Here's the story....

We are a family of six trying to cut back in today's economy down to one income. There's me, hubby, 11 year old daughter, 8 year old son, 7 year old daughter and almost 1 year old baby boy. I bought a freezer for myself for my birthday in February and started to cook ahead, and stock up on sale items. But then summer came and I cut my hours even less so I figured I needed to get right the the heart of the matter-or the stomach as the case may be. I started cutting coupons, really reading the sale ads instead of just depending on Aldi and our local fruit market. It has cut some of the flab from our food budget, but now I really really want to stay home so I have to get it down even less. I started reading websites, ebooks, and anything else I can get my hands on. My first step this weekend was to realistically write out our budget. I found a great worksheet here: http://www.shoppingfortwo.com/Budget/budget-signup.htm That's when I figured out that hubby had better cut back on his spending or everything I do would never work. Then I started doing the CVS shopping deals. I am getting better, and our CVS is not that far, but it is going to take more practice to get where I am walking out with only a few $$ spent. Now last but not least, I did the Dixie paper plate deal at Walgreens on Friday with my $5/20 coupon and actually spent $31.00 (10 on prescription) and had 54.00 woth of stuff. Now I am dedicated to cutting coupons, printing coupons, and searching out the deals. This week is grocery shopping week for me and I intend to make the best of it! My habit is to shop every two weeks and not (and I am serious about it) walk back into a store for another two weeks. I am rethinking this so that I can so one bigger shop one week and one smaller shop the next.....we'll see once I get my ads on Wednesday!