Like basically everyone on the internet, I decided to learn to make bread this weekend. A coworker offered to teach me over video chat, and it was such a cool experience!

I have literally never made bread before. And not that I need to be buying fresh bread every week, I LOVE bread. So I thought having this skill in my arsenal wouldn’t be a bad thing. We spent the better part of the day (6 hours) prepping, resting, rolling, folding, and finally baking the bread. Was it perfect? Absolutely not. Was it delicious? Oh you bet your butt.

Let’s see, what else? I have been in a grocery store twice in the past 8 weeks, and this has definitely lowered my grocery bill. I am working my way through everything on hand and finding new things to use up daily. I am not going for coffee or drinks with friends, but once a week I am ordering take out from a favorite local spot. So this line item of my budget is also considerably lower. I do get an Imperfect Foods box weekly (mostly produce) so this allows me to have fresh fruits and veggies, and requires that I actually plan accordingly to eat it all.

I will admit, that the first few weeks of home quarantine I definitely spent way more money than I needed to. I was worried about all my favorite local businesses, and my favorite animal rescues, and basically threw money at them all. I don’t regret it. I feel like I’ve contributed, and I ended up with some really cool swag. (I have enough sweatshirts for all of eternity, please don’t let me buy anymore. ever.) I bought a few gifts and pre-paid for a haircut with my friend. She needs the money now and will happily cut my hair when it’s safe to do so again.

On top of that, I’m not driving regularly, and not parking downtown. This is saving me heaps of money as it costs $18 a day downtown, and I typically put gas in my car about every 10 days. Now it’s more like every 40 days. And since I am working from home I don’t need to pay for any transportation or parking costs.

All in all, I think I am probably coming in about even, maybe saving a little money. I think the longer this continues, the more I will save, balancing out the money I spent initially. How about you? How are you handling your finances through this?

1) I’ve been eating meals on repeat so as to not waste anything. I don’t mind eating the same meal day after day. It’s actually nice not having to think about it.

2) I’ve been using up what I have, since going to the store isn’t an option. Today for lunch I had purple potatoes, broccoli and egg. Random, but it worked! And I didn’t waste those random bits of food.

3) Because I am driving so infrequently, I filled up my tank of gas this week for the first time in 5 weeks. While I typically don’t drive a ton, rarely does a tank last a month.

4) I baked blueberry muffins. My mom’s muffin recipe is amazeballs. And buying a dozen muffins anywhere would certainly cost more than the ingredients I used to make them (including frozen berries I picked last summer)

5) I traded with a friend. I offered up two quarts of chicken stock, plus a quart of chicken soup and half a dozen carrot cake cupcakes. She shared home made gnocchi and scones. It was such a lovely way to show that we care for one another, while still remaining apart. And let me tell you, that human knows what they are doing in the kitchen and I will now need to learn to make gnocchi.

What about you? What have you been up to lately?