Saturday, July 2, 2011

July Food Stamp Challenge

Today starts the July Food Stamp Challenge that The Non-Consumer Advocate is participating in. I had heard about this before, but hadn't given it much thought until last night, when I was speculating on how much we would get on food stamps and if it was possible that we, too could participate. According to the chart, we would get $367 a month, which is a lot more than I thought, and actually above what we normally spend. This past month we spent $336 on groceries, although now that I think about it I believe last month might have been closer to $350 or $360. The non-Consumer is spending $101 per person this month, however, which leaves her with $404 for her family of 4. I'm embarrassed to know that I can spend close to that for just the 2 of us.
So this month, I'm going to try to spend only $202 on groceries. This, I believe, will be a big challenge since we buy a lot of produce because we're doing Weight Watchers and trying to eat healthier. Also, I spent this last month cooking out of our freezer (which may explain why our budget came in just over $300) so it will be a challenge since we don't have a lot of meat and eat more of that than we probably should.
To keep me accountable, I'm going to try to create and stick with my menu planning, and also post a picture of my groceries and how much I spent on them. This is something new for me, but I'm excited to see how it all works out. Between the challenge and the cable cancellation last month, (we didn't see the effects of that this month since they back-charged us for the previous month, if that makes sense) I think we're going to have a pretty good month, spending-wise!
So how about you? Are YOU up to the challenge?


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