by Hope
For the last 5-6 months, I have really been limited in what I ate. What I purchased. I’ve lived on sandwiches, eggs, bacon, and some fruit and veggies. This is not a complaint at all. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my food. Chosen it as my staples of choice. I didn’t feel denied. And it’s really helped me keep my food spending under control.
But the last couple of weeks, I was craving cereal. (Yes, I know, not a healthy choice at all.) But just sometimes…well, I had my grocery budget for the month and with this week in Texas (where I am now,) I had a little room to splurge.
Another aspect of this is that I rarely go grocery shopping. I rarely go into stores anymore. I order my food for pick up for the most part. (No charge for pick up.) This means I’ve not had much exposure to how things had changed in the last couple of years.
After I picked up Beauty from work one evening, we ran to Walmart to pick up some groceries. And wow, it’s the cereal aisle that opened my eyes to how things have changed. With five kids, we always bought family size everything. It just made sense pricewise and quantity wise.
So when I went to pick up my treasured cereal, I was shocked to find that “Family Size” is now what regular size used to be, i.e. much, much smaller. And the price…still higher. That’s so crazy.
I’ve not been immune to the cost of food rising discussions, but since I went from buying for a family of 6 to 3 and now to 1 so rapidly, my food budget has gone down rapidly. I didn’t really notice the individual prices going up.
The visit to the cereal aisle was eye-opening in many ways.
These boxes of cereal will last me months. And I will thoroughly enjoy them. And I’m very grateful to have been able to “splurge” this month. But, I’m even more grateful that I am not a mom struggling to feed her 5 kids at this time.
Hope is a resourceful, solutions-driven online business manager with over two decades of experience helping clients streamline operations, manage projects, and grow their businesses through digital marketing and technology.
But life has a way of rewriting your plans.
A year ago, Hope made the decision to move in with her aging parents full time – a season she wouldn’t trade, even as it came with its own financial and emotional weight. Earlier this year, she lost her mother, and is now walking the tender, disorienting path of grief while learning what “forward” looks like from here.
Hope came to the Blogging Away Debt community in 2015 as a single mom raising five foster and adoptive children. She’s written through job changes, financial setbacks, and the bittersweet transition to an empty nest. Her kids are finding their footing in the world now – and so is she.
Rooted in faith and fueled by the same perseverance she’s brought to every hard season, Hope is ready to face her finances with fresh eyes and an honest pen. She believes that clarity, courage, and community can change the trajectory of anyone’s story including her own.
She lives in Austin, TX with her dad, loves adventures with her dog Addie, and is figuring out, one step at a time, what this next chapter is meant to be.
Yupp, it’s just greed. Family size chips are now all of a sudden 235g here in Canada … give me a break.