Wrapping Up A Thrifty May

I began the month of May with $35 in my checking account and full tanks of gas on both vehicles.  Not a bad way to begin a new month, that's for sure!  On payday I did my usual, paid all of our monthly expenses and hit my savings goals hard.  I am making progress in the savings department and that makes this girl extremely happy.  Mid month I was able to make another large deposit into savings again and used my overtime pay to stock up on groceries, catfood and some non food items.

Like last month I put a lot of thought and effort into my prepper pantry.  I was able to finance it by using my gift card I received this past Christmas from my employer and money I earned from working overtime.  I made sure to pay the best possible price on everything I purchased and was able to really make that money count.  I always try to use those gift cards I get on something important.  I used the last three on my home upgrade projects.  This time I felt really good using my gift card to invest in our prepper pantry.

I kept our regular grocery spending in check and under budget this month as we focused on using up several things we already had in our pantry and freezer from last year.  We want to make sure we are rotating our food stock and keeping it as fresh as possible.

I also used some of my overtime pay from my mid month paycheck to pay off the balance of my PayPal account so I know completely own my dehydrator and my vacuum sealer.  No interest was charged to me and I was able to neatly work it into my budget.  No muss, no fuss.

As I proceed into June I have big plans and a couple of goals to complete.  I'm excited about the prospect of completing those goals too.  Every step I take is progress and progress leads me to accomplishing the goals I've set for myself.  Those completed goals will make our life better and that makes all the hard work to get there worth it all.

My Thrifty Grocery Budget 2020 - May

May has been a very different month for me as far as grocery shopping went.  For the first time in my life I am dealing with the fact that some groceries are not available when I wanted them.  Shipments don't always arrive and there have been shortages and outages.  Things I have taken for granted.  So I focused my efforts more on my Prepper Pantry and less on our regular grocery budget.  Fortunately we have a lot of short term food items in our pantry, refrigerator and freezer so we didn't need much this month leaving me with a fair bit of extra money to roll over and use in June.

I picked up quite a few nonfood items too and still have $3.06 to carry forward and use next month too.  I purchased cat food, laundry detergent & fabric softener as well as tissues.

I purchased quite a bit of food and some non food items and supplies for the prepper pantry using extra money I earned by working overtime hours at my job and gift cards I already had.  I am keeping those expenses completely separate from my regular grocery shopping budget for now.  Once I'm done I'll be converting to a working pantry which is a use and replace method which I plan to talk about more in a future post.  Stay tuned if you have any interest in that.

I did some pretty big prepper hauls

Here is the list of food I bought this month:

$88.05 ÷ 31 days ÷3 people = $.95 per person per day!! Less than a dollar a day!!!

A very satisfying trip to Dollar Tree

Using up a lot of what we already had on hand to make our daily meals helped a lot this month to keep our costs really low.  I will take the balance I didn't use and roll it over into next month's budget.  I'm sure I can find ways to use that extra money.

I made a few runs to Cash & Carry for prepper pantry items

Were you able to come across any good sales or deals?  What are some of the items you are having difficulty finding?  Are you worried about the current state of our food supply?

Prepper Pantry - Chocolate & Baking Cocoa

While to some prepping chocolate may not seem like an essential item but to me it sure is.  Not just because I like to eat chocolate either.  I decided to add chocolate to my prepper pantry for a number of reasons, not the least of which includes morale, very important, as well as its value as a tradable item.  As I'm prepping those are two important areas to consider.

Morale during a crisis is tenuous at best.  But if you have the ability to brighten your day with a chocolate chip cookie for instance then all the better.  Chocolate chips and baking cocoa are also great items to use to trade for something else you might need.  Like toilet paper!

Measured out in 2 cup increments

I was really fortunate and found some nice semi sweet chocolate baking chips at Grocery Outlet on sale for 99¢ a bag so I bought five.  I would have loved to buy more, but under the current circumstances I felt it best to leave some for others.  I opened all the bags and dumped them into a bowl so I could measure out two cups and placed that into a sandwich bag which I left open.

 

I wrapped each packet in a chip wrapper

I cut the ends off the wrappers so I could use them to wrap around the baking chips and that gave me my label with all my nutrition information plus a recipe for cookies as well as a light barrier.  I slipped my little packet of baking chips into a vacuum sealing bag and used my vacuum sealer to finish up my packaging and I wrote the date on each packet.

 

Then I sealed each packet

I even included some white chocolate baking chips

I only use a cup of chips when I make a batch of cookies so I felt that it would work best for me to measure out in two cup increments and store it like that.  Two batches of cookies per packet and the contents will fit nicely inside a pint sized mason jar once opened.  The others stay fresh and stored away until needed.

All sealed, labeled and ready for long term storage

I did the same thing with a bag of white chocolate chips too so I have variety.  As I am able I will add more to my chocolate stash.  As far as baking cocoa I left it in its original containers and tucked them into Ziploc bags simply to keep them clean and better protected.  They are already nicely sealed and the containers will protect them from light as well.

Last Week's Thrifty Moves

Sunday morning I was up with the chickens, dressed, with one cup of coffee down and heading out the door with my shopping list.  I went to four stores in total finding only a few items on my list at Fred Meyer.  Their shelves were quite picked over and the meat they had in their ad was nowhere to be found.  Winco, Cash & Carry as well as Dollar Tree were able to meet my needs and once I was done I headed straight home to put everything away and get busy on my next tasks.

I put strawberry rhubarb jam on in my slow cooker
The rhubarb came from our garden!

At Fred Meyer I was able to get some beautiful strawberries that were on sale for $1.99 a 2# box.  I diced up a quart of berries before heading out to our yard to cultivate some rhubarb and after slicing all of that up I made a nice big pot of strawberry rhubarb jam in my slow cooker.  It smelled like heaven!

I found sliced organic mushrooms on markdown and knew
I needed to dehydrate them for our long term storage

I also removed all of the onions and bell peppers from the dehydrator and gave it a quick wash before reloading it with three packages of organic sliced mushrooms I found on markdown, a bunch of celery I had in our crisper drawer and three of the apples I had picked up from the markdown bin as well.  I puttered out in the garden, pulled weeds, spread compost around the berry bushes, did a load of laundry, checked the chickens, cleaned up the kitchen and canned the jam.  It was a great Sunday!

We have been dehydrating (and eating!) a lot of markdown apples

Monday morning I awoke to a well soaked lawn and garden from a lovely overnight rain.  I emptied the mushrooms and celery from the dehydrator and washed the trays.  I cleaned my jam jars that I let cool overnight, washed the rings I'd removed and put labels on the jars before putting them away in the pantry.  I need more jam jars!  So I guess I'll be on the hunt.

This is the rhubarb I harvested from our garden.  Beautiful

When I got home Monday evening I reloaded the dehydrator with more markdown apples completely filling it up.  The ones I did on Sunday taste absolutely fabulous, just like everything else I've dried so far, which has really been encouraging.

Dehydrated onions - they smell fantastic!

Tuesday morning I took the bowl of dried onions and whizzed it around in my little food processor to make them a little finer, but not too much.  I was able to reduce those four trays of chopped onions to fill a quart jar about two thirds full.  I think I chopped up ten onions total and I still have a lot more in the bag to do up.  That evening I cut up a nice sized bowl of strawberries for a future batch of jam and stuck them in the freezer.  I will make the jam once I find enough jam jars at the thrift store to complete the task.

I water bath canned my jams

Wednesday morning I reloaded the dehydrator with frozen blueberries and a tray of fresh strawberries I sliced up.  The girls like the dried apples so much they went to Fred Meyer to see if there were any more apples in the markdown bin.  They came home with three bags of apples for $1 each.  My youngest was super excited about it too.

When I got home from work I put on a big pot of salsa and canned it in my new canner.  I am having way too much fun with that thing I have to tell you.  I am also looking forward to exploring its many other functions too, once I have a spare minute.  While the salsa simmered I refilled the dehydrator with apple slices and let it go overnight.

My daughters made these gorgeous dipped strawberries

After work on Thursday I emptied and reloaded the dehydrator with more trays filled with sliced apples.  I let those go overnight rotating the trays just before I went to bed and again in the morning when I got up.  When I got home from work they were perfect and ready to go into a one gallon glass jar I have had for eons.  The dried apples look so pretty.

Lots of rain last week!

Friday was the official start of my staycation.  I celebrated after work by stopping at the nearby thrift store and picked up nine more canning jars.  Right now they are sold out at the stores and out of stock online.  I prefer to find mine at thrift stores anyway.  A perfect start to my vacation.

Salsa!

Saturday morning I didn't want to sleep away my vacation so I was up early and snuck out to Fred Meyer again this week to pick up butter for $1.99, sour cream for $1 as well as tissues and markdown apples also for $1 each.  Not too shabby.  The apples ended up in the dehydrator, of course.

When I got home from the store I put all of the groceries away, made a batch of strawberry jam with the diced ripe strawberries I'd put away in the freezer on Tuesday and tidied up the kitchen.  Then the young one and I headed off to do some thrift store shopping with the sole purpose to hunt down some canning jars and she wanted to find a couple of books.  We found both jars and  books so we came home pretty happy campers having visited a total of six shops.  Go us!

On the way home from the thrift stores we stopped in at another
Fred Meyer and found this bounty in their markdown produce bin

I added water to the empty fabric softener bottle, gave it a good shake and had enough solution for one more load of laundry.  I did the same thing to the dish soap bottle after I emptied out the contents into my pump dispenser.  I had enough soapy solution to wash up dishes all week long which included all my canning and prepping dishes too.  At work I finished up a bottle of lotion I had sitting upside down for the past few weeks and was able to use up every bit of it.  All of the empty containers ended up in the recycle bin.

A gallon jar of dried apples!

We ate meals using up items pulled from our kitchen freezer which included meat balls, turkey chili, taco meat for taco salads and corn dogs.  The girls bought egg roll wrappers and we made egg rolls, pot stickers and rangoons.  All of the fillings came from our refrigerator or freezer.  We had a fun time making all of that and the girls really enjoyed eating it over the course of two days.  They even had some for breakfast.

Salsa jars labeled and ready for the pantry

Prepper Pantry = canned pancake syrup, strawberry rhubarb jam, strawberry jam, sloppy joes, ground turkey & salsa.  Dehydrated mushrooms, onions, celery, apples, strawberries & blueberries.

Some of the 15 Minute Chores I accomplished to keep my home in order:

Laundry Room & Half Bathroom - vacuumed floors.  Daily swish & swipe.

Dining Room - vacuumed & mopped  floor.

Kitchen -  vacuumed & mopped floor, scrubbed sink, cleaned range hood & stove.

Bedrooms & Main Bathroom - vacuumed & dusted.  Scrubbed sink & tub.  Daily swish & swipe.

Other - two large loads of laundry, vacuumed & dusted living room, hallway & entry, mopped living room entry.  Swept front porch & tidied the garage.

I found 19 canning jars at the thrift stores Saturday

How was your thrifty week?

Memorial Day

How I Am Financing My Prepper Pantry

When I decided to put together my prepper pantry I literally had no budget.  None.  But I knew if I was creative I could figure something out and I did.  The very first thing I did was go through my current pantry as well as all of my cupboards to determine what I already had.  I found a few items I had extra and that gave me my start.

Every time I grocery shop I grab 4 cans of tuna & 2 chicken

The first couple of weeks I worked on this using any extra money I had on hand to buy the things I needed.  If I worked any overtime I used that, if I had extra after paying my bills or buying our regular groceries I used that.  I used up the tail ends of some gift cards I had in my wallet.  When I was done with all of that I decided to use my Christmas gift card I received last year from my employer.  It was a good amount of money and I knew if I was really thoughtful and careful with it I would be able to do a lot with it.  Which is exactly what I did.

Gallon bags were on sale buy 1 get 1 free!

With my larger gift card I did a big shop at Winco and another one at Cash & Carry.  I made a trip to Dollar Tree too.  I was able to pick up quite a few food items as well as a few nonfood items like laundry detergent and food bags.

The new dehydrator is fabulous!

I sold some items on eBay and used the proceeds to purchase a vacuum sealer, rolls of vacuum bag material and a food dehydrater.  I used spare change in my wallet to pick up extra canning jars at a thrift store and some extra cash to buy lids at Wal-Mart.  I also bought a case of 20 Mason jars from Grocery Outlet with part of a gift card.

I gleaned a lot of canning jars and rings, storage boxes and canisters that I'd stashed out in our garage.  I repurposed some others I already had in the house.  I used up the Ziploc bags I had in a drawer and then bought some more on sale with my gift cards.

A trip to Dollar Tree proved very helpful

Since I began my prepper pantry I've had the opportunity to work more overtime and I've done that too.  As the balance on my Christmas gift card has dwindled I will do be doing my best to stretch the remainder of it to its fullest.  Then when I get paid next time I will use that extra money on my paycheck to get something else.

Thrift stores are a great place to find jars of all sizes

As time goes on and I shop with our regular grocery budget I hope to add more items to my cart too.  Finding items on sale, markdown or clearance and using paper or digital coupons to stretch those dollars will go a long way as well.

These banker boxes I had in the garage are perfect to store
vacuum sealed items while protecting them from dust and light

So far I have made a lot of progress and I know I still have a ways to go.  As long as I keep working at it I know I can get it done.  Have any of you beefed up your pantry supplies lately?

A Quick Garden Update

Not a lot of news yet on the garden front.  We've had a lot of rain which has made the soil in the raised beds nice and muddy.  I'm not complaining about it though because it is moisture we need and I do appreciate it.  Our lawn is nice and green as a result so as always I look for the silver lining.

Stopped mid project by the rain

The rain and cooler temperatures have allowed the bareroot strawberries I planted to get a good start.  They are beginning to sprout leaves and the ones I was sure were goners are actually still alive.  I've got netting stretched over the top of them to keep away squirrels and birds.

The blueberry bushes seem very happy in their new home and not signs of transplant shock.  I've spread some of our homemade compost around them and kept the beds clean and weed free.

The raspberries seem to be no worse for wear either.  They tend to be much more sensitive to being transplanted and were looking pretty wilted at first.  I can tell they are doing much better now and as with the blueberries I've spread some of our compost around them as well and am keeping the bed clean and weed free too.

These things are relentless

The one thing I have been doing almost daily is pulling weeds.  They seem to pop up everywhere and with all the rain it isn't all that surprising.  Those wild geraniums are prolific little buggers and I am sure I could pull them up daily and still never get them all.  But I'm trying.  I've been stirring up our compost bin on the right hand sided and adding new stuff to it from the left hand side.  I'm hoping to have a fresh batch in a month or so to amend the lawn as well as our garden as summer comes on.

I think the chickens miss me out there with them

Next up is to finish the raised beds and get some things planted.  I need to acquire some dirt for the new bed and finish turning the compost into the two old ones.  I seem to run out of time between rain storms.  Even if I don't get anything more done I've already done a lot and I won't feel bad about that.  But I've got some tomato starts to get in the ground pretty soon and a bunch of seeds I'd like to use so I'm hopeful I will get a lot more done.  So far, so good though and I'm pleased with my progress.