Wednesday, November 7, 2007

My Pantry

I love my husband. His main goals in life are to provide for, protect, and enjoy his family. He does these things well. Another goal he has at the top of his list is to make ME happy. I just mentioned how I would like to make room in the closet off the kitchen for a small pantry. He has spent today building me a wonderful full sized pantry!! I am in awe of how he can create something out of nothing. His ability to make things out of wood is wonderful. There are many things in my home that Sweet Hubby has made to make our home more beautiful. I will, one day soon share these things with you.

For now, I will share my grocery shopping trip. I shopped at Super Wal Mart today. Next week I will actually go to Kroger for their sale and Wal Mart for everything else. UGH! That sounds exhausting. I may talk to Sweet Hubby and see if I can do a bi-weekly shop instead of weekly. My feet hurt!! I had 2 FULL carts of groceries...twice as much as usual and I intended to cut my bill in half. Last week I spent a total of $413.66 on food. GASP!! So this week I had a budget of $200.00. I changed a few things about my list. First I changed the kinds of foods I bought. Hardly any prepared foods. No treats or cookies, etc. No frozen bags of fries or chicken nuggets. Another thing I changed is, I looked at the prices. For example, I buy Cottonelle TP (I won't change that) and I noticed I could buy 24 double rolls for 11.94. Well I looked at the 12 double roll package and it was 5.50. It was cheaper to buy 2 of those...I would have never looked. I also saw the cottage cheese I buy was 3.64!! I switched to the store brand for a 1.40 savings. Cereal is a biggie here. Kyle eats a Jethro size (small mixing bowl) bowl of cereal in the morning, at 3 pm and at bedtime he has a normal size bowl. I told him he would be able to have his Jethro bowl in the morning and a regular size bowl at some point during the day....he would need to choose another snack for his third hunger pang. I bought a total of 7 large boxes of name brand cereals today. Another area where I do not care for store brand, and in this case there is not much savings. The price difference in cereal at Wal Mart and Kroger is DOLLARS. Wal Mart is 1/3 cheaper. I hope we do not go through the 7 boxes in one week, but this will tell me how many I need. I also had several things on my list for my baking center...I spent 29.10 in that isle alone. (I added with a calculator each section...dairy, baking, frozen, etc., just to see what I spend). OK, so GRAND TOTAL was $209.42!!! I only bought 2 things that were not on my list and those were for my mom, who gave me cash, so I guess I was only over my budget by $6!! I DID cut my bill in half and we will be eating better than we ever have!! If I can do this then anyone can!! Little TJ came over wearing his new shirt. I had not seen him in several days. Rachel said he was calling me on his toy phone. When they came over this afternoon, he said all the way here "I like the Grandma". Awwww. What happens at Grandma's, stays at Grandma's!! Well, all the groceries are put away and the Egg Casserole is in the oven. It was a good day! Here are a few pics of my finished pantry. They are dark, so I apologize.
Just to note...I am using this full size pantry for overflow. I still use my wonderful panrty with the sliding drawers for all of our food we are using. There is just no way I can bulk shop and have extra storage for extra boxes of cereal, etc. with my kitchen pantry alone. Isn't it wonderful?? Thank You Sweet Hubby!!!

17 comments:

Unknown said...

What a talented hubby you have Bren, lovely new pantry. Well done on the grocery shopping, give yourself a huge pat on the back. Remember if you need or want "from scratch" recipes I have loads. Talk to you tomorrow.

Niki said...

Your great guy sounds alot like mine...that type of man is a pleasure to cherish! YOU DID SO GREAT!!! How was the egg cass, did it turn out? I love your pantry cupboards tell hubby they look great!
Blessings,hugs and a big pat on the back!

Unknown said...

So you are making progress on your shopping, good for you. Your hubby didn´t waste time, just made the pantry right away. Great job.

Niki said...

I forgot to say how cute TJ looked, I'm going to have to get a tshirt like that one day soon!

Belvie said...

Wow Bren! Congratulations! You did a great job with the shopping. Looking at all those bags....it must have worn you out putting them away.

How sweet of your husband to do the pantry for you. Guess that is his way of supporting your efforts to cut the grocery costs down a bit.

Corin said...

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!! GO BREN GO!!! Sounds like you had a great shopping trip!

What a wonderful husband to build you a pantry! They really are nice to have!

My garage pantry is very very deep, and the shelves are exactly the height of quart sized canning jars. I'm saving my pennies, then I'll rip those out and put up shelves that work better for me.

Melzie said...

Your pantry is AWESOME I've been contemplating my back/laundry/JUNK room and considering making it a pantry. Can I borrow your hubby? Mind isnt house-talented LOL. Mine can make you a race car...WHAT?! NO DEAL?! lol...how many people are you feeling on that for a week? We spend about $150 a week on food and household goods, I'm trying to cut that even more by making menus. wuvs you ;) xoxo melzie

Anonymous said...

Hi Bren,
I love your pantry. It is nice to have a handy dh. My Dave can build anything too. My project is a tea towel. You did great on your shopping. I am going on Friday. With prayer and planning will I do well. Do you have a CVS there? They have name brand cereal cheap this week.
Together we will get through this season of learning.
Hugs,
Elizabeth

copperswife said...

Bren!!!!!! I am soooooooo excited for you!!! You did great!!!

And that husband of yours! The pantry is terrific. Talk about teamwork! The two of you make a great team!

CONNIE W said...

You make a great team and the results are amazing. My kitchen pantry is about the same size as yours but I wish mine were larger but since it is not, I'm happy to have it. Isn't it great to see a plan come together.

Charlene said...

I have enjoyed getting caught up with your Blog. I've followed the links and am surprised to find us below the thrifty level. We have 5 in our family and I spend $500 a month on food and household items.

I have been telling myself we can't afford to buy better quality food, but I think we probably can. Especially if I keep up my personal cooking challenge of eating more dinners at home.

I have enjoyed your "centers" and hope to be able to post some of my kitchen areas soon.

I am always inspired by your posts.

meggie said...

You are so lucky to have such a talented & obliging husband! What a lovely pantry.
Good on you with your shopping too, you are really a 'Wonder Woman' Bren!!

Knit-Wit said...

Yeah! You did it! I KNEW you could!

Cereal is the budget killer in my family. Some weeks I don't even buy it and the kids have learned to make their own eggs or we'll have oatmeal or toast.

I love having a husband whose goal in life is to make me happy. :)

Teodo said...

Your husband is a treasure|
Now you can be happy.
ciao ciao

Darlene said...

A new pantry! WooHoo!

Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday, dear Bren,
Happy Birthday to you!

I hope you and yours have a wonderful day. Enjoy!

Dani said...

Congratulations on your shopping trip, and your new pantry looks great!

Donetta said...

That is awesome! Throw in some whole bay leaf for natural pest controll