“Do not save what is left after spending; instead, spend what is left after saving.”
— Warren Buffet

Eight-hundred and twenty-one dollars. That’s how much my husband and I spent on groceries with our first paycheck of the month, combined. And if your jaw dropped while reading that sentence, trust me when I tell you mine did while writing it. I can’t believe it. Eight-hundred and twenty-one dollars? I have to spell it out for the dramatics of course, but I genuinely can’t believe this reality, especially because we hardly splurged on anything. We mainly covered the basics and replenished the essentials; meats, fruits, veggies, and juices like coconut water, fairlife, celsius, and kombucha — and though I admit those types of products are considered high-ticket items, the fact remains the same: take out would never do me this dirty. I mean, not only do I spend more time at the store buying the food, but I also have to come home and make it, all while ensuring it tastes good too? No, the stakes are too high. I’ll say it again, take out would never do me this dirty.

My mind was blown.

And, based on the financial plan I’m following (the 50/30/20 rule), I’m rather embarrassed to say that my contribution only totaled out to be around $300. In my defense, though, my husband makes more than I do. Suffice to say, I had to get to the bottom of this, so I did some research and came to find out that the average family of 4 spends roughly 975-1,100 dollars on groceries per month. And just to be clear, that’s considered to be the lower end of the spectrum on the scale of spending. 

Now, brb. Second paycheck just cleared and it’s time to head to the store. 

$200, made out like a bandit, though my husband, not so much…. $350.

That makes the monthly total just under $1400 — and that’s considered to be the “moderate” side of the spectrum. 

Sigh.

As much as I want to say the price alone is worth giving everything up, the reality is, I’ve never felt better eating at home. I also have to acknowledge that I’m not single anymore, so I can’t expect the cost to reflect as such. I’m married, I have a son, and my husband and I support a grandparent within the home, and everyone needs to eat.

So, with that said, this is only the beginning; the first month of many where my family will meet at the table with plates full of home-cooked meals instead of plastic bags filled with saturated-fat packed styrofoam containers.

The beauty of it all is that we tried. We started, and the more effort we put into this challenge, the greater the impact will be on our finances. I mean, just imagine what would happen if we started successfully meal-planning our weeks, we’d have grocery shopping down to a T. Something once seen as stressful would fail to cause any stress at all — and how amazing is it to have something worth changing, especially when that’d be the result?

I gotta tell you, it’s this newfound awareness that makes solving this obstacle so thrilling for me.

So, here’s the deal, we have ourselves a Rubik’s Cube. It’s all scrambled and mixed and it’s up to us to solve it. No problem. We’ll just have to keep tackling it month-by-month until, finally, all the colors align.

You’ll see.

And what a day that’ll be.

Until then, I’ll be seeing you.

Cheers,
B.