Monthly Shopping Trip!

I get my money once a month, which allows about $500 for spending on food and toiletries for the entire month. On the day the money hits my checking account, I start reviewing grocery store circulars (especially King Soopers) and anything I can find for Wal-Mart and Vitamin Cottage. Then I make my list for the coming month's needs, and go shopping the next day.

The good thing about holidays is that lots of goodies are on sale, especially this week. Here's a few things I found:

• King Soopers has gluten-free rice mac and cheese on sale for $1.00 a box! Believe it or not, that's a great price!
• KS has Kuner's chili beans for .69 cents a can.
• KS has cans of chicken and beef stock for .50 cents a can.
• KS has several types of apples - 10 pounds for $10.00. Same with pears, which my Kid loves!
• For meat, I usually find if I get to King Soopers early on a Monday, I find lots of "almost expired" meat, noted with a bright orange sticker, for sometimes 50% of the original price. I very rarely buy meat if it doesn't have an orange sticker.

Wal-Mart's circular didn't show much on sale that I wanted (baking supplies but I'm all full up!), but they have some great standby's that I usually get for a decent price (their "great value" brand): turkey pepperoni, taco shells, instant decaf tea, pizza sauce.

Vitamin Cottage online circular doesn't show anything from the grocery section, and I didn't receive a hard copy in the mail this week, but here's my list, none of which go on sale very often: vanilla goat yogurt, gluten-free montina bread, rice pasta, rice flour, bean flour, whole amaranth grain, and dried soup veggies/onion/garlic.

Since we couldn't garden this past year, we don't have much put away. However, I'm getting as much as possible some things that are on sale, and I'll dehydrate what I can, like cranberries and green beans. Maybe even a pumpkin! See.... this time of year I usually see potatoes, onions, sweet potatos, cranberries and nuts-in-shells on sale. Also cans of green beans, pumpkin pie filling (which is in short supply this year) and canned cranberry sauce. Among others. Perhaps the circulars just aren't showing these things, but take advantage of this time of year, especially the coming weeks, to stock on your favorite food supplies.