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Mama Moon
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| Posted: May 18 2007 at 6:23am | IP Logged
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Dear Grateful2God
I pray that your situation will change and that the Lord would show you a way to become independent. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be with so many children on a small budget but I would humbly suggest - would it be possible for your homeschooling family to grow certain vegetables for yourselves. I always find that planting and patiently tending and watching plants grow a wonderful experience. Maybe one of your dc has green fingers! Even if you just have a little space or or can borrow a small area, it may be worth a try. Vegetables all add up. And if you have your own land, what about investing in a couple of fruit trees...
Wishing you much courage!
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Mama Moon
blessed with 2 precious ones
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stacykay
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| Posted: May 18 2007 at 10:30am | IP Logged
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Nothing new to add, as I am still working on ways to cut the grocery budget, and don't know how effective I am. 
Wanted to ask if anyone saw ABC news, yesterday, either on GMA or the evening news with C. Gibson? There was a piece about food prices and how they have been rising quickly over this past year. The news people linked it to the increased use of corn, not only for food, feed, its byproducts, but for ethanol, also. I could see how it would affect dairy and beef, and those items with high fructose corn syrup, but not fruits and veggies.
They also stated that a "family of four, a year ago, would spend an average of $300.00 a WEEK on groceries!" You all certainly have them beat! 
We are going to try a container garden this summer, on our patio, for some veggies. Our yard is impossibly filled with roots! I am going to try the kiddie swimming pools, talked about here. Click on the left side bar for the info about the kiddie pools. Lots of creative ideas here!
God Bless,
Stacy in MI
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Lisbet
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| Posted: May 18 2007 at 10:48am | IP Logged
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About Aldi's, I always regret not going there. I went there yesterday with $150 dollars in hand, and I bought loads and loads of food, 2 carts overflowing, to prepare for a big cooking day, I got whole chickens, 2 bags chicken breasts, 2 large containers of oatmeal, 4 boxes of cereal, 5 lbs. ground beef, lots of pasta, rice, shredded cheese, ham, bread, buns, english muffins, really, ALOT of stuff, even some convience foods for quick summer lunches, and my total came to $127.00. Same things at Kroger would have cost me over $200 I'm sure. I prepared 6 meals yesterday afternoon, one for dinner, the rest for the freezer, and I have plenty of food to make 5 more meals!
I don't know why I ever stop going there, convience I guess. But we are working very hard on our budget right now, and it's so worth it.
__________________
Lisa, wife to Tony,
Mama to:
Nick, 17
Abby, 15
Gabe, 13
Isaac, 11
Mary, 10
Sam, 9
Henry, 7
Molly, 6
Mark, 5
Greta, 3
Cecilia born 10.29.10
Josephine born 6.11.12
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stacykay
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| Posted: May 18 2007 at 1:10pm | IP Logged
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Here is a little article about Aldi's, from a site called singlemom.com (I was just googing Aldi's and this came up .)
There is an Aldi's about 12 miles away from us. Have you all who shop there had good product experiences there? Any favorite items? I am thinking about going over next week. Thanks!
God Bless,
Stacy in MI
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Karen T
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| Posted: May 18 2007 at 5:25pm | IP Logged
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stacykay wrote:
We are going to try a container garden this summer, on our patio, for some veggies. Our yard is impossibly filled with roots! I am going to try the kiddie swimming pools, talked about here. Click on the left side bar for the info about the kiddie pools. Lots of creative ideas here!
God Bless,
Stacy in MI |
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You might want to look at Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew.
I found it at our library. Make sure you get the newer version (2005 I think) vs. the older 90's version - it has good info too, but the newest one is even simpler!
Karen T
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stacykay
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Thanks, Karen! Both copies are checked out at the library, so I put a request in for the newer one- so excited to see what we can grow!
God Bless,
Stacy in MI
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stacykay
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| Posted: June 11 2007 at 12:14pm | IP Logged
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I saw this on ABC news.com, and thought some may be interested in this self-described coupon addict. On the right, next to the print story is the video. Interesting!
Sure seems like prices are going up and up!
God Bless,
Stacy in MI
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Becky Parker
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| Posted: June 11 2007 at 2:50pm | IP Logged
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I used to clip coupons all the time, but I kept finding that the items I could buy with coupons were items I normally didn't buy anyway. I also don't know how anyone could walk out of a store with 22 bottles of shampoo and not pay a dime (as the story said). I don't mean to be pessimistic, but I usually see a sign that says "limit 2" or a coupon that says "not to be used with any other offer" or something like that. Maybe I'm just not trying hard enough. I think it's great that she can save so much though. Maybe I need to start looking at coupons again, even if it's just for the occasional item we need.
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Becky
Wife to Wes, Mom to 6 wonderful kids on Earth and 4 in Heaven!
Academy Of The Good Shepherd
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kingvozzo
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| Posted: June 11 2007 at 4:29pm | IP Logged
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What I want to know is how many people are in this woman's family? I'm surprised the article didn't say something like "she feeds a family of 5 on $0.92 a month!"
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Noreen
Wife to Ed
Mom to 4 great kids and 10 sweet ones in Our Lady's arms
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cathochick
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| Posted: June 11 2007 at 6:14pm | IP Logged
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ALmom wrote:
| ...how do you cook the oatmeal. If I could cook enough at one time, that would be cheaper than anything else - but I pull out 6 cups of oats (12 cups of water) - and it only serves maybe 3 people in our house and they don't stay filled - not even for 30 minutes. How do you keep your children filled - does the oatmeal really stay with them. We all leave the table feeling hungry when we eat oatmeal. They really are still hungry. Do you stretch it with something in it to make it higher in protein? |
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Janet,
Do you have a crockpot? I buy bulk steel cut oats and cook them in the crockpot overnight. Sometimes I cook it on the stovetop. We sometimes add nuts and raisins, but the steel cut oats seem fairly filling to me. I think the steel cut oats might make more oatmeal. I use one cup of oats to four cups of water.
--Jessica
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Rachel May
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| Posted: June 24 2007 at 12:50pm | IP Logged
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My friend recently told me about Share which sells you $35-40 worth of good food for $16 a prepackaged box, if you can show that you have volunteered 2 hours per month.
I believe for every 2 hours you can get another box without a limit except your wallet or fridge space, and you have to be able to pick it up in a 2 hour window on one specific day.
She bought 2 boxes last month, one full of shrimp, tederloin, chicken, and turkey and the other full of fresh produce. She said it's a nationl organization, but the link she gave me is for MD, DC and VA. I' thinking about trying it since volunteering can be as simple as watching your neighbor's kids. You just have them sign something.
I'm curious if anyone else has tried it or has any experence with it?
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Rachel
Thomas and Anthony (10), Maria (8), Charles (6), Cecilia (5), James (3), and Joseph (1)
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Karen T
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| Posted: June 24 2007 at 3:48pm | IP Logged
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Rachel, thanks for posting this link. I've marked it and will check this out as soon as we move in a few weeks to Md! I know from visiting MIL that groceries are higher up there (along with everything else) than here in Ga and I'm planning to make the trek to the nearest military base at least once a month to stock up on some things but gas prices will keep me from going too often
Now that I won't be working outside the home for awhile at least, I've been planning to get a little more involved with some volunteer work anyway, so this would be great!
Karen T
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Rachel May
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| Posted: June 25 2007 at 10:12am | IP Logged
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I noticed on the website that it is an INTERNATIONAL organization started by a Catholic deacon in San Diego so there should be opportunitiesd for many of us to try it.
Karen, I hope your move goes well!
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Rachel
Thomas and Anthony (10), Maria (8), Charles (6), Cecilia (5), James (3), and Joseph (1)
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Kristie 4
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| Posted: June 25 2007 at 1:52pm | IP Logged
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Hi,
Today on the top of my list was "Menu Planning" aka how to cut more in our budget!!
Up here in Canada, where prices seem much more than in most of the states, I spend around $800 a month on groceries/cleaners/paper products. We eat ALOT of beans, lentils, veggie curries. We used to eat all organic (lived on 250 acres, had a huge garden etc) but now with more children and different eating habits I find I can afford almost no organic food (we buy organic milk when we can and mostly stay away from meat.) We ate more simply when we ate all organic and that helped.
What dings us sometimes is when the kids friends come over for dinner- rice and beans or curried lentil stew doesn't go over well so I find I am running off to the store.
We are on a very tight budget, we are volunteer church workers in the inner city with a mission, and we need to cut back in many areas as we have gotten quite in debt after moving to the city.
I find that having the store so close to run to has messed with the budget too! (Wasn't a problem when we lived on the small, no store, Island which is where we came from 2 years ago!!).
Thanks you for all the great posts (I have played catch up reading, all the way from a year ago).
I am off to plan now....(I always start my planning with a menu for two weeks- otherwise I often spend the two week (or three  ) limit and get home and can't figure out what to make which can definitely add to the stress!!
What do you all do for company cooking??
BTW, a resource that I find helpful (and use lots) is More With Less: the cookbook and also the book Living More With Less, they are both put out by the Mennonite Central Committee and many of the recipes have an international flavor .
Kristie
A Walk in the Woods
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Kristie in Canada
Mom to 3 boys and one spunky princess!!
A Walk in the Woods
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Kristie 4
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| Posted: June 25 2007 at 2:09pm | IP Logged
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Wow... I just went back to page three to do some more reading, and lo and behold there were some Canadians on page 4. I am going back again to do some more reading.
I am also going to check out the pantry posts!!
This is so timely for us!
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Kristie in Canada
Mom to 3 boys and one spunky princess!!
A Walk in the Woods
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Kristie 4
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| Posted: June 25 2007 at 2:37pm | IP Logged
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Do any of you budget certain things as you buy them??
For ex. here, when I buy cheese I want the mozza for our Friday pizza night (a weekly treat which makeds the beans go down well on the preceeding nights!!) I tell my son that he is not to cook with or eat it (he is a 12yob that is ravenous now and loves to cook). Because I didn't grow up with any restrictions (both parents worked good paying jobs) I sometimes am uncomfortable making some of these requests. We have also been money stressed this year since moving to an urban environment and the kids sense this (they have big ears !! at times). How do you handle this sort of thing??
I will second homemade bread for breakie: in my favourite cookbook , More with Less, they state that cold cereal has nothing that a hunk of homemade bread doesn't (and I might add that the bread has lots more). I make a very dense chewy loaf that hits the spot for a midmorning snack when the oats haven't quite filled it.
I also give bread if the other food isn't enjoyed (ie. my son disliked oats), but do fall to short order cooking it at lunch sometimes!!
Kristie
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Kristie in Canada
Mom to 3 boys and one spunky princess!!
A Walk in the Woods
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asplendidtime
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| Posted: June 29 2007 at 1:48pm | IP Logged
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Kristie,
I made up three monthly menu plans, so I buy groceries to be enough for the recipes. I definitely ration how much ground beef I need, how many cans of tomatoes, how much cheese. Sometimes I grate the cheese and freeze in increments necessary for future meals--that way it doesn't disappear.
Then I make sure we have lots of things we can have spur of the moment, like popcorn. Or you can make sure you have lots of spreads (bean spread, Peanut butter, egg salad) to put on sandwiches in case people get snackish. My dh is really careful, he asks me first what he can snack on, because he doesn't want to eat something slated for a meal.
I learned a lot from reading Miserly Moms by Jonni McCoy.
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Rebecca~Mama to
Noah 17,
Katie 16,
Mary 14,
Tim 13,
Jonah 12,
Josh 10,
Zoe 9,
Will 7,
Peter 6,
Laura-Mae 4,
Emily-Joy 2,
Genevieve & Gabriella 1
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4Real Forums : Mothering and Family Life
Topic: food budget
