Budget Question

A friend recently emailed me a question in regards to this post and my $50 budget.



Her question is..."When you say that you spend around $50 a week on groceries, does this also include tolietries, paper products, female products, and things of that nature?"



The answer to the question is most of the time, but there is a lot more to it than that and I'd like to explain a little bit further.



First let me start by saying that it had been my hope to be able to post my weekly shopping trips including pictures of what was purchased and how much was spent and saved. Unfortunately, it didn't work out. I simply don't have the time to keep up with that. I apologize for that. I was also hoping to talk more about my bulk shopping as well, but I never got to that either.



I use many different methods for keeping my weekly grocery budget low. In addition to matching coupons and sales, I also buy a lot in bulk and make almost everything from scratch.

I buy wheat berries, white flour, whole wheat pastry flour, oats, and sometimes rice in bulk. I am in a coop called Wheat Montana. I almost never buy bread or other baked goods such as cookies. Instead I'll buy 50 lbs of white flour at about $16 and make everything from scratch or wheat berries and grind them to make bread. I make bread about 3 times per week to feed these hungry boys. They also love to snack on sweet breads, muffins, scones, cookies, etc. and I make them all.



I buy spices and sometimes coffee in bulk from another coop called Frontier. I go in with some other families and get great quality items at a fraction of the cost. This is one of the brands of spices they sell at Whole Foods.



I also rejoined a produce coop. I was in one for about 4 years and pulled out about six months ago. The problem was we weren't eating enough produce because buying it in the grocery store was much too expensive, especially for our green drinks. So we decided to get back involved. Every 10 days the coop will purchase produce in bulk and split it among many families, making the cost low. I am very happy to be back in the coop, but I am going to have to increase my weekly budget. I'll be getting to that in another post shortly.



So, to get back to the original question, most of the time those personal items are included. But, a lot of these bulk purchases are not. My husband has asked me to change that in the new year and include them. When I am spending $50 a week on groceries, I am not normally buying many of the items I buy in bulk, thus making that weekly budget low.



I hope that answers your question. I'll try to post some bulk purchases in the near future. If you have an interest in joining me in any of these coops, let me know and I'll get you the information.



From our home to yours,
Jennifer