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Saturday, December 12, 2009

My Kroger Saga: WHAT?!? No Coupons!?!?

Okay... I told you that I'd share my Kroger shopping experience with you, so here goes. I mentioned to you that I'd gone"unplugged" for a while on Tuesday. I didn't even cook dinner. In fact, we had dinner at Applebee's that evening, and then Emma and I were going to make a quick stop at Kroger for bread, milk, and a couple of other essentials.

As we left Applebee's, it started to rain ice! I would have rather jumped in the car and headed for home right then, but I realized that an ice storm could cause problems if we didn't stop at the store. We were almost out of milk, completely out of bread, and almost out of peanut butter. There were some other things that we needed too, so we decided to make it the quickest Kroger trip in history.

Once we were in the store I realized that I had left my coupon binder at home! Rats! Fortunately most of the things I was buying weren't coupon-ish items, but I certainly could have saved a few bucks had I remembered it.

We made it out of Kroger in record time, and we only spent around $50. Add that to the $13 my husband spent last Saturday, and we're still under budget for the week. Here's what we got. (Click image to enlarge.)



I learned a couple of things from this trip. First, not shopping with coupons once in a while can be refreshing. No, I'm not giving up my couponing ways! But we did make it through the store much more quickly without me rooting around in my coupon binder. And the best part was that the ice had turned to just rain by the time we left the store.

I also learned that we can stay under budget without coupons. Obviously this wasn't a huge shopping trip. In fact, it was a little disheartening to see so much table showing in my picture when I'd spent $50. Usually it's covered a little better for $50.

Now I need to get my coupons clipped and get back into the couponing game!

To see more great shopping trips from this week, stop by these sites:
:: Super Savings Saturday hosted by Money Saving Mom
:: Friday Finals hosted by Southern Savers
:: Stockpile Saturday hosted by Saving Your Cents
:: Saving Our Cents Saturday hosted by Saving Our Cents

3 comments:

Catherine at Frugal Homemaker Plus said...

You can take your receipt in and say you forgot your coupons that day. They'll take them and give you cash. I've done that a few times when I did not have my coupons with me!

Megan said...

I like to take a trip to the store without coupons every now and then. Sometimes it's just nice to get in and out without much contemplation.

UnfinishedMom said...

I agree, very once in a while without coupons is a refreshing thing.

PS: You've got an award waiting for you over at my place: http://unfinishedmom.blogspot.com/2009/12/humbled.html