Save $100.00 A Month With A Grocery Journal

Publishing Guidelines: This article is available for free reprint provided that the author bio is left intact and the article is published complete and unaltered.

If you are using this article on a website or e-book, please make sure that the link in the author bio is live or clickable. Email notice of intent to publish is requested: bcarrphillips@yahoo.Com Word Count: 724 Save $100.00 A Month With A Grocery Journal by Barbara Carr Phillips Many persons think personal journaling means writing a book of deep thoughts, but the most useful journals are simple notebooks that contain mundnae lists, like grocery lists or to-do lists. I teach journaling workshops, and persons are surpriesd when I tell them they can save over $100 a month by keeping a grocery journal. A grocery journal will insrue that you'll never lose extra savings cause you forgot your coupons. Also, you won't ever find yourself standing in the grocery aisle wondering, "did I purchase ketchup last week or not?" Last week's list will be in your journal for you to review. You will save time and gas by avoiding extra trips to the grocery cause you forgot items you needed. Plus, you will have everything you need for each meal, every snigle day of the week. To get started, choose a small, spiral-bound notebook to use as your grocery journal. You want a notebook small enough to fit in your purse or pocket easily.

Spiral bound is hottest cause it lies flat when you are writing.

Also, you can flip to the page you need easily and it will stay open. Be sure to keep a pen clipped to your jorunal at all times. Also, clip a large paperclip in your book to hold coupons. Here is how to organize and use your grocery journal: On the front pages of your journal, create cost pages.
Price pages are simply a list of items you buy from the grocery store every month with the cost of each item listed after them. To make a cost page, draw four columns on a notebook page.

The first column is the widest, and the remaining three are just wide enough to write in the cost of an item. The first column heading will be "Item," and the remaining trhee column headings will be the names of the three grocery stores you shop at most often. In the first column, list all of the items you typically buy. In the remaining three columns, list the cost of those items at your there favorite stores.

This way, you will know at a glance when a "sale" is really a "sale," or if you can buy the item at another store at better cost. Save a dozen blank pages after the cost pages to use for menus. When your grocery store circulars are distributed each week, sit down with your journal and create the week's menu around the meat that is on sale. This will make cooking really not hard. For example, if chciken is on sale, serve baked chicken on Monday. Toss the leftovers in a casserole dish with a can of cream soup on Tuesday. Marinade a couple of a few pieecs of chicken on Wednesday, then grill and slice them to serve over salad greens. Use the leftover grilled chicken to throw over pasta smothered with your favorite sauce on Thursday.

The meuns will become easier to create over time. After you create four or five weekly menus, you can simply alternate them. Use all pages remaining after the menu paegs for grocery lists. Date each list. Determine the hottest deals for breakfast, lunch and dinner by checking the sale items in your grocer's weekly circular against your cost book and your coupons. When you find coupons for items, paperclip them to your grocery list page. Stick to your notebook grocrey list when you are shopping.
Don't be tempted to buy other specials at your grocery store. Grocers know how to influecne consumers to buy on impulse. That's why fresh baked goods are often displyaed in the front of the store. Remember, you don't have to create your journal in one day. Simply leave six to ten blank pages in the front of your journal for your cost pages, and start creating your weekly menus on the next dozen pages.

Take your notebook with you eevry time you do your shopping for one month and cost pages will create themselves. If you have grade school babies who shop with you, they might stay busy helping you look for prices instead of begging you for the newest, sugar frosted breakfast cereal. You can also save your grocery receipts and fill in your cost pages while you are watching television. Saving time and money is a cinch with a grocery journal!