#3 Goes Shopping



He knew the drill.  "Over there by the flowers!"

 #3 is feeling so much better and so we went shopping tonight!  Tomorrow his challenge will start at breakfast, so he gets to enjoy one last dessert with us. 

His meal plan was interesting.  #3 is my pickiest eater, but also likes a few things no one else in our house likes.  He likes plain foods and he will eat some foods every day if you let him.  Every day at school, he has a plain cheeseburger.  I was pretty sure he would have the most money left because he wouldn't want condiments and other extras.  One interesting thing he wants with his dinner is celery dipped in peanut butter.  I was shocked one Thanksgiving to discover he likes celery.  Another day he saw a grapefruit a neighbor had dropped outside and he asked, "Is that grapefruit?  I love grapefruit!  I tried it at school."  I had no idea.  This is my kid who exclaimed, "I told you I hate juicy meat!"  I made the most delicious rosemary garlic pork roast.  It was so moist, but he was repulsed by it. 

We were in luck!  A peanut butter sale.

#3 wanted Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, but the Fred Meyer brand was 50 cents a box.  Then he saw some canned macaroni and cheese, which was $1.50 each, but he didn't have to buy butter with that.  The butter was $2.99.  He kept his eye on the prize, wanting lots of money to spend on treats next week. 

I stepped on this calculator today because it was in the middle of my kids' bedroom floor, but amazingly it still worked.

My husband grew up on "macaroni and tomato juice".  I can't bring myself to eat it, but all of my kids like it.  He adds cheese too, but #3 said he could go without it for the sake of saving money.  This will feed him for at least four days.  The other few days he will be eating 89 cent "spaghetti rings" with his celery and peanut butter.  He bought a box of brown sugar and cinnamon oatmeal for $2.59.  It has 10 pouches, so he can eat that all week for breakfast.  That was his most expensive purchase.

He really wanted to have oranges with his lunches and last night I saw them at QFC for 88 cents a pound.  I thought it would be worth it to buy them there.  #2 spent half of his leftover money on a pack of gum to chew during the MSP next week (state testing) because they say it helps you concentrate better.  He cracks me up.  At QFC, he found Toblerone bars for a dollar each.  That was $1.99 off the regular price.  He also pointed out some Fuji apples for 78 cents a pound.  "That's a good deal!" 

See how happy he looks?  Wait until you hear the grand total. 

#3 spent $20.89!  He has $12.11 to spend on whatever he wants.  He's hoping he can find a cheap movie and buy candy.  He has some birthday money to add to it. 

Now comes the hard part.  #3 asks me on a regular basis, "What's for dessert?"  "Since when is dessert a regular meal?" I ask.  He has a major sweet tooth.  He had one last bowl of ice cream and asked if he could have two scoops instead of one.  "No!" I laughed. 

Milk, celery, peanut butter, bananas, canned mac and cheese, spaghetti rings, oatmeal, oranges, and macaroni and tomato juice.  He'll be in Heaven not having to eat any of my "disgusting" food.  I'll be in Heaven not hearing him complain about what's for dinner.  But the thought of eating what he's eating makes me want to hurl.

#2 Goes Shopping

His money is dreamy.  And yes, I posed him in front of the flowers too.

Tonight went a little more quickly than last week and we got off to an earlier start.  We had leftovers for dinner and #2 had a snack since his dinner would be rather late.  We talked quite a bit about his list.  He wanted to have hamburgers, orange chicken, Eggo's with whipped cream and strawberries, Spaghetti, and more.  He can't eat breakfast at school two days a week because he has orchestra, so he had to plan four breakfasts.

Smelling the flowers.  This picture is so serene.

He thought he would buy some frozen hamburger patties, but that would be at least $8 and the chicken would be at least $7.  Sure enough, when we went shopping the hamburger patties were just too much, so I told him we could buy a pound of ground beef for less than half as much and make our own patties.  We'll probably look up a YouTube video on how to do it, mostly because I don't actually want to handle the meat.  I'm going to make him do it!  Bwah hahahahahaaaaa!!!!  I can't even stand molding ground beef with gloves on because the sound also disgusts me.  I've built a tolerance to touching steaks, roasts, chickens, etc., but just thinking about forming ground beef patties last night made me feel a little nauseated.  The thought of making an entire meatloaf was practically enough to induce vomiting.

I'm going to stop thinking about that now.

It was decided that he would have to do without orange chicken and eat more leftovers.  He should be able to make four large hamburgers and he wants tomatoes and onion on them. 

Broccoli was no longer on sale for 68 cents a pound.  That was pretty disappointing, so he bought cauliflower for 99 cents a pound.  One head should feed him for at least four nights.

Tomorrow is his dad's birthday, so he's contributing a baguette bread which he bought for $1.50.  I gave him the choice between making his own meal or joining us for ours.  I'm making "Duck Pasta".  Years ago my husband had a pasta dish with duck at a restaurant and he loved it.  Last year I made Spicy Duck Ragu which he liked, but it was different and rather spicy.  I found another one he might like better.  You cook some bacon and sautee sweet onion, garlic, portabello mushrooms, and the duck, which I will have to bone.  I couldn't find duck breasts for sale, so I'll just cook the whole duck.  You can find them at Cash and Carry for $2.33 a pound.  You can also buy a 3 pound package of bacon ends and pieces for a little over $4, which is a little more than a 1 pound package of regular bacon.  If you need pieces instead of bacon strips, it works out great!

#2 is commenting on how much spaghetti a pound makes now that it's done cooking.  He says it doesn't look like enough to feed even one person before you cook it.  #1 still had some tonight and I made him eat it so it wouldn't go to waste.  He didn't mind.

We talked about Eggo's at the store, but here he was buying a whole loaf of bread and only had a couple sandwiches planned.  I told him he could make french toast with strawberries and whipped cream.  We're going to slice up the strawberries and freeze them.  We also found half a pint of whipping cream for 99 cents.  We looked at the Eggo's and they had some for about $2 and you do think how it's really not that much money, but it's amazing how everything adds up.  He agreed to make french toast. 

He bought his own peanut butter and I told him he could use the blackberry jam I bought, but he wanted strawberry so he bought that too.  They also didn't have the 99 cent ketchup anymore, so he bought the Fred Meyer brand.  He doesn't like that one, but he said it was worth it to save money.

He also opted not to buy any juice.  He'll just have water and milk this week.  It will be interesting to see how fast his milk goes.  #1 still had a little left, but he also had two juices that he used up.  The strawberries were $3, so I guess that's the one thing he got to splurge on. 

His total came to $30.01 and the cashier didn't make him pay the penny.  He has $3 left!  I was very impressed when he said he wants to put it in the bank.  He also decided he wasn't going to eat sugar cereal.  He would have Cheerios with sliced banana. 

Here goes another week of adventure!

Day One: Shopping With Our Firstborn

Tonight was interesting, amusing, and exhausting.  It brought back memories of when my husband and I were newlyweds in the Air Force, walking around the Commissary while we painstakingly calculated every item on a list. Having to put back one item would probably throw off not one meal plan, but multiple meals.  Discovering we were over our limit at the cash register was too much humiliation to bear.  I think we used a calculator until we had our first son (he was very vocal about how he hated going anywhere), which brings us to victim number one!  I mean, our willing contestant.

He looks so happy with his $33, doesn't he?  And doesn't every boy want to pose in front of pretty flowers?  Oh dear.  He's reading over my shoulder and exclaiming, "Hey, you planned that!"

His original menu included a mix of bacon, eggs, and toast for breakfast with apple slices and cereal.  In fact, he thought he would eat two breakfast sandwiches.  I suppressed the urge to laugh.  He also threw in a banana somewhere to make it interesting.  He usually buys lunch at school (for a reduced price), so I figured it wouldn't be an accurate amount if we expected him to buy all of his food for lunch.

Tonight he was going to have a sandwich and an apple.  When he saw how much the lunch meat was, he decided on hot dogs instead that were $1.00.  The lunch meat was about $3.89.  We found buns for 99 cents - 8 of them to go with his 8 hot dogs.  We were able to avoid this scenario.



Instead of mayonnaise for sandwiches, he bought some ketchup for a dollar to go with the hot dogs.  He was determined to make orange chicken that he could eat for a couple nights, but he had no idea how expensive chicken breasts are and that you can't just buy two of them.  You're committed to a whole package.  Ah, I remember being single and having little variety to my meals for that reason.

We went to the produce section so we could get a better idea of how we were doing.  He would need ten apples for everything he planned.  They were $1.49 per pound.  I asked him how much he thought they would weigh.  He guessed about two pounds.  Those alone came out to $9!  He said he would get smaller apples instead, but it still wasn't looking good.  So I offered him a solution, "You can take advantage of the school's free breakfast the whole week."

We put back the bacon, which was about $3.84.

To make orange chicken, he would also need some stir fry vegetables.  I suggested maybe he just do broccoli.  If you buy it fresh, it's 68 cents per pound and you don't have to buy a large amount.  He was happy with that.  He also bought cornstarch as his one staple he was required to pay for.  Salt was the one seasoning he chose.  He gets to borrow my orange sauce, but we remembered at the last minute that he needed vegetable oil.  That was another $1.99.

He was going to use cheese with his eggs and bacon, so we put that back too.  Saved him $1.89 (for a half pound).

He really wanted to make spaghetti with meat sauce.  The ground beef alone would be more than the can of sauce he ended up buying for $1.49.  We looked closer at the label when we got home.  It's meat flavored sauce.

We found a coupon for Fred Meyer cereal.  He will have to plan his own breakfasts for the weekend.  That came to $1.50.

Milk was $2.49 for a gallon.  I'm curious as to whether he will drink the whole thing by the end of the week, but I plan on marking the level with a Sharpie every night to see how quickly it's going. 

Wednesday we are having a friend over for dinner, so he's bringing some excess rice that he's using for orange chicken.  We're calling it a potluck.

After wandering all over the store for over an hour and managing to buy the pineapple and apple juices he wanted, that came to a grand total of $31.44.  He has $1.56 to spend!  But he doesn't get to spend it until this week is through.  He has to prove that he can make the food last without having to buy anything else. 

I already had to remind him to close his package of buns unless he wants to eat the rest of his hot dogs on what would feel like giant, flavorless croutons.

His food is labeled.  Some of it is in the fridge and the rest is safely stowed in a box on top.  He says he kind of likes the idea of having food no one else is allowed to eat.  His brothers have an idea of how painful their shopping trips will be, but they're still throwing out ideas like Eggo's with whipped cream and strawberries. 

Aw, they're so cute!  And they're so not going to be eating that.