March Grocery Spending

You're not going to believe how little we spent on groceries this month, so before we get to that, keep these things in mind:

• We spent the 1st weekend in March at a cabin with friends, and I bought those groceries in February.
• I went home to SD for 4 days. (Thanks, momma, for feeding me!)
• We ate out 3 meals because we had Groupons that were expiring. 
• I ate lunch out 2 times with my QM girls.  
• WS bought me lunch 4 times. 
• A new networking friend treated me to lunch.
• I treated a different networking friend to lunch.
• I used an expiring Groupon for dinner out with a friend.
• We ate a catered meal at Follies. 
• Jordan used a Christmas gift card on Buffalo Wild Wings. 
• A couple from our church group treated us to dinner to celebrate my new job. 
• I ate dinner at a Women's Shelter that the med student wives volunteered to bring a meal to.
• Jordan's favorite bbq place is closing (b/c the owner has cancer), so he treated himself to that once and we ate that for dinner once. 

So. That's A LOT of meals that we either ate out (I'm honestly kind of embarrassed looking at that big list!), were treated to, or were just gone. 

We spent $68.29 on groceries this month. Here's what we got:

4 gallons of milk

8 single-serving yogurts

2 loaf bread

3 8oz bricks of cheese

2lbs of carrots

7.83lbs of oranges

1 pineapple
1 bunch bananas
1lb frozen brussel sprouts

dozen eggs

croutons (on sale for $0.99)

devils food cake (on sale for $0.99)

1 pizza crust mix (on sale for $0.38)
24oz ketchup (on sale for $0.98)
1 can tomato soup (on sale for $0.38) 

2 boxes ice cream (on sale for $1.68 each; about the only time we buy ice cream - cookie dough for me; tin roof sundae for Jordan)
2 cans northern beans (for the soup dinner at the women's shelter)

2 cans green chiles (for the soup dinner at the women's shelter)

8oz sour cream (for the soup dinner at the women's shelter)

1 bunch cilantro (for our weekend at the cabin)

bacon cheddar focaccia bread (for our weekend at the cabin)

2 bags chips (for our weekend at the cabin)

I didn't keep perfect track of our meals this month (or much track at all), but we didn't eat anything too fancy - just what was in the freezer/pantry:

• Tomato soup and grilled sandwiches
• Spaghetti and garlic bread
• Eggs, toast and sausage
• Bridgewater sausage, corn and green beans
• Salmon and mashed potatoes
• Bacon-wrapped deer steak with potatoes 
• Leftovers from eating out
• Leftover Taco Soup from our weekend at the cabin
• A $2 frozen pizza or two
• Polished off the last 2 of the freezer meals

I believe I mentioned this a few posts ago, but this month I completely avoided the sales ad and only bought things that we needed (those couple sales things were the last ad from February that I bought in March). I had a freezer FULL of food (and still do) and am trying to eat/cook as much as we can without buying more. I'll probably do the same thing in April...we seriously have a lot of food.

What's your standby meal when you don't have time to plan dinner or get it ready beforehand? Do you decide that means it's time to go out?