Raley's, Wednesday 10/13/10

Combining exercise and shopping....

I woke up one day last month and realized that I was feeling frumpy and tired.  I wondered, "how am I going to muster up enough energy to take care of my children over the next 10-15 years.  I'm 41 years old and that means that my current children will graduate from high school when I am 57.  My husband and I are planning on adopting one more child sometime over the next 2-3 years which will make me 60 when my youngest child graduates from high school. 

This motivated me to start thinking about getting into shape again.... 

There was a time when I didn't need to think about "staying in shape."  I was very active growing up in Southern California.  I played volleyball, softball and soccer in grade school.  I ran cross country in high school and then I joined a competitive volleyball team in my early 20's when I worked for Disney.  I love competitive sports.  I really want to play competitive sports again and the only way that I can do that is to get into shape again.  The problem is that I need to "work" at staying in shape now. 

So, I  logged onto Amazon and began researching jogging strollers.  I had several Amazon gift certificates that I had accumulated over the last 6 months from various rewards programs and this was a good opportunity to put them to use.  I knew that I wouldn't be able to go to the gym with my husband's new schedule so I figured walking/jogging was going to be a logical way for me to fit in exercise.

Then something strange happened.  I started to think about how I could combine exercise with shopping.  I never really feel as though I have time to do either task so I thought, "if I can combine the two then I can maximize my time.  I tested out my theory by walking to Rite-Aid a few weeks ago to do my shop.  That seemed to work well and I came back home refreshed and excited about both my exercise and my shop (jogging stroller + pandora-streamed Disney channel = shopping happiness with children). 

Last night I began to think about walking to my local grocery store.  I remembered reading an article about how the French walked to their local markets every day to buy their food.  So, I ventured out this morning and walked to Raley's and did my grocery shopping for the week and then trekked back home and put everything away. 

I'm feeling very French right now....

OK, here's the shop:

THINGS I NEEDED:
2 packages Organic raisins $1.99ea. (sale price)
= $1.99 ea.
8 Raley's yogurt $.48 cents ea. (sale price)
= $.48 ea.
2 Yoplait yogurt $.50 cents ea. (sale price)
= $.50 ea.
4.03 lbs. bananas @ $.68 lb. (regular price)
= $2.74 total
1 Golden Pineapple $2.47 ea. (sale price)
= $2.47 total
1.51 lbs. green beans @ $1.47 lb. (sale price)
= $2.22 total
2.51 lbs. Honeycrisp Apples @ $2.49 lb. (regular price)
= $6.25 total
1.98 lbs. Acorn Squash @ $.77 lb. (sale price)
= $1.52 total
4.27 lbs. Spaghetti Squash @ $.77 lb. (sale price)
= $3.28 total
2 Raspberries $3.99 B1G1 (buy one for $3.99, get second one free)
= $3.99 total
.55 lbs. Red Bell Pepper @ 2.99 lb. (regular price)
= $1.64 total
2.26 lbs. Red Seedless Grapes @ $1.97 lb. (sale price)
= $4.45 total
1 package of grape tomatoes $2.99 (regular price)
= $2.99 ea.
1.48 lbs. zucchini squash @ $1.49 lb. (regular price)
= $2.21 total

TOTAL: $67.58
TOTAL AFTER ADVERTISED SALES: $42.60
SAVINGS: 37%

NOTE: My stockpile is full of meat, dairy and dry goods so I decided to spend my $50 budget this week on lots of fruits and vegetables.  I will be using the bananas and raspberries for smoothies this week.  The zuchinni will be used for bread and the apples will be used for "baked apples" one night for dessert.  I love the produce here.  The cashier told me today that most of the fruit comes from Watsonville which is about 3 hours away from here.  I "heart" local produce.

NOTE: I didn't use any coupons on this shop.  I posted this shop for the folks that are coming to my class next Tuesday night.  I wanted you to see a shop that didn't include coupons in case you don't feel as though you have time to clip coupons.  You can still save a significant amount of money at the grocery store if you buy what is on sale from week to week.  We will talk about this more at the class but I wanted to give you a visual of a shop without coupons.

NOTE: I couldn't resist the honeycrisp apples even though they weren't on sale (they were $1.50 lb. a few weeks ago and we bought loads of them but I just can't get enough of these apples this year).  I went to Apple Hill a few weeks ago to get some Honeycrisp apples and they were sold out at every farm that we went to.