, to leave the rollover amount at $227.49).
April - $23.94 in un-budgeted expenses
4/29/2013 - I wound up picking up my two and an additional child on my way to grocery shop. Typically, when I pick the girls up, I have a treat prepared in the form of a hand full of almonds, some beef jerky, and other snacks. While I was waiting for Thing1 to get out of school, a friend called and asked if I could pick up her daughter at the same time as I pick up Thing2. Not having enough snacks for all three kids, and knowing that I was going to drag them all to the grocers, I drove straight through a drive through to the tune of $13.94 on our way to Aldi. <sigh> I know better. Grrr....
4/1-30/2013 - I drove through McDonald's nearly every day for a $1.00 sweet tea as I was running around. I will guestimate $20.00 in tea. $20.00 in a month! When I started digging all of the receipts out of the front pocket of my purse, I was kind of caught off guard by how very often I drove through for a drink and did not even think about it. $1.00 a day adds up. Plus, sweet tea? It is one of the last hold overs from the way that I used to eat, and I need to break the habit.
April grocery total = $759.56 (overage of 91.56 - to be taken from $227.49 rollover, to leave to rollover amount at $135.93)
I know that I need to sit down and do some inventory of my cupboards, refrigerator, and freezers. It is not a coincidence that I have not sat down to do a meal plan since the middle of March, and that my grocery bill is edging up and up. I need to take my inventory, make some meal plans based only on the proteins and frozen veggies that I have on hand, and see if I can spend this month only as a supplemental month (i.e... only buy a few things a week to supplement what I already have on hand)
So, I need to avoid the lure of the drive-thru sweet tea, and I need to get back in the habit of taking inventory and making a meal plan every week. - TO DO list updated! :-)
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