March Frugals!

[early morning]

yesterday was a no-drive no spend day. I don't get many of those! Today will be a planned spend day - I need a few groceries that ALDI does not have - small sandwich buns and sour pickles- for a carry-in dish. I will, of course, hit Starbucks while there - I'm down to 4 fancy coffees out a month. Of course that's times 2 or 3, depending on if DH and/or DD are along, lol. Got all of our taxes figured and filed last Monday for free - I always feel better when that's done. Found a box of my glass zoo animal figurines from the early 60s in with a bunch of stuff we moved from Mom's house - they are priced and packed to go to our antique mall booth this afternoon. Got most of the mail-order plants planted before the rain - they arrived during a freezing spell here and I was worried about them, but they are in and they looked pretty good. I have another batch on the way and no place to put them, but we'll figure it out!

[Meezer_Mom]

Thanks for the suggestions Mary and Rosa. I use an ATM card and cash because I was a victim of identity theft. My current bank offers some peace of mind. There are enough ATMs to use provided I make the effort to go to them.

[Yppej]

I am keeping my groceries in the $30 to $40 a week range for myself, trying to eat mindfully and stop when I am full. So far I have lost 2 pounds. It also helps that I saw the layoffs at work so while I was still employed stocked up on several staples when they were on sale including olive oil and toilet paper.

[frugal-one]

Made tapioca... it didn't turn out. It was runny. I must have miscounted and not put in enough tapioca. So, I made popcicles out of it. They were REALLY good, surprisingly.

[Yppej]

I closed out March with spending below what I received in unemployment compensation. The challenge will be to stay on track during months when I have real estate taxes, homeowners insurance or auto insurance.

[frugal-one]

Found a few Taster's Choice individual tubes of decaffeinated instant coffee in my cupboard (think I used them to bake something one time). Trying to clean out the cupboards so decided to make iced coffee and used organic vanilla half and half. VERY GOOD. Like it so much I went and bought a container of Taster's Choice instant coffee. There are a number of recipes for different coffees on line to try.

[rosarugosa]

I claimed a $5.00 Amazon gift card from doing daily Bing searches today. I went to the library and borrowed a brand-new book for free, and bought 4 paperbacks from the sale room for a grand total of $2.00. (I like paperbacks for commuting purposes since they are lighter, and I share them around and then eventually re-donate them. I call that 50 cents per book well spent!)
I did end of the month budget reconciliation and was able to push $200 extra into savings!
DH picked up an extra shift at work today, so he gets frugal points too.