my 50th post. and second quarter coupon statistics.

first things first id like to take a few minutes to blubber about how this is my fiftieth (FIFTIETH!) blog post. seriously. fifty posts. this is a really huge deal for me because, well, when i started, i didnt think that anyone would even read it and knowing me it wasnt going to last, given that im lazy and unmotivated and quit everything i start. so of all the people that are surprised that this little blog is still going (and that people other than my mom are reading it), i am definitely the most surprised. i wish i had something more exciting to say about this, but im really just still in disbelief that its even still going. maybe my 100th post will be more special. maybe. 

anyways, back to our regularly scheduled programming... 

as you may have noticed, today is july 1st, which means that i had to clean out all of my expired june coupons:

today also marks SIX MONTHS of tracking my grocery savings (you can read more about it here). now since ive recently had to make HUGE changes to my diet and how i shop (read more here and here) , i was really worried that i wouldnt  be able to stick to our budget, or that couponing would become a waste of time, or that id have to give up my little game of trying to beat my saving percentage high score. well, im happy to announce that NONE of those things happened!

obviously my new dietary restrictions mean that we now require some pretty expensive staples, and that were spending a LOT more money on produce than before, however were also not buying any processed/packaged foods (which are actually much more expensive than fresh foods) so things even out. ive also stopped stocking up on "extra" food, and just buying exactly what we need for the coming week, so after just a few weeks i managed to keep our $50 a week grocery budget in effect, and have managed to come in under budget a few times. while im not really using that many food coupons (most of them are for foods i cant eat), im still using LOTS of target coupons (and their new cartwheel app, its my new favorite) and hardly paying anything for our household/toiletry-type items (also ive been planning our trips a little better so we only have to go to target once every 2-3 weeks). and despite all the little changes ive made to trim down our grocery spending, im STILL making great savings percentages! 

so here are the numbers for this quarter: ive used $240.25 in actual coupons, and saved a total of $738 dollars (an average of 37% savings per transaction). so while this is a little less impressive than last time, i feel its also worth noting that i am consistently spending less than i was before. and my total cumulative savings for the year (less newspapers and printer ink)? $1481.82. seriously. i dont even know what id do if i hadnt learned how to shop this efficiently (thanks mom!), because let me tell you, we do NOT have that kind of money.  

family coffee date.

things have been excessively busy in the meyers house lately. james is back working full-time, for some reason ive gotten a weird rush of classes this week, and i have to spend tomorrow fasting in preparation for yet another unpleasant doctors appointment. on top of all this, its been a million degrees out and our shoebox apartment with poorly placed windows has no ceiling fans. i think i speak for all of us when i say we definitely deserved a fun treat this weekend. something like a big fancy family dinner date. unfortunately our bank account didnt agree with that idea. i did however have a buy-one-drink-get-one-free coupon for coffee bean, so after i got home from work this afternoon we had a family coffee date

since one of the drinks was free, we agreed to get a snack to share as well. the only thing that looked like i could eat it was the little fruit and cheese box, and at first i was like "six dollars for grapes and cheese? is this really necessary?", but then i remembered, this was a special treat. and im totally glad we splurged on it, it was actually PACKED with really great cheese and made a super satisfying snack for all three of us. this particular location also had a really cozy semi-enclosed patio area, so we got to have some much needed quiet time to relax (have i mentioned that ALL of our neighbors have been excessively loud lately, all the time?)

sigh. i really, really wish alice would stand still for a picture just once in her life. 

it was so great to go hang out as a family, that when we finished our treat, we really didnt want to go home to our stuffy, noisy apartment. we were having leftovers for dinner and i didnt need to get home to cook, so we didnt. we went over to the mall and walked around for a while until we decided it was time to eat dinner and watch doctor who. 

and thats exactly what we did. it was the most perfect saturday weve had in a very, very long time.

summer goals.

summer is definitely in full swing here at the meyers house, and alice is really into it. we have totally been taking advantage of all the free things to do around here, in addition to more regular beach days, weve also been spending more time at the park:

swimming in our buildings pool:

drawing with chalk:

and checking out the splash pad at alondra park (ok, alice wasnt super into this one):

 

in a couple of days it will be july, and our disneyland passes will be blocked out until mid-august (not that we want to go in the summertime anyways). with no free disneyland, ive been compiling a mental list of other free things to try this summer now that alice is old enough to enjoy day trips (or i guess more accurately, now that alice is old enough for me to enjoy taking her on day trips). as this mental list was growing two things came to mind: 1.  i was starting to get a little crazy and needed to take it down a notch and stick to a small manageable list that we might actually be able to finish, and 2. why limit our summer goals to just day trips for alice? why not make a short list of goals for other areas of life too? 

james and i talked about it for a bit, and we concluded that this was a much better idea than the big grandiose yearly goal list we made back in january (organized by month, with deadlines, and completely based on a projected income that well... didnt happen). heres what we came up with:

for alice:

1. go to at least two new parks. theres SO many parks in the south bay that this should be the easiest one. 

2. visit the california science center. alice has been to the natural history museum a couple times now, but not the science center, and its one of my favorite field trips from when i was a kid. 

for me:

1. get the new etsy shop up and running. this is currently in progress, and im really excited about how its going, i just want to make sure that everythings in working order by the end of summer

2. work on improving my photography skills. since i started this blog ive noticed that my photography has gotten really sloppy. i found some photos from my old etsy shop, back when i took pictures almost every day, and i couldnt even believe that i used to be that good, so i need to practice more so i can be that good again. 

for the family:

1. deep clean the whole house and purge it of unnecessary belongings. we did this with our closets back in january and it was awesome, i think the whole house will be a lot more comfortable if it wasnt so cluttered. 

2. institute a weekly family bible study time. this is something we talk about doing all the time and never actually do, so now were going to fix that. 

and thats our summer goal list! im really excited to work on these and see how they go. 

so what do you have planned this summer?