Could Your Family Go a Month Without Eating Out? Mine Did! Money Motherhood

At the beginning of January, I joined a social media group called No Spend January, inspired by the overspending of the holidays and blogs dedicated to such challenges. Some members of our group took “no spend” seriously, opting to spend money only on necessities, while others, like me, took on a "no eating out" challenge. 

To be honest, I wasn’t sure my family would succeed. My husband and I both work full time, I have a commute and both of our boys play basketball, causing us to scramble some nights to figure out dinner. We often eat out in order to make things easier. But we were committed to making it work. We were hoping to save money and eat healthier, too (and prove to ourselves that we could do it!). And we did! 

We saved money, ate better and experimented with new recipes. What helped us the most was meal planning. We went grocery shopping on the weekends, planned our meals for the week and got a jump start on school lunch snacks. I even got some Bento boxes for myself so I was less tempted to eat out at work. After a while it felt like a competition to see if we could actually stick to it, which made it fun! 

Do you think you could go a month without eating out?