Thursday 30 January 2014

February's EXTREME Frugal Challenge!

Share it Please

In February I am going to be setting myself an EXTREME frugal challenge - I will only allow myself $100 for groceries for the ENTIRE month! I'm excited to stretch my resources and my imagination and REALLY challenge myself. And I want to show others how they can manage if unexpected bills arrive and there is hardly any money left over for several weeks. 

The Simple Savings crew are famous for their $21 Challenge - in essence, getting people to 'eat out of their pantries and fridges' for a week and using up existing resources, rather than buying more at the grocery store - with just a little buffer for things you don't have. I'm essentially going one step further and doing this for 4 weeks in a row! If you had COMPLETELY bare cupboards you might struggle with this, but most of us have pantries and freezers containing odds and ends that we never seem to get around to using.

For this challenge I will spend $70 for the first two weeks, and $30 for the next two weeks. Spending the bulk of my budget at the start will allow me to stock up on staples for the month and plan my meals better. 

As a reminder, our family is one adult and one teenager with healthy appetites.  I imagine a single parent family with 2 - 4 younger children would require the same amount of food as us.  A larger family will be able to follow the same principles and allow a little extra towards the budget.

I'm excited to share this challenge with you - I'll post my first update next Friday with my shopping list and the first weeks' meals!

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