Archives for January 2013

Happy Thursday dolls! We’d like to introduce you to our friend, Megan of And here’s to you, Mrs. Robinson! As this week’s Bloggie Bestie she’s here to share a sweet Valentine story with you! Won’t you take a sec and leave her a sweet note? Then pop over to her place where I’m sharing an easy Valentine’s day craft! 😉

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Hello Truly Lovely readers! My name is Megan Robinson and I write over at {And here’s to you, Mrs. Robinson}. I love to have a place where I can go to express my thoughts, share my stories, and hopefully inspire and uplift other women. I like to talk about womanhood, motherhood, marriage and everything in between!

Today I’m excited to talk to you about a fun little holiday coming up: Valentine’s Day! Growing up, I thought Valentine’s Day was kind of lame. I mean, if you didn’t have a boy to celebrate with then what.was.the.point. So instead I always told people that I was celebrating Arizona’s birthday since Arizona is the coolest place evaaahhhhh! And they bought it. I was quirky so it worked. 

Flash forward: I’m in college dating this supa-cute boy and we’re getting serious. He had planned some pretty awesome Valentine’s Day dates and was totally restoring my faith in the holiday. Then one time we decided to visit Arizona to celebrate its birthday in style, and what do you know, the cute boy proposes to me on Valentine’s Day!  I will be honest. I totally thought it would be so cheesy to get engaged on Valentine’s. But in that precious moment, it was just the perfect way to celebrate the day of love {and Arizona’s birthday} that I could ask for. 

Now February 14th is not just a day filled with tons of chocolate and conversation hearts to me. It’s not even about the beautiful state abundant with saguaro cacti. To me, February 14th is the day that I said “yes” to a uncertain future filled with lots of love and lots of faith. It was the beginning of a life I didn’t even know I wanted until I was with my now husband.

I didn’t know what I was saying yes to 4 years ago. How could you ever know what the future holds? But knowing what I know now, I would say yes again in a heartbeat. {In all it’s cheesiness, it is the truth :)}

Thank you for letting me share my little Valentine’s Day love story with you guys today and thank you to Kassi and Kayli for doing this fun blog swap! I hope you all will stop by my place and say hello when you get a chance, I would love to meet you!

Happy Arizona’s Birthday!
😉

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How fun to be able to celebrate your engage-iverseray every Valentine’s Day!!! Thanks for sharing with us Megan!!!
Your turn friends!!! Do you have a special Valentine’s day story???

Hello there lovelies!
Today let’s meet our first Bloggie Bestie of 2013!!
Paula of Beauty Through Imperfection!
Today she’s here to share her 8 Tips for Saving at the Grocery Store! With the New Year in full swing, who doesn’t want to know how to save money, am I right?!?! Take it away Paula!!!
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Hi! I’m Paula and I blog over at Beauty Through Imperfection. First of all, I am so thankful to Kassi and Kayli for the opportunity to be bloggie besties! I think this is SUCH a fun idea!

A little about me/my blog; I have been married to my bestest friend for 4 years! We met when we were both 18, and decided to get married 35 days later! (crazy, I know! but it works for us!) We have 2 adorable kiddos; Little Man (2 years) and the Princess (5 months).

I’m a SAHM, and I’m really thankful that we are able to work it out so I can stay home with the kiddos! I haven’t always been able to stay home, so I really appreciate it now that I’m able to. We are currently living in a 2 bedroom 3rd story apartment(!) and saving all our pennies for a house. I love writing, but the main purpose of the blog is to encourage other moms/wives! You can find funny stories, heartfelt lessons, “oops” moments from my imperfect life & lots more on the blog.

Today, I wanted to share with you a few things that I’ve discovered that can help to save money when grocery shopping! I hope some of these tips are helpful for you!

1. Half your meat – Most recipes can easily be altered to use less meat. I do this with most of the casseroles I cook, and they usually don’t have to be ‘edited’ in any other way. Instead of using 1 pound of beef or what not I use a half pound and save the other half for the next night’s recipe. The flavor is still nice and meat-y and we save a lot of $ every week this way!

2. Bake your own bread – This is not something that I’m currently doing, but I’ve done it in the past and it saved us a lot of money every month. Bread can be expensive, especially depending on what type you buy! We buy bread for a bit over $2 a loaf, but I could bake my own for about 50 cents a loaf. BIG difference, and can make a huge impact on your grocery budget if your family really likes bread! (my boys LOVE it!) I used this recipe when I was doing it. It’s an easy and fast recipe that makes really yummy bread! You don’t even have to worry about kneading the dough!

3. Meatless meal – Do one meal a week without meat. Meat makes up a majority of the cost for most meals, so even just doing 1 meatless meal a week could save you a lot in the long run. Do a meal like beans & rice, meatless spaghetti/Alfredo noodles, a lot of fresh veggies/potatoes (Baked) or even breakfast tacos. So many options to save a ton of $ every week!

4. Shop sales – Only buy produce that is on sale. Familiarize yourself with the average price of fruits/veggies that you like and shop accordingly. We eat fruit and veggies by the season, and sometimes I will change our menu to plan around an extremely cheap veggie I found in the store. Plan to be flexible if there are good deals on ingredients to something that you know how to make.

5. DON’T shop aisle end caps – You know those “great deals” on the end caps of aisles? You are just walking by and then you see something and think “oh yeah, I need that!” and so you grab one and keep going? I don’t know why we automatically assume it’s a great deal if it is on the end, but I’ve noticed that most of the time it is not. Many times it’s an awful deal and if you go search for that item actually on an isle you can find the same thing (different brand) at a much lower price. So when you see something you are forgetting, go and find the product where it is normally located in order to find the best price.

6. Buy “off” brand – Do I even need to say this one? Don’t always buy name brand. Be willing to experiment with the off brand stuff, and you will end up saving a lot of money. Target brand (up & up) diapers are amazing, and they are half the price of name brand. Walmart whales (equivalent of goldfish) are actually better in my opinion, but they are much cheaper. There are so many great products that are not name brand, be willing to try and see what your family likes.

7. Stock up when there are sales – If something that you use regularly is on sale, buy as much of it as your budget will allow. This month chicken was half the price it usually is, so I stocked up and filled our freezer! We will be eating mainly chicken meals for at least the next month (depending on how long the sale lasts), but we are also saving a LOT of money.

8. Buy some treats – Okay this may sound counter productive but hear me out. Find a healthy limit to “treat” food (ice cream etc) and stick to it. If you cut out all of the special foods you will end up splurging by going out to an ice cream parlor or hitting up the grocery store another time in the week to pick something up (and we all know it is impossible to go to the grocery store and leave with just one item). I keep our treats/junk food limited to 1. We can only have one sweet/sugary/’treat’ in the house at a time. I will not buy more than one a week and I will not buy any more until the first is GONE. Meaning if it lasts longer than a week, I won’t buy anything else ‘special’ the next time I’m shopping. This keep us disciplined, healthy, on budget and enables us to enjoy special desserts and treats a few times a week.

These are just a few of the things that we do to save $ each month. I hope they help you as well!

Thanks again to Kassi and Kayli for the opportunity to share!

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I don’t know about you, but there are several tips here I know I can use to save money the next time I’m grocery shopping!!!
Thanks so much to Paula for sharing her tips with us! Won’t you take a minute to jump over and tell her hello at her place?
I’m sharing a guest post there as we speak!

AND if you’re interested in being the NEXT Bloggie Bestie, learn more about it here, then shoot me an email!