the grocery buying blitz

Yesterday I printed out my grocery lists for 5 stores with coupons stapled to the top, piled all the children in the van and hit the road in a massive food shopping marathon. We first went to Harris Teeter where, after writing a check for $38, the cashier pulled the register recipt to do her automatic, "You saved...," her jaw literally dropped, "$31. You did good girl!" In the afternoon we hit CVS, Food Lion, and finally Kroger, where we again saved 40- 50% off the total bill.

We didn't get home from our second trip out until 6pm, a miscalculation on my part that led to an apology to Tim for the chaos of bags and boxes, crabby children, and no dinner simmering on the stove. Within 20 minutes though we sat down to grilled cheese and tomato soup and with my little calculator figured out our savings. We bought our weekly $250 worth of groceries for just $150. Not exactly worthy of those magazine headlines, "I bought 9 carts of food for $.45," but not bad either. The only thing I needed that was forgotten in the rush were those pre-made pie crusts that you just roll out.

Perhaps this week my chicken pot pie can be topped with homemade crust since I certainly don't feel like stepping foot in another grocery store for at least a week.