4 Tools You Need To Simplify Your Grocery Shopping
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Grocery shopping can be stressful if you don’t get organized it can easily become a hassle. In this article, I am going to share with you my favorite tools to simplify my grocery store experience.
How to simplify your grocery store experience
- Create a meal plan for the week
- Make a grocery list
- Have a budget
- Organize your groceries
Tools You Need For Grocery Shopping
Knock Knock What to Eat Pad
On Sunday or Monday, my husband and I seat together to plan our dinners for the week. He often works in the evening so it’s a good time for us to sync our calendar.
I love the Knock Knock What to Eat Pad because it’s really easy to use.
We write when we will go out, what we will have for dinner, and then I add my meal prep for breakfast and lunch on the right side of the pad.
I just got the Everyday Ketogenic Kitchen book to get easy and yummy recipes for lunch and breakfast. (The pecan chocolate muffin recipes is my go-to for breakfast right now)
We also add what he needs for snacks during the day, or what he will eat when he comes home late without dinner. (Usually a can of chili with sour cream and tortillas lol)
The Knock Knock What to Eat Pad has a magnet on the back so we keep it on top of the fridge.
I also use the Wellness planner to write a detailed plan for all of my personal meals, the pad is what we use for our family of three (if you count Toby the cat 😀 )
Knock Knock All Out of Note Pad
Next to the Knock Knock What to Eat Pad we have the Knock Knock All Out of Note Pad.
I love it because it organizes your list by grocery store areas so it’s easy to get everything you need in the same aisle.
The way we use this is simple if we run out of something during the week like toilet paper or light bulbs we had it on the list. Then after creating our meal plan, we check what we need to get for the week.
And at the end, we look at the list printed on the Knock Knock All Out of Note Pad to make sure that we don’t forget anything. It’s actually really useful!
When we go to the grocery store, the goal is to only get what is on the list. We only look for what we need and are not distracted by other products so we save time and money!
Bella Taylor Cash System Wallets
At the beginning of the month, we do our budget and get cash out for:
- Grocery shopping
- Date/outing
- Personal shopping and outing
Our grocery shopping budget for the two of us is $400 a month, about $100 a week.
If you want to know how to create your own budget and get the calculator that we use, check out this article.
Before losing my job, we were going to Fred Meyer and honestly spending more than we should… The problem was that we had a budget but were too lazy to track our expenses and stick to it.
This is why we decided to start the cash envelope system. It allows us to stay on budget without the hassle of tracking our expenses.
First, we used paper envelopes for each category but I ended up with a lot of coins lost in my purse. So I did some research to find the best way to keep our cash separated per categories.
When I saw the Bella Taylor Cash System Wallets, I totally fell in love with it. First of all, I loved the color, it comes in different fabrics but I have a tendency to buy everything I can in blue…
Most importantly, it was exactly what I was looking for! It has 10 cash/receipt slots and comes with printed labels that you can use.
I personally only use 3 of the slots:
- Groceries for groceries 😀
- Restaurant for our date/out budget
- Entertainment for my personal budget
Now we are going to WinCo for our grocery shopping, and I love it! We spend way less money than we used to while I am trying to get organic products every time I can.
Lotus Trolley Bags
My husband says that we look stylish with our
Lotus Trolley Bags 😀
As you can see it’s the same color theme as our wallet lol
But I have to say that this literally changed my shopping experience!
When you go to WinCo, you are the one putting stuff away in your bags and the Lotus Trolley Bags makes it so much easier.
The way I use it is simple, each bag has its own purpose:
- Purple: toilet paper, and other big and lightweight products (people tend to overfill this one so it breaks down because of the weight)
- Teal: Anything that goes in the freezer and fridge
- Blue: products for the pantry
- Beige: personal and bathroom products
Then all I have to do is take the bag in front of the fridge, pantry, … and unload it. It’s already sorted before going back to the car!
This is helping me to gain time when I get home, plus I am no longer drowning under plastic bags, I am being more mindful of the environment and I love to look cool at the grocery store haha
Save for later
Further Reading:
- How To Create Healthy Habits With The Wellness Journal
- The One Thing You Need To Stay On Budget
- How to Create a Monthly Budget + FREE Calculator
- 10 Articles To Read If You Want To Improve Your Life
- The Best FREE Resources to Live a Healthy and Happy Life
Over to you:
What tools do you use to simplify your grocery shopping?
PATTY
April 6, 2018 at 3:27 amI love those Lotus Trolley Bags! I never saw bags that hung inside the cart! What a great idea!
Pris M.
April 6, 2018 at 8:47 amSo many good ideas here. I need major help with my grocery shopping situation!!