My mission for the next few months

So that whole coupon clipping, $4 a week grocery bill thing had my brain working overtime this weekend.  I did a little research and I found a few more pieces of information.  I had never heard the term Catalina before used for couponing.  That's a big part of getting your groceries for cheap.  From what I understand, a Catalina is your cash rebate to put towards your next round of groceries.  So if you buy 2 Pillsbury pie crusts, you get $2.50 towards your next grocery bill.  That's how you pay for the more expensive groceries that can't be whittled down enough by coupons.  Also, if the coupon doesn't have a size specific, you can purchase travel sizes to make money off the coupon.

The problem with buying smaller product amounts or travel sizes to me is environmental.  Buying 10 travel size Dove antiperspirants goes against my moral philosophy of living lightly off the land.  I personally can't buy a dozen containers to throw into a landfill, I feel too guilty.

I did buy a newspaper on Sunday (felt a wee bit guilty for all the paper waste, but I did recycle...) and clipped like crazy.  I also signed my savings card online for Safeway--less paper waste, yeah!  

So my goal for the next few months is to see if I could get down to $100 a week for groceries.  That's less than $1 per person per meal, not including snacks.  I can't even imagine getting that low, but with coupons, catalinas and buyer reward programs, I know I can save money.  It will be a matter of how much I can save.