Food

Being a single mom has many challenges. One of those challenges is living on a budget. When you go from two incomes to one, it can become very difficult to pay those bills. A lot of women receive child support from their ex-husbands, but there are those of us who do not. The daily email I received from www.divorcecare.com today was about food and it made me think about the different ways you can save on your grocery bill.

1) Try to buy fresh foods and prepare your meals from scratch. Prepackaged foods are convenient but WAY more expensive.

2) Take your lunch to work every day instead of eating out. Fast food is really expensive. A few turkey or ham sandwiches each week never hurt anyone. You can always have leftovers from the night before too. Where I work we eat out one day out of the week. That's my treat for the week.

3) Schools offer free and reduced lunches for kids. You have to apply for these and depending on your income you may be able to get one or the other. Full price school lunches are not cheap these days.

4) Of course, there are always coupons. You can get them from the newspaper or even swap with friends. There are also a lot of websites now where you can purchase coupons. At www.coupons.com you can download the coupon printer and print whichever coupons you want.

5) Angel Food Ministries is a great resource for food. You can purchase food for a month at a price that is a whole lot cheaper than the grocery store. You also get to choose which "boxes" you would like to purchase. You pick up the food at a local church of your choice (as long as they participate). Visit their website at www.angelfoodministries.com.

I hope this helps someone save money on those high grocery bills. It seems like the prices go up every day, but with a few tricks and a little work we can lower those totals.