Groceries

I'm getting a bit bummed out by the costs of groceries in the last couple of months.

I don't budget and I'm not sure what our usual groceries cost, but they seemed incredibly high over the summer. The price of potatoes in the spring prompted me to plant a few and with every shovel of potatoes we harvest I feel a bit better about things. And I've got a huge pan of tomatoes reducing on the stove right now. That happens every couple of days.

I've had a few canning mishaps this week too and I translate it always into dollars or servings of fruit. It's annoying how my mind works. I've had 4 jars of apple sauce unseal in the cool room and I have no idea why. It just seems so wasteful. I'm even being more careful than ever about my processing. Humph. It means a lot of baking with wine-y apple sauce when I'm not in the mood for baking.

I really don't want to obsess about groceries, but it just seems like I must be doing something wrong. It doesn't help that I read a lot of US blogs and it's so much more affordable to shop there. I've heard from friends that they don't have the variety that we have, but at this point I would really welcome some cheap groceries.

A blog I recently discovered is Owlhaven. Through the month of September she challenged her readers to a $75/week grocery challenge. She managed to almost succeed with 10 kids in her house. I did notice that no Canadians took up the challenge. I didn't discover the challenge until last week so I'm going to start in October. Even with only 5 in the house, I'm positive I won't be able to stick to that low budget. Whatever. I'm going to see what happens, and it will force us to eat up some of the abundance in our pantry and freezer.

She's also written a book (Family Feasts for $75 a Week) and is having a contest today for three copies of her book. I wouldn't mind a copy, so I've doubled my chances by mentioning her contest here. If I win, I'll have a contest for one of the other books here (reserving the third as a gift for later).

I may not be able to stick to her $75 limit, but I figure there must be something I can learn from her book. I was happy to note that she doesn't use coupons at all because I don't want to get into that all-consuming pasttime. My current obsession is enough to occupy my mind.

I'll be more perky and happy next post. I promise.