I've been wondering what I could do with $100 these days, and I got to find out because we didn't spend our $50.00 grocery money from last week on our trip.

I made trips to three different stores when we got home. I had two crabby children and 100 weather and 1 seriously crabby checker against me, but we still did pretty good. Here's what we got --

Price Chopper -

1 Canada Dry 2 liter
8 Yoplait yogurts
3 Digiornos pizzas
5 boxes of GM cereal (Unfortunately, one rang up full price and messed up my total!)
5 boxes of Keebler cookies
1 box of Hefty gallon ziplocks
3 cans of Libby's corn

I would not normally have bought 5 boxes of cookies, but it came with a $10.00 mail in rebate. So, I basically got paid to buy them. I will have to hide them so we don't eat them all at once!

Pre-tax total was $30.20. Total savings was $32.86 not counting the mail in rebate.

Hen House

1 big bottle of Lysol multi-purpose cleaner refill
1 6 pack of ramen noodles
2 Betty Crocker Warm Delights
2 chocolate Chex Mix
2 Orville Redenbacher Natural popcorn boxes
5 boxes of Kellogg's cereal
1/2 gallon of chocolate milk
1 gallon of 2% milk
2 Tony's pizzas
1 box of Eggo's
1 Lean Pocket quesadilla
1 Marie Callendar Tortellini
18 oz of blueberries

Pre-tax total$24.35. Total savings $43.09. Total savings of 64%. A good trip, I thought! I also got a $10.00 mail in rebate for buying 5 boxes of Kellogg's. I've GOT to remember to send these in! I'm BAD about mail in rebates!

Hy-Vee

1 box of Reese's pieces
1 16 oz of 4% cottage cheese
4 bags of 6 store brand bagels
1 Laughing Cow cheese wheel
2 boxes of Edward's dessert singles
2 Kemp's yogurt parfaits (These look so yummy!)
1 12 oz honey bear
1 huge bottle of Bertolli olive oil (This cost $10.98 and was FREE!)
1 bag of Doritos
2 tubes of Gerber puffs
1 bottle of Hunt's ketchup
1 bottle of Pam for baking
2 Smuckers all natural blueberry jam
1 Hormel meatloaf dinner
1 bag of Tyson Anytizers
4 bags of store brand shredded cheese
5.30 lbs of bananas
1 pineapple
4 lbs of strawberries
1 cantaloupe
2 mangoes
1 small pack of raspberries
4.20 lbs of white peaches

LOVED the produce sale. I'm sliced and froze about 3 lbs of bananas. Once the peaches ripen, I will make peach sauce, and I may try slicing and freezing some of those as well. We'll also be eating tons of smoothies and fresh fruit salad.

This is the store that taxes crazy and that I never know exactly how much I saved. My pre-tax total was $60.00 even.

We are STUFFED to the gills on food. Fridge, freezer and pantry are all overflowing. We are very blessed. I probably could have banked our $50.00 from last week, but with my class coming up, I figured it best to try to get ahead a little. I may miss a week or two, and with me being gone from 6:30 AM - 8:30 PM two nights a week for the next 5 weeks, I've got to make sure the family is going to be able to fend for themselves. Groceries will be the last thing that I need on my mind.

A little summer tip --

As you all know, it is the small efforts that add up. During the summer at home and on vacation, I try really hard to not by drinks on the road. Instead, I divide up a bottle of juice in to sippy cups and freeze. When we're on our way out the door, I grab one for each girl, and we're good to go. This saved us considerably on our trip. I went through two bottles of organic juice that I paid $1.00 and change for each instead of buying 10 or so $2.00 single servings of juice on the road.