Frugal resources

I'm back at it again- working hard at spending less while trying to get my freezer and pantry up to speed. I pretty much emptied everything out when we left for vacation and am now feeling the effects of not having the stock of grocery store loss leaders on hand to plan with. It's becoming more of a challenge now that the price of about everything has gone up. But, my hats off to those who live in Florida and other areas of the country where prices are higher. Milk at $4.oo a gallon was an eye opener for me!

Today I spent about three hours of planning and shopping for my trip to four different stores: Kroger, Meijer, WalMart and Target. Where I live these stores are all within four miles of my home, thankfully. How could I possible compare and shop these stores for the best deals? Well, let me introduce you to a blog that it making my life much easier- BeCentsAble. At this site there is a great feature called Grocery Gathering. Each week they list just about every store and deals/coupons/links to make shopping very easy.

Along these lines, I've discovered Meijer Mealbox. Here if you click on the "specials" tab you will be led to Meijer coupons that can be printed to your heart's content. These can result in great savings.

For example: This week Talapia is BOGO at $5.99. There is a Meijer coupon for $2 off one bag. So 2 bags of Talapia with two coupons costs a mere $2.00. I think we are set for fish for a while:)

I've learned that my Meijer will only take two identical coupons per transaction. I go through the self scan and just break it down into several smaller transactions. No problem.

In the end all of the planning paid off. I spent about $135 of my $400 budget and saved with coupons and sale items $112. I also earned a $5 Target gift card in the process. Well worth the effort, I'd say.

What blogs or sites do you use to help you make the budget stretch at the grocery? I'd love to check them out.