One Last Shopping Trip - June 2013 Pantry Challenge, Week 4

So this is the last week of our June 2013 pantry challenge here in the Stormhammer house.

Not sure how much of a challenge I can call it since we're staying with the $20 for a while now - practice for Internship year! - but we'll see how that goes.

We got our CSA box this last week:



It contained the following goodies: Flowering sage (I put this in a jar on my kitchen table since it was so pretty!), sweet basil, dill, spinach, lettuce, rhubarb, radishes and strawberries.

Just to make you all jealous, here's a photo of the luscious strawberries - we ate them in almost one sitting!  I had totally forgotten how sweet really fresh strawberries are.  The children were astounded by that!


We really need to go strawberry picking this year! (Hopefully next week.)

When I cleaned out the "groceries" envelope of our cash system here I was elated to find $10.31 in the envelope - I had been putting the bills and coins I'd gotten in change back into it as we went and this week was so very grateful for that!

I don't have a photo of groceries this week - John went to the store while I was frantically working on things at the public library (I'll tell that story later).  For some odd reason photos of groceries aren't high on his list, he he! He went to two stores and here's what he bought:

Store #1:
1 English Cucumber: $0.98
3.04 lbs Peaches @ $0.99/lb = $3.01
Total Store #1: $3.99

Store #2:
5 lbs Store Brand All-Purpose Flour $2.45
3.52 lbs Bananas @ $0.59/lb = $2.08
1.10 lbs Green Bell Peppers @ $1.50/lb = $1.09
Total Store #2: $5.62

Total Both Stores: $9.61
Total Remaining: $0.70

How about that?!!!  I'm pretty pleased that we made it through with a hair bit of change left.  We didn't have to buy laundry detergent or TP or anything like that, so we'll see how this all holds up in the future.  We still have strawberries (store bought ones) and grapes in the fridge from last week and a friend gave us some apples that her family didn't like (!!!!).  We still have loads of meat in the freezer and several other things too.  We're still eating fine!

Honestly, doing this $20 a week (or less) for food for a month or two in a row is fine with me and it's fun figuring out what to make and use up and all that jazz.  Doing it semi-permanently (30-32 months is what we're looking at right now, if we start in July 2013) is terrifying to me!  I like to know exactly how things are going to play out and all this lack of fore knowledge is driving me straight up a tree!

In spite of that, I'm looking forward to seeing how the Lord uses this to bless us over the next almost 3 years worth of months.  We're starting to see glimpses of this - the apples from a friend are just one example.  Our veggies in our garden are doing well, though not producing at the moment except the rhubarb, raspberries, chives and lettuce. So, Lord willing, we should have plenty from the garden and our CSA as well as some things for later in the year.  I'll let you know what surprises and blessings we have in this way as we go through the next few months.

Next week we will be getting oatmeal (we're almost out after months of having more than plenty), honey (from our local farmer's market in bulk at a great price) and maybe some canned goods, depending on what's on sale.  Maple Syrup is also on sale, and we're out of that too so I'm hoping we have enough to buy a jar of that too - I've been using it for cooking instead of sugar (maple-oat scones anyone?) and it's been getting used up fast!

Come back on Monday for our menu!

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