Week 18: How I Saved $133

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Each week I share how I saved money, hoping that some of these frugal ideas could be helpful to you.

Check out the Resources Page for tons of other money saving resources!

If you’ve read other How I Saved posts, feel free to skip down to the deals.

If you’re new, here’s a little background about why I share my savings…

You’d be surprised how much money you can save when you really put your mind to it. It’s the accumulation of lots of small choices and habits that dictate the path your finances take.

The money that you save might seem meaningless in small amounts, but it truly adds up. It leaves more money in your bank account that you can use to pay off debt, save for the future, or do more of what you enjoy.

I absolutely love saving money and wanted to start sharing how I save each week. Not to show off, but to hopefully demonstrate different ways to save and maybe inspire you to want to do the same.

I strive to save on groceries, eating out, clothes, gifts, gasoline, etc. You name it, and I want to save money on it.

My main motivation for saving money is to pay off our mortgage in the next 2-3 years. Every dollar saved is in honor of that goal.

We’ve paid off thousands of dollars in debt over the past couple years. Wouldn’t it feel so awesome to be completely debt free? And get to keep most of your paycheck instead of immediately sending it away to pay bills? I think so.

I thought I’d share how much I save each week by using my favorite savings formula: combining sales and coupons. Or whatever other ways I come up with to be frugal. Hopefully some of these methods can be applied to your life.

You can get caught up and read the rest of the How I Saved posts here

Related: Flat out broke? Try these 5 tips.

Here are my savings for Week 18 – April 30 – May 6

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Grocery Savings:

This is the easiest way to cut back on spending and save money. Each week, plan your shopping trip(s) based on what’s on sale. Then combine those sales with matching coupons to get the most bang for your buck. I always aim for at least 50% savings.

Related: Use one of these 5 easy meal planning strategies to make the most of your grocery budget.

I use coupon matchup sites to plan my deals. My favorites are Kroger Krazy, Meijer Madness, and Bargains to Bounty. They make it so easy by spelling out exactly what the sale items are, and which coupons to use. Such a couponing time saver!

The absolute best place to print coupons is coupons.com. It’s where I get all my printable coupons.

Here are the deals!

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Meijer Shopping Trip:

Since my allergies have been acting up majorly, I needed to stock up on some more Nasacort. There were a couple Nasacort coupons in the newspaper recently, and the best one was $15 off a 2-pack of the 120 count sprays.

Meijer had it priced at $31.49. In addition to my $15 off coupon, there were running a promotion where you get $3 off a $20+ allergy-related purchase. After both of those discounts, I paid $13.49 for 240 sprays. They sell 1-count 60 spray bottles for exactly $13.49, and I got the equivalent of 4 of them for that same price. That’s a 75% savings.

Revlon Colorstay is my favorite foundation, and it was on sale for Buy One, get One 50% off. I also had two $4 off coupons from a newspaper insert.

The foundation is regularly priced at $10.79 each, but after the sale and coupons, I paid $8.18 for both. That’s a 62% savings.

I also earned a $3 off my next shopping trip mPerk reward. If you shop at Meijer, make sure you are signed up for mPerks. In addition to the digital coupons you can ‘clip,’ they have rewards you earn if you spend a certain amount in a month. And the best part is, they base that amount on the full price of the items.

My reward offer says that I get $3 off my next shopping trip if I spend $150 in 30 days. I never actually spend that much, but the full price of what I purchase is equivalent to $150. I hope that makes sense!

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Here’s a great article that explains how to save money at Meijer.

Amount Saved: $62.05

Amount Spent: $21.67

Percentage Saved: 65%

Kroger Shopping Trip:

There were really some great deals going on at Kroger. Cinco de Mayo always brings about some excellent prices on Mexican food stuff. Don’t forget to check Kroger Krazy and Bargains to Bounty before your shopping trip. There are always so many more things on sale than show up in the ad.

My Kroger deals were:

  • Ortega tostada shells (50 cents each) – On sale for $1 each, plus a $1 off 2 printable coupon
  • Old El Paso taco seasoning (FREE) – a Free Friday digital coupon from last week
  • La Banderita tortillas (49 cents) – Kroger had a 4 day promotion where certain ‘Cinco de Mayo’ items were marked way down. These 10 packs of tortillas were included, at 49 cents a pack. You could buy up to 5 packages at that price, and I bought all five. They’re good for a couple months, plus I can freeze them for later use.
  • Bush’s black beans (24 cents) – On sale for 99 cents, less a 75 cents off one newspaper insert coupon. I had 2 coupons, so I bought two.
  • Kroger brand lunchmeat ($1.75) – These were priced at $2.50, and there was a 75 cents off each digital coupon that could be used up to 5 times. I bought two.
  • Kroger buns (49 cents) – I checked the bread ‘clearance rack’ and they had a lot of packages of buns marked down to 49 cents each. I bought 4 packages, since they freeze quite well.
  • Kroger brand bandages (FREE) – These were on sale for $1 per box, and there was a $1 off digital coupon. I thought the coupon was $1 off of two boxes, but it took $1 off each for some reason, so they were completely free.

I always make sure to do the survey on the bottom of my Kroger receipts, because that gives me 50 bonus fuel points. You can do a survey once every 7 days, which ends up being 200 extra fuel points a month if you go once a week. That means 20 cents off per gallon of gas. I’d say 95% of their receipts have surveys, so be sure to check!

Amount Saved: 34.03

Amount Spent: $9.39

Percentage Saved: 72%

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Aldi Shopping Trip:

Aldi is one of the most effortless ways to save money on groceries. You’re going to save 20-50% on most  items there, compared to other stores. You don’t have to wait for sales at Aldi. Some items are a little cheaper during certain seasons, but everything is always affordable.

I buy many staple items there, or whatever else I need/want that I can’t get cheaper elsewhere. For the purpose of these How I Saved posts, I’m going to estimate a 30% savings (and I think that’s being conservative). I am saving money by shopping at Aldi, so it totally counts.

We were in need of quite a few things at Aldi, since last month was a pantry and freezer use-up. I bought staples such as peanut butter, bread, cheese, english muffins, bread, applesauce, etc. Plus turkey, not realizing that it was going to be cheaper at Kroger. Hate when that happens!  : )

Related: Here are the 70 best things to buy at Aldi.

Related: Want some basic grocery savings ideas? Here are 5 ways to save money without using coupons.

Amount Spent: $37.24

Amount Saved (assuming 30% savings): $11.17

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I use a collapsible shopping basket like this one for my Aldi shopping.

Ibotta Savings: 25 cents (off on ‘Any Item’ from Kroger)

New to Ibotta? Click here for a $10 welcome bonus! You can cash out your earnings or use them to get a gift card to tons of awesome places like Amazon, iTunes, Nike, Target, Uber, and many more!

Gasoline Savings: 42 cents

Kroger always offers 3 cents off per gallon if you have their shopper’s card, so I used that.

Miscellaneous Savings:

At the Dollar Tree, I bought a variety of things, including disinfecting cleaning wipes, makeup wipes, and birthday candles. I have no doubt that I saved at least $15 by shopping there versus a store like Target.

We washed both cars ourselves, saving $10 compared to a car wash.

Amount Saved: $25

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Related: 7 beauty products you could be buying at the dollar store

Grand Total Savings for Week 18: $132.92

Total Saved Year-to-Date: $1541.95

You can read the rest of the How I Saved posts here.

Don’t forget to check out the Resources Page for tons of other money saving resources!

What are your tricks for saving money? How much did you save this week?

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2 Comments

  1. I’ve been following your weekly savings for awhile now, and I’m impressed with how much you’ve saved so far! It’s inspired me to do some similar posts on my own blog. 🙂 Keep up the great work!

    1. Thanks so much for following along, Christy! I’m actually surprised how much it adds up to, since I’ve never tallied it before. I look forward to checking out your money saving posts!

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