If you follow me on Instagram or if are my friend on Facebook, you may have noticed that lately I've been posting several pictures of food that I've been eating or things that I've been doing to embrace this new healthy lifestyle of eating clean and working out.
As I was doing some chores around the house, I thought about what can I do (other than post my pics of what I'm eating and exercises I'm doing) to help someone else who may think this lifestyle is too expensive to embrace. Well just in case that person is you, I'm so glad I thought to write this post!
Let me first start with saying, I would have been one of those people who thought eating healthy and joining a gym was out of my budget. I am very money conscious and try to be as strictly on a budget as possible. I try to never complain about the low salary educators are paid, because God definitely blesses me and provides for me regardless if I can't always do everything I want to do. I never want to seem ungrateful because so many people are unemployed and would take my salary to their no salary any day. Either way, everyone knows educators are not the breadwinners by any means, so sometimes you really have to get creative and smart when you're stretching a dollar. They don't call me Frugal Frannie for nothing! And I take that name with pride because that's just how it has to be some times!
So I usually set a budget of about $150/month for groceries. Now some people may think "that's ridiculously low" or you might think it's too high, who knows. Either way, I used to have a grocery budget of $175 then I had to scale back due to some other financial obligations. I looked through my spending history on www.mint.com (excellent budgeting tool to help keep you on track on where you're spending your money and how much you spend each month on certain things and it's totally secure) and I noticed that prior to me wanting to eat completely clean, I was meeting my monthly budget of $150 for groceries without exceeding it. I do recall in previous months, I'd have to get "creative" with my meals towards the end of the month when my budget had ran out and I was left with really having to only eat the food I already had instead of buying more food. This usually left me eating a bunch of processed food that was stored in my pantry or buying a pizza from Dominos on a day between Monday and Wednesday so I can get the $7.99 carry out special and eating off that pizza for a few days to survive.
Since I started eating clean, I have already spent $200 on groceries and if I didn't have a budget, I would certainly go back to the store between now and January 31st to buy more food. The first week of eating clean, I went to the grocery store and I went HAM!!! I spent like $100 on food that was mostly produce which I knew would be gone by the end of the week. $100/week on groceries, $150/monthly budget for groceries...you do the math and imagine my dismay when I realized I had gone too hard too fast with this whole thing. You might be wondering, so what did you do Ash? I talked to my sister and she made a really good point. She suggested that I make dishes that allow you to make a lot with few ingredients. Stuff like quiche, casseroles, etc. With that being said, I started thinking about things that I could make that 1.) I already had in my freezer, pantry, or refrigerator and 2) could be something that could stretch out for a couple of days. I also read up on how frozen veggies are just as healthy as fresh and thanks be to GOD, Kroger had a 10/$10 sale on their frozen veggies so I stocked UP!!!!
I have also started thinking of ways to shop smarter which definitely requires a lot of planning and a lot of time. Convenience comes at a price...and sometimes that means eating junk and not having that fit body that you want (since abs are made in the kitchen you know). Without a plan, you will more than likely make bad decisions for food because when you're hungry, you aren't thinking about how you can make a nice healthy dish. You want food and you want it now!! And if food requires you to cook it (other than in a microwave), then you usually want no parts in preparing it! So the next thing to do is eat whatever is convenient whether that be fast food, chips, candy, sweets, anything to get your blood sugar back to a normal reading or sometimes higher if you eat the wrong foods.
I've started cooking on Sundays and preparing dishes for lunch throughout the week. By doing this, I cook all the food I want for the week, put it in Tupperware, refrigerate or freeze, then when it's time to pack my lunch for the day, I just grab and go. That eliminates standing in front of the refrigerator, swaying back and forth thinking "what shall I eat, what shall I eat".
As for grocery shopping a lot smarter, I have now downloaded an app called Grocery Pal (Google App Market...Android). This app has stores like Kroger, Harris Teeter, Giant, Food Lion, Wal-Mart, etc. and all their circulars listed so you can see which store has the best deal. It also allows you to make shopping lists and download coupons to your loyalty card. I did notice the loyalty card section is limited, but you can always do this online at your favorite grocery store's website. I downloaded a coupon for $3.00 off the protein powder that I use from Kroger's website and one day I was shopping and noticed the protein powder was on sale for $13.00 (down from $18.00) plus my $3 off brought my protein powder to a whopping $10 (I saved $8 woohooo)!!! I was soooo excited about this deal! Kroger also sends coupons in the mail every month and they do NOT accept expired coupons so I have started highlighting the expiration date to be sure I don't miss out on a good deal. I am also carrying my coupons in my purse so that if I randomly pop into the store, they're always with me. Thanks to this idea, I scored a pack of Boca burgers for $.64!!! They had been marked down to $1.64 and I had a coupon (in my purse...YES!) for $1.00 off! Talk about EXCITEMENT!
So there are a few tips for you! I hope they help and remember you will get better at this and it will take less time as you get used to it all. It'll be second nature! I'm excited about next month's shopping because I have learned a few lessons so I know better for next time. Happy shopping and remember..eat clean, train mean, get lean!!!
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