making ends meet

We are a family of five, and I stay at home while my hubby goes out to  work. How can we  live on $200 biweekly for groceries and still feed our 3 kids well?

I go to the local market and buy apples and oranges, vegetables.  I think we eat fairly healthy, but I'm finding that we are always running out of money or supplies like toothpaste or shampoo just before pay day.

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

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For starters Don't throw any leftovers away, you can repurpose any food into a lunch, a snack or part of another meal. And the saying "Eat everything on your plate" was a bad idea from the start, It SHOULD be: "Don't take more than you can eat" ... This would not only help stop waste, but it would help with childhood obesity. Another thing, cooking from scratch can really help you save money & eat healthier if you have the time, but if you work outside the home this can be very difficult to do because of time constraints. Of course, cut out empty calories like junk food, chips, cake, cookies & frozen treats except on special occasions unless you're making them from scratch. Also, for those who have weight problems, you already know it's best if you bake your food & don't fry it!

I raised 4 kids on a SUPER-TIGHT budget. I had a breadmaker & used it to make my own "Hot Pockets" out of left overs & would freeze them for snacks or use them as a fun lunch surprise. You can make "hot-pockets" with any leftover meat, cheese, veggies, even left over casseroles. Homemade pockets can be Mexican, Italian, or Thai based. You can even put rice or potatoes & cheese in them, or fruit with a bit of honey can be baked inside of a homemade hot-pocket. (Just add a thickener like you would when making a pie) If you don't have a breadmaker, They always have them at Thrift Shops or Craig's List. You can most likely find the manual for a used one on-line.

Try to have healthy snacks already made up for your kids. My daughter always has a bag of cut up carrots & celery in her fridge which can be eaten alone or w/ ranch dressing dip. Whenever her small daughter says "I'm hungry" (which REALLY means "I'm board") she says, "Go get yourself some carrot sticks!" & if she does, she knows she REALLY IS hungry, but if not, she knows she's just board. For Teenagers, maybe something like Pretzels might do. They are fat-free & don't have a bunch of junk in them & can be bought at the dollar store. My mom raised us to reach for fruit when we wanted a snack, but I really couldn't afford to keep my fridge stocked w/fruit when raising my kids.$$$ Good for you if you can!

Of course, watch the Sales & only buy certain things when they are on sale & coupon shop like there's no tomorrow. My daughter always tries to use a STORE coupon WITH a MANUFACTURERS coupon & sometimes she'll get a fancy make-up or moisturizer for only 25 cents! Recently, I noticed our "cheapie" brand of TP has gone up a a lot! ($4 a 4 pack for Scott 1000) So I now watch the Wallgreens ads because their TP goes on sale for only 39 cents each! ($1.56 for 4) & you can't beat THAT! My kids are all grown now, but when I DID have a little extra money & something I knew I'd use in the future went on sale (like mustard, mayonnaise or ketchup etc) I'd buy it for later use.

I want to say a quick word about sales. I've found that for food, Walmart isn't always the cheapest place to shop. In my area Fred Myers has better sale prices on food than Walmart's regular prices. Recently we just started shopping at a "Liquidation" type of grocery stores. These things are NOT past pull date. But new, discontinued items straight from the manufacturer. We also have a 24 hour store called "WinCo" that has normal prices that are FAR cheaper than ANY SALE PRICES I've seen anywhere... Simply AMAZING prices! They keep their prices down by not taking Credit Cards (I don't know about checks) Just Debit cards or Cash. Costco, Sams & Walmart aren't always the cheapest stores around!

WINCO STORE LOCATIONS:
http://www.wincofoods.com/locations.htm

I remember my mom talking about how my Dad's mom had raised 3 kids during the depression. She did things like rinse out baggies & re-use them. She always had a plate of Bread & butter on the table in case the kids were still hungry after the main coursed were gone & she'd do food-stretching things (which I thought strange at the time) like adding spaghetti noodles to her chili to make it go further. She'd even add a bit of oatmeal to her hamburgers & meat loaf to make them go further. I'm a vegetarian & raised my kids with "not a lot" of meat. Instead of a large piece of meat for each, I'd chop up ONE piece of chicken up & add it to fried rice or a caserole. It's not true that you need to eat meat every day. I haven't eaten it since 1979 & I'm as healthy (at 53) as can be. Of course small children need a certain amount of protein, but they can get it from cheese, dairy, rice & beans etc.

My kids qualified for discounted school lunches which I took advantage of after & my husband & I worked for years paying IN to the tax system, So I didn't feel bad actually using it. If you DO qualify for free or discounted lunches, that's who they're for, & if your kids don't mind, (my daughter was to embarrassed) this can be a major help to a low-income family! Speaking of school, unless you live where there are NO buses, send your kids to school on the bus, do NOT drive them. Just think of all the money (& time) it cost to drive kids to school when you're already paying for the busses with your taxes!

I sewed all the clothes for both of my daughters until they went into Jr. High. I bought most of my 2 sons clothes at second-hand stores, thrift shops & garage sales. Except for once a year, I saved up a little out of each paycheck to be able to let them pick out NEW clothes for "back to school" (only once a year) at a discount store like TJ Max, Ross, Marshals or K-mart (Target cost to much!). I still by all of my own clothes at Thrift shops & resell my unwanted clothes at Consignment shops. When it came to Christmas I never used a charge card. Some Christmas's we had very little but no one ever seemed to mind. I've heard of families who cut pictures out of catalogs, then buy these things after Christmas when they're on sale.

Another way to save money (so you have extra for food) is on electricity. Buy a toaster oven for $20 at Walmart. This way, if your meal fits into the toaster oven, you'll not have to heat up the larger oven. Just think, if you're only heating up bread-rolls, you don't need a large oven to do it in! Other ways to save on power bills is to only wash clothes in cold water & hang clothes outside on nice days instead of running the dryer. My biggest waste is leaving the TV on. They say besides the Furnace, Oven & Dryer it's the Next Biggest user of power in the home! So turn the TV OFF when it's not in use! We like to sleep with the heat off, so we always remember to turn the furnace off at night. (This saves us a ton!) Also, put plastic on your windows in the winter time. You can hardly see the kind that shrinks w/a heat gun or blow dryer & it saves ALL KINDS of money. They say if you're not using a room to turn the heat off in it & to just heat the room your in w/an oil-filled "radiator" style heater ($40 at Home Depot).

Sometimes people think they need expensive vacations (& they'll pay on THAT charge card forever to pay it off!) But in reality, Kids are just as happy with a family camping trip close to home. Whenever you can, buy USED! That's cars, & other household items. If you ever get into financial trouble, go to a nonprofit credit councilor as they can get your credit card interest TOTALLY DROPPED by talking to the credit card company & they'll put you on a sliding scale to pay back your consolidated debts. These days one of the VERY BEST ways to save money is to buy yourself an older TINY car to run errands in, especially if your main vehicle is a mini-van, an SUV or a truck. I drive a small older car to run my errands even though I need a mini-van for work. You really need a tiny car to drive your kids to & from sporting events & to go shopping & to the Doctor, etc. I can fit me & 4 kids in my little TINY 1991 hatch back, PLUS, there's even room for groceries in the back! Don't say you can't afford another car, you can't aford NOT to have a tiny car these days (I found my daughter an '88 Honda for $800 & she drove it for over 2 years with no repairs needed!) Just make sure you have someone help you pick the car out if you don't know what you're doing!

---> Probably the smartest thing I ever did was sit down with my older kids (starting in about 6th grade) & putting my monthly bills in front of them, then I'd give them my checkbook & let THEM actually write out the checks for the bills each month. This REALLY opened their eyes when they saw how much $ came in & went out to support the family each month. I'd show them how much was deposited from their father paycheck & give them a calculator & let them figure out how much was left after bills for food etc. My oldest daughter said this really helped her when she got her own place to know how to pay bills & budget. PLUS, it really makes the older kids feel important. When they were done writing out the checks, they'd bring them to me for signing after they'd addressed & stamped the envelops themselves.

* I guess when it comes down to it, you can't JUST save on your groceries, you have to try to save on EVERYTHING else! ... This leaves extra money for the groceries & small treats once in a while... We can't help BUT to try & save EVERYWHERE we can with prices on everything going up every day & our paychecks (especially for the elderly & disabled) not going up one penny! (& the oil companies whistling all the way to the bank!)

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