Ice Cream Overload

It is quite possible that I overdid it on the ice cream. There was a deal running at Hy Vee where if you spent $12 on ice cream, you got a $4 catalina for $4 off your next purchase. I hadn't exactly budgeted for spending $12 on ice cream, but the Haagen Dasz caught me hook line and sinker. Did you see those flavors??? Midnight Cookies & Cream and Bananas Foster. (PS, Dear Haagen Dasz, please bring back Sticky Toffee Pudding!) I am SO not sharing those. Anyway, I immediately used my $4 catalina to pay for some pop to get us (me) through the week.

Here is what we got:

Barilla shell noodles
2 bags of Doritos
2 jars of generic unsweetened applesauce
2 cans of generic black beans ( I should invest in a black bean farm.)
2 boxes of Kraft mac and cheese
1 Old Orchard apple juice
1 V8 Fusion
1 package of Popumz
3 tubs of Edy's ice cream
2 pints of Haagen Dazs
1 Hormel Honey Ham
1 gallon of hormone free whole milk
2 bottles of Purex
1 10 oz brick of generic cheese
1 package of Kraft Singles
1 package of Kraft shredded cheese
1.85 lbs of green grapes

My pre-tax total came in at about $43.00. I'm, not sure how much I saved by purchasing only sale items, but it should be a significant amount. I only used two coupons today -- on the ham and on the V8. I just didn't have much luck matching up coupons this week. (Let's remember that I don't get the paper or have a printer!)

I'm a little worried that I don't have enough fruit to support my fruit eating bottomless pits of children. I have grapes, a few apples, a few strawberries on their last leg and some baby's favorite. I intended on saving a few dollars in case Target had some kind of berries on sale this upcoming week...............but the Haagen Dasz.................Mommy Fail. Really though, if we start to have a crisis, I'll pick something up with our family spending money this week.

I actually have several meals slated for this week. I currently have stuffed shells baking away in the oven. We'll be having a super delicious dinner of stuffed shell and green beans for dinner. And ice cream, of course. I'm also planning on making a crockpot of salsa soup to divide up for lunches this week. Later in the week, I'll throw together some apple juice chicken. Other than that, the family will be happy to have some of our usual quick eating favorites: ham sandwiches, grilled cheese, black bean and cheese quesadillas, cheese and crackers, and mac and cheese.

See this week's other purchase here.

$50 Budget Resumes

Good news! We came out on the other side of what I hoped would be a temporary reduction in our grocery budget! My husband's work schedule is still a little crazy, but for the moment it seems like they are pushing people to work 40 hours in 3 days instead of his (formerly) usual 45+ hours in 4 days. 40 hours in 3 days is fine with us because it afford him a whole extra day with his little people and means that even though we both work full-time we only need help with the girls twice a week. A good thing! So, we'll just keep being thankful for every paycheck that comes home in any amount and keep remember who our Source is.

I'm running a little behind on grocery shopping this week. I made one quick stop at Price Chopper on my way home. I signed up for their new card and got the above items. I can't find my receipt, but my total was just under $10 before tax. There was a great coupon on the bags of Snyder's tortilla chips for $1.50 off produce if you bought two bags at $1.99/ bag. It wasn't on my list, but I couldn't pass it up! I picked up 1.5 lbs of green beans for free! We enjoyed some chips with our family's favorite black bean dip last night for a snack and we'll love having fresh green beans with dinner tomorrow night!

See this week's other purchase here.

Princess Naughtypants

Paula Deen's Banana Pudding

A few weeks ago, one of my friend's made Paula Deen's banana pudding. It was AWESOME -- like really, really awesome. I intended on making the recipe as written, until I decided that I might need to double the batch since I had to feed 14 people. AND, my friend told me that it actually took her three packages of Chessman cookies in the single batch. I stood in front of the Chessman at the grocery store yesterday for a good 3 or 4 minutes -- $3.35 x 6 = $20.10. I couldn't do it. That's HALF of this week's grocery budget. Plus, I had to buy sweetened condensed milk. I knew we had Nilla wafers in our pantry, so Nilla wafers won that battle. It's kind of a bummer, but it's cookies, people. Not life or death.

Here is the recipe from Food Network:

Ingredients

• 2 bags Pepperidge Farm Chessmen cookies
• 6 to 8 bananas, sliced
• 2 cups milk
• 1 (5-ounce) box instant French vanilla pudding
• 1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
• 1 (12-ounce) container frozen whipped topping thawed, or equal amount sweetened whipped cream

Directions

Line the bottom of a 13 by 9 by 2-inch dish with 1 bag of cookies and layer bananas on top.

In a bowl, combine the milk and pudding mix and blend well using a handheld electric mixer. Using another bowl, combine the cream cheese and condensed milk together and mix until smooth. Fold the whipped topping into the cream cheese mixture. Add the cream cheese mixture to the pudding mixture and stir until well blended. Pour the mixture over the cookies and bananas and cover with the remaining cookies. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

***

I'm sure I'll be missing the Chessman cookies a little bit, but the others won't know! Maybe next time they'll get the real deal! And, as a final note, I don't think I really needed to double the batch. I had an INSANE amount of filling. If you're wanting to stretch the dish to feed a few more than 12, I'd probably just use more bananas than you normally would.

For more recipes, see Balancing Beauty and Bedlam, Tempt My Tummy Tuesdays, Tuesdays at the Table, LifeasMom, Joy of Desserts, Grocery Cart Challenge.

$20 at Hen House

(What a BAD picture. Sorry!)

We spent our remaining $20 at Hen House today. Here is what we got:

1 flat of strawberries (split with my mom)
2 cans of sweetened condensed milk
1 jar of Tostitos salsa
1 Tree Top apple cider
4 bags of Kraft cheddar cheese
3 16 oz tubs of cottage cheese
2 Palermo's frozen pizzas

My pre-tax total was $26.46. I saved 57%. I recouped $5 from my mom for the strawberries. And, on a final note, I'm a little bit bummed because my savings would have been much better, but I had to buy sweetened condensed milk at full price. (Oh the horror.) We're going over to my mother in laws tomorrow, and I promised I'd bring dessert. I thought I had everything I needed, but I was missing the milk. Darnit! Dessert recipe to follow some time tomorrow. It's a good one!

With this week's banana purchase, I see banana bread, banana smoothies AND banana pudding in our future. I also really love having a banana or an apple with a tablespoon of peanut butter for breakfast or a snack. Could it get any healthier or cheaper??? (See this week's other purchase (with bananas) here.) I probably won't do a lot of serious meal preparation this week. We'll probably have at least one breakfast for dinner meal, and other than that, we'll do a lot of light dinners like PBJ, grilled cheese or black bean and cheese quesadillas with a side of fruit and cottage cheese. I have a few pizzas and a Wanchai Ferry dinner stashed for some easy lunches for the family while I am at work. There's plenty of yogurt and strawberries for smoothies. I'm not gonna lie -- the options are slimmer than usual, but I'm not going to sweat it. The new grocery week always rolls around more quickly than I expect!

$40/week budget revisited

Here we are at week 2 of the $40 budget. For some reason, I feel a little paralyzed by my missing $10. I am really thinking about things differently. Instead of thinking about what's super cheap and stocking up, I feel like I'm focusing more on what we're REALLY going to need/eat for the week. It's a little silly because we're only talking a $10 difference, but I also feel like this is a little more "real" of a situation. Like for once, I have a really small grocery budget due to need rather than due to choice. Now I know what it really feels like, and it sure isn't great. Unfortunately, we've had somewhat of a similar work situation this pay period too. I am not sure how our budget will break down quite yet, but it is possible than our $40 budget will persist for the upcoming two weeks as well. It's not just our grocery budget that has suffered. We've had to cut back on our 401Ks, college savings, our personal spending money, and our Christmas club budget -- basically anywhere where we could. College savings and Christmas club budgets have been nil since the first of the year, but reducing the 401K contributions, our grocery budget and our small amounts of personal money to the bare minimum has been a more recent change. We're really not suffering though. We have everything we need, and we trust that God knows what He's doing. It's just a little bit of a switch while we ride this out.

Here is what I got at Hy-Vee today --



1 gallon of Minute Maid OJ
1.4 lb deli ham
2 Yoplait smoothies
2 boxes of Mini Wheats
3 cans of generic black beans
1 single serving of banana Nesquik
1 bag of frozen cranberries (except the charged me for 2. Going to have to keep my receipt!)
15 lbs of bananas

My pre-tax total was $19.00. We'll make one other trip tomorrow.

See this week's other purchase here.

See last week here.

Cooking Dinner!

Aurelia and Daddy learn to make cavatini!