Well I wanted to try and stick to $35/week or $140 total for June despite the new baby- but we went over. I was pretty sure I would since we now have the added expense of baby formula- which I have thankfully been scoring deals on left and right!
So I came out at $173 or $33 over budget- but that includes at least 6 packs of Huggies/Pampers and about 11 cans of Similac/Enfamil and Good Start formula. Before I started couponing we spent a whopping $20-25 per can on formula and went through about 2 a week! So I am extremely pleased with this month despite going over. (Note: I include everything in this budget- cleaning supplies, toiletries, groceries, dog food etc..)
We have decided to increase the budget a little bit for July and see what happens. I am going to shoot for $40/week or $160 total.
Funny when my husband and I were single, we used to spend $600/month on groceries alone. I can’t even imagine how we could possibly have spent so much!
One note is that I have been using coupons and watching sales long enough to have a fairly decent stockpile. For example, we have enough toiletries and cleaning products on hand to allow me to wait until I can pay virtually nothing for these types of items. This is a huge help in stretching our dollars from week to week.
And how about you? How did your month go?
This may be a silly question, but how do you pay so little for formula, and do you switch brands based on what is available? I have always considered the $22.99 I pay for a large can of Similac at BJ's a good deal. I'll kick myself if I've been overpaying for the last 3 1/2 years!
Hi Beth, I used to pay that too at Costco w/ our toddler. Now w/ baby #2 I am determined to cut the price we pay at least in half. My pediatrician told me we can bounce formulas around and it won't hurt her tummy. My toddler didn't react well to Enfamil so for the time being Maya seems fine with the different brands.
I have all sorts of plans up my sleeve- I found several Good Start $2 off peelies recently and Target has giant cans of Good Start priced at $17.99- I have also discovered you can trade for formula checks on A Full Cup! So $11 formula check + $2 peelie= $4.99 for a 30 oz can at Target. I also bought some of the meters a few weeks ago at Wags and used the $10 profit to buy clearanced Similac ($11.49!) for next to nothing. I found smaller size Good Start on clearance at Target and paid 0 for 2 cans by using a $1 and a $11 formula check… etc.. etc.. I am also toying with the idea of getting $25 in free after coupon merchandise at Kmart doubles next week, buying a can of Good Start for $25- double the $2 peelie and use the $5 off 50 coupon to save $9 and then use an $11 formula check– we'll see. Anyway- just follow my blog I post the majority of my shopping trips and break everything down. If you scroll down to my trip from last night at Target you'll see the tips on how to trade coupons and the link to A Full Cup.
I hope that helps!
Just curious…..how much food do you make from scratch? Seems like I saw you mention awhile back about baking bread (?) – is that one way you keep costs soooo low, by making things most folks just buy? It's all I can do to keep our family budget just for food at $250, and that's for me, hubby and 20-month old son. I'd love tips on getting even lower!
Hi Elizabeth– I used to cook a ton and bake a ton but now with a new baby I just don't get to it as much. We do a lot of things- I stockpile items at the very lowest point (for example I bought 20 boxes of Raisin Bran for $4.79 in March that we are still eating or the tortillas we got last week for .24/pack- I bought 5 packs of 30 ct tortillas) so we have a lot in the pantry. I also keep things pretty simple as you can see from my meal plans (under menu planning tab)and the most important thing is that we don't throw anything away. If we have extra bananas I freeze them for banana bread, I used to toss a ton of stuff at the end of the week and now I almost never toss a thing. I also plan carefully every week to get the very best deals possible and I make dinners based upon what's on sale. So if tortillas are .24 a pack we have breakfast burritos, my husband makes yummy homemade chips for salsa, we eat quesadillas etc.. etc.. I post a lot of my shopping trips too if you follow my blog. It might not look like much that I buy but when you have a decent stockpile going you don't need much. We have pasta sauce, pasta, crackers, condiments, canned veggies etc.. etc.. etc.. all on hand.
Also, it does take a lot of time to plan the trips, cut the coupons and I almost always hit more than 1 store- but if you save several hundred dollars a month it is totally worthwhile. Do you follow the coupon matchups from bloggers for the stores you shop at? That helps a lot as well to make sure you get the best deals.
Hello, we have four children but when our twins were born they were born ealry at 32 weeks. Praise the Lord there was nothing wrong with them, but they did have to stay in the neoNatal for six days just to make sure that they would maintain the bady weight and temp's. ANYWAYS when we frist brought them home they were only eating about a teaspoon at a time but that soon changed. I could not breastfeed so the hospital had put them on Similac for preemies…to be cont.
I cannot remember the specific name of the formula but it was the Similac brand, we had a hard time finding it. The ONLY place that we could find it was a Walgreen's and it was so expensive ($25), that was 12 years ago. At the twins next doctor's visit, I mentioned that we could not find this but only at Walgreen's. Our doctor said that he would get in touch with a sales Rep. and get some samples for us. OK, I'm thinking small packs for samples. Well two weeks later we pulled into the driveway and there was enough formula (the big cans) for both babies to last nine months. I can't remember the exact number of cans that we got, but there were two small pallets stacked high on our front porch, not to mention two VERY HAPPY parents and babies.
I said all of that to say…see if your doctor can set you up with a sales rep. (If you want to)
*****Now I have some 'samples' listed over on my blog (I can assure you that they are NOT the big cans! :)) http://tinyurl.com/l73les