How To Eat Healthier And Save Money

Pride; it’s what I’m feeling right now after making it to the supermarket only one time this week and not a time since. So it’s only Wednesday, but I haven’t been to Publix since Sunday, which is huge news. It was $375 worth of groceries to get us through to Friday, but I actually managed to get through one trip and I still have everything I need for the entire week. My husband and I sat down and really planned out our week this week. For two reasons; the first being that we spend so much money at the store, and we cannot figure out how. The second is that he is training for his new job (the man was with the same company for 15 years and had a new job offer, and then another new job offer two weeks into his new job that was actually his dream job that came out of nowhere, and he had to take it) two hours from home this week.

That means I’m here by myself with the big girls and the twins. I have to take the girls to school every day. Our twins are two and kind of crazy in that they’re into everything you don’t lock down. I also have three days a week when I go straight from pick-up to taking our oldest to cheer practice and we don’t get home until 8. I didn’t have any free time this week without my husband home to go to the store, so we decided to plan out our week and make sure there was no reason. Every time we ‘forget’ something we need, we go to the store and it’s another $100 trip. It’s been over $1,000 in one week because of trips like that.

It had to stop. The good news is that we did it this week. I do have to go back to the store in a few minutes to pick up some items we need for the rest of the week now that a Tropical Storm is slated to make direct landfall over us tomorrow, but that’s a different story. We’re learning how to eat well but without spending a fortune, and I thought you might all appreciate that kind of knowledge. It’s time to get healthy, get going and get our wallets in line with our good health.

Overdo the veggies

It turns out that there is no real such thing as overdoing the veggies, but you know what I mean. We want to make sure you know that you can skip the sides. You don’t need to spend money on things like starches and other sides when you can just fill your plates with veggies and your main dish. It’s what we do, and we save big time not buying other side items.

Drink water

So many people state that they don’t know where to start when it comes to eating healthy and/or saving money. We know, though; you have to get rid of the stuff you’re drinking that’s not water. You don’t need anything else. While we will never give up coffee or wine, we drink water the rest of the day. There is no juice or soda or anything of that nature in our house. We want healthy beverages so that we can maintain our good health.

Know your portions

If you really want to get fit and save some money, you need to know a bit more about portion size. There is a big problem in the world in that so many people do not know how to correctly portion their food. In our house, we use our small plates when we eat and we put more veggies than anything. We do eat chicken and fish most nights, but that’s about a quarter of our small plate. The rest is veggies – we obsessed.

When you know how to properly portion your meals, you learn that there is a way to eat healthier without actually spending a ton of money on things that aren’t good for you. It is great savings both ways.

Skip the snacks

I have zero willpower at times. When I am in the mood for something sugary, I cannot stop myself. If it’s in the house, I will eat it. I do myself a favor and I simply don’t eat it because I don’t have it in the house. If I don’t have chocolate, I can’t eat it. If I don’t have it, I don’t pay for it. Do you see how that works? Now we have no junk in our house, and that is huge savings to both our good health and our wallets. It’s good advice that I think more people should pay attention to if you want to save in any way.

Photo by Getty Images