The First Grocery Shopping Trip
A cash budget and Trader Joe's cart.
Yesterday, I took Q (my 14-year-old) grocery shopping. I let him know on Friday evening that this was The Plan, and that he needed to be ready by 8:00 a.m. I like to get my Saturday grocery shopping done early so I can move on with my day.
At 7:30 a.m., I hadn’t seen any sign of him. It was also only two days after school ended (on Thursday), so I was feeling a bit like Mean Mom to wake him up on the first Sunday of summer. So I kept working at my computer in my office. At 8:02, he appeared at my side, fully dressed. I was still in my pajamas. I told him to give me a few minutes and we would leave. I also promised him Starbucks (he likes the cheese danish).
Our first stop was Target for staples, like dishwasher detergent and toilet paper. Almost all of our food comes from Trader Joe’s, and none of his lunch ingredients were from Target. He asked if he could wait in the car, and I said sure.
On the way to Trader Joe’s, I talked out loud about how I’d manage the lunch budget. I told the kids that I’d give them $40 per week. I use Greenlight to manage their allowance, so at first I thought I’d just transfer money into the account of whichever kid was shopping with me for the week.
But then the logistics started to play out in my head. What if there was a little extra? How would we keep track of adding that to next week’s lunch allowance? Would we be constantly transferring money back and forth between the two teen accounts? After talking through this (out loud, basically to myself), I decided that cash would be easier.
At Trader Joe’s, we got two shopping carts. Me, for everything else we’d need for the week. Him, ingredients specifically tied to their lunch plans.
One of the first things he grabbed was a bag of baby spinach. I said, “That’s totally fine, but I think your recipe said to use frozen spinach. Do you want to use fresh spinach instead?” He replied, “There’s a difference?” I said yes, there’s a difference.
He did some mental math as we navigated the store, keeping track of the items in his cart. He only added the ingredients that were on his list.
When we got to the checkout, I told the checkout woman that he was checking out his own items and paying himself. The total was $35.48. Win! I said he could keep the extra money for next week’s groceries.
On the way home, he asked if he should keep the receipt. I said he didn’t have to, unless he wanted to keep track of how much different food items cost for better planning. He said he wanted to keep the receipt and would find a place to store them.
After we got home and put the groceries away, we found an old wallet that will be the “lunch money wallet” for the summer. Any extra money from the week’s shopping will go in the wallet, and whoever is shopping with me for the week will bring it.
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