A Day at the Lake... But First - A Challenge Update!

Day 1 of September Shopping Challenge down!  It's harder than you think.

I actually did this week's shop yesterday, since I knew we'd be at the lake all day today. I was super proud of myself. I made a menu, checked what I already had in and made a shopping list, guessed each item's price and concluded my shopping would cost $167.

It was $160 before I remembered a few more things.

I went to the grocery store, stuck to my list (only bought four things that weren't on the list - two of which I actually needed and simply forgot about) and only skipped one thing on the list because I couldn't find it. My total came to $162!

I call that a super success.

I also covered all the other little payments - bills, Fifi's monthly swim team fees, wedding present purchase (stayed under my budget by literally 1 cent!) and school lunch cash.

Now the plan is to stay away from stores and shops all week. This won't be easy.  In fact, I had to go into one today. On the way to the lake, I realized I'd left Jaguar's arm floaties at home. Not wanting to be miserable all day chasing after a drowning two-year-old, I stopped into a Dollar General to pick up some floaties.  Luckily, with summer stock being replaced with Halloween (already?!), the floaties were 50% off - making them $1.  I got two packs and... erm... a box of ding dongs.  Impulse buy confession. They shouldn't have Little Debbie's snacks just RIGHT THERE at the checkout. That's playing dirty!

Soooo....

Spider Man Floaties!

The lake, yeah, we went! I actually can't believe we've been here for two summers, and this was our first trip to the lake, only an hour down the road. It was practically empty, despite being Labor Day weekend, so we practically had the whole "beach" to ourselves. The kids LOVED it. Jaguar got a huge kick out of throwing sand at everyone.  Fifi enjoyed snorkeling and trying to find fish.  Lolly, of course, made best friends with the kids of the one other family on the beach with us.

Swimming with Mimi.

The Sandman.

Snorkel time.

We swam, played in the sand, and ate a picnic.  Unfortunately the leisure was cut (quite literally) short when Jaguar cut his knee open. We didn't have any first aid with us (I'm a crap mum, I get it), so we cleaned him up as best we could and gathered up our stuff early to head back to my mom's camper site.  I figured we'd just doctor him up and head home, but we ended up hanging out with Mom and my step-dad (and my brother and sister-in-law) for another few hours, drinking beer and Diet Coke and whatnot.

That bad mother thing again.

Shell Collector.

The ride home was glorious... we all fell asleep. Except for Scott, luckily, since he was driving, and actually, I think Jaguar may have stayed awake the whole time - how he didn't konk out straight away, I cannot fathom.

Me and my beach babe.

Oh, and even though I failed a little today with my ding-dong purchase, I DID manage to resist the urge to stop on our way home at Wendy's or Pizza Hut or something else junk foody and effortless and money-costing.  Even though we toyed with the idea, we were strong and came home instead, and I made delicious, if I do say so myself, homemade pizza for dinner. I even made an extra calzone to put in Fifi's and Lolly's lunches tomorrow.

Errbody.
Thanks to my tripod, you see.