Skip to main content

The Frugal Five: #74

 The Frugal Five: #74


With inflation on the rise and salaries not increasing, our ability to make ends meet keeps going down.    Therefore, we must be more careful with our money.   The Frugal Five is a series where we celebrate the daily or weekly activities that help us live a frugal life.    


1- Gas Shopping

In my area, gas prices vary with an average range of $0.05 per gallon and sometimes as much as $0.30 per gallon.     By watching what the base price is and then adding my gas discounts, I was able to save $0.80 per gallon or $8.00 this week.  Although this doesn’t seem like a lot, it does add up for the year. 


2- Planning for Leftovers

This week a whole turkey was on the menu for Thanksgiving, so I planned three days of meals around this bird.    We are having a turkey pot pie and hot turkey sandwiches this week.   In addition, I planned to place some of the meat in the freezer for another time.    


3- Choose a Simple Cooking Style

Holiday cooking tends to elaborate and uses a lot of ingredients.    Each time we choose to make a more complicated dish with many ingredients, the price of our meal goes up.   I have chosen to make a simpler meal this year for Thanksgiving.    However, we do enjoy one side dish which takes several ingredients, but since we have simplified the rest of them, our cost is not excessive. 

     

4- Take Advantage of Free Items


I earned several side dishes from IBOTTA this holiday week, so I will pick them up.    I have already shopped for Thanksgiving based on the sales, so the items I pick up will be rotated into my pantry for future meals.    In addition, at my school, there was a box of individually packaged baked Cheetos available for staff to take, so I picked up several bags to use as rewards for my students.   


5- Growing Herbs

I either have herb houseplants or dried herbs from the community garden this summer.   This helps me to reduce the cost of cooking many meals.    For example, I am roasting vegetables this year for Thanksgiving, so I will need some herbs to add to the oil mix.    Luckily, I have several herbs either dried from the garden or fresh that will go nicely with the vegetables.   


What Free-bees have you been able to pick up this year?    My September free-bee haul knocked it out of the park!    Hopefully, October will pick up soon, because it is looking a lot like my August haul.      


Here is my list: 

Do you want to see what we did last week?   

Just click on the picture for the link. 



Please leave a comment below with your ways of saving money this week.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

2025 Updated Breakfast Under $1.00

On the USDA Website, their thrifty grocery budgets range from  $25.70 to $72.80 per week ($3.67 - $10.40 per day) per person.   The two factors that determine the amount allocated are age and sex.  With such a small amount of money allocated daily for food and my attempt to eat healthily, I need to plan each week carefully.     With the Bird Flu hitting America hard recently, the egg is no longer a humble star but is turning into a luxury.     A dozen eggs cost $5.49 or $0.46 each.  At this price, I am looking at other options for breakfast.   Breakfast is a great place to add value to your meal planning.    It can be the cheapest or most expensive meal.  The choice is up to you.    NOTE: Prices are for the Northeast area for March 1,  2025 Let’s look at breakfasts that come in at or under $1.00.     Beagle and Cream Cheese ($0.69 per serving) Kroger Prices Bagels (6ct)- $2...

Meal Planning: #287

  Menu Plan #287 NOTE-  1- Click on the picture and get a link to a post sharing the recipe.  2- Although all prices were correct at the time of the blog postings, the current cost of preparation of these dishes may be higher due to inflation and location.      August  USDA Low Food Plan According to this plan, our family would have a budget of $185.60 per week.  We elevate our dining experiences by including fresh fruits, vegetables, and higher-quality meats.  Since we have health concerns and are active individuals, we limit our processed food choices.          Here is what we did this week to make our week easier:   Breakfast Options:  Yogurt Muffins Egg Sandwiches Lunch Options: Grilled Chicken  Salads Chicken Salad Monday Hamburgers Roasted Potatoes Corn  Tuesday Street Tacos Salad Wednesday Enchilada Salad Chips w/ Salsa Thursday Leftovers Friday Chicken Parmesan Pasta Sal...

The Frugal Five: #88

  The Frugal Five: #88 With inflation on the rise and salaries not increasing, our ability to make ends meet keeps going down.    Therefore, we must be more careful with our money.   The Frugal Five is a series where we celebrate the daily or weekly activities that help us live a frugal life.     This week I am exploring how to keep costs down during busy weeks.    Keeping dinner on the table instead of eating out is one of my strategies to get the job done.    Here are some of my tips and trips.    1- Free-Bee Pick Up  Over the last month, we have been blessed with several Free-Bees.  First, a friend gave us a dozen eggs from his chickens.  In addition, we picked up several photos with discount codes from Walgreens and CVS.   Next, we used our local grocery store coupons for several free food items such as seltzer water, ice cream, etc.   Then, we picked up toothpaste and eyeliners from ...