$300-$48.76=$251.24 Week 1/May

               Friday was supposed to be my first post about my new challenge to spend $300 or less a month for groceries. Seeing as I didn't go shopping Friday as I normally would have that post is now today!
               So here goes! I started by going through my kitchen and finding out what all I did have in there. From there I made a list of meals for the next 7 days. Most of these meals were based on ingredients I already have. Then I put together a list of items I would need to make these meals, and how much they cost at Aldi's where I normally shop. Once I had this list together I double checked it to make sure we would have everything to make 3 meals a day plus snacks. My list showed that I should be able to buy everything for under $50, awesome!

               I was able to get everything on my list plus some extras for $48.76! So my family and I are fed for the next 7 days, until at least May 8th and we still have $251.24 for the rest of the month. My mini-goal inside of my big goal is to spend no more than $50 a week. And ya know what? I'm pretty sure I can do it! Oh, yeah, a big helper is to leave the cards at home! Only take as much cash as you want to spend. Also even when you calculate and use your calculator as things go in the cart, you can get distracted and forget to enter something or the price isn't clearly marked. So if you get through the check out and your total goes over, think back to how much things were and take out something you can do without. For example I was standing in line thinking, "Okay, so if I have to the tuna was 52 cents a can, the mac and cheese was 35 cents a box..." Luckily I was nicely under budget this time and didn't have to take anything back!