We lost my dad when I was a kid and my mother hadn't ever worked as a married woman.

I didn't think about it at the time. We had a little subsistence farm and I worked for wages, trapped furbearers in the fall, dug worms and sold frogs to fishermen in the spring and summer. Somehow we made it

To this day, however, I'm as "tight as the bark on a tree".
Everything is precious and is carefully conserved, cleaned, repaired and put away. I have a few tools that we're old when I was a kid; who do you know that ever wore out a garden rake?

Eatables?

Always had a garden. Didn't marry young, but a young woman (actually slightly older than I) set her cap for me and won my heart asking to work together, gardening. I had a little piece of dirt; she wanted to grow fresh goodies.

After a few years, we had shelves full of tomatoes, beans, pickles and raspberry jam. Kids came along and griped...as mom and dad had...about doing chores. But some rewards like a snow pea, ground cherry, or cherry tomato popped in the mouth changed their minds. Today they garden themselves.

Anyway, didn't have much money as a kid, but we always ate. Lotsa garden stuff.

I was given the opportunity to visit an inner city food plot a long time ago. I learned a few things: mechanized farming can grow about 4000 lbs of potatoes per acre on the best sites in a favorable year. Intensive hand care can grow 14000 lbs/acre; no wasted space to accommodate heavy equipment wheels: just a narrow path to walk.

And I got the impression that the inner city folk applying their effort to the space were even more appreciative than I was for a few pounds of potatoes or a cabbage.

I haven't worn out a garden rake (my mortal enemy in the garden, as I've stepped on one a few times). But, the tines are bent far outward from where they started their journey.

There are so many ways to save money on food even in these times of high inflation. Gardening, cutting out soda and processed foods and cooking from scratch makes a huge difference.

Growing some food is not just good for your physical health, it's good for your mental health @AlittleSalt .
Even here, I can grow greens in the winter under lights. Not my whole diet for sure, but it helps a lot to have something fresh, even if it's a little bit. IDKY you think you can't have a garden, but as long as I have one half gallon pot with dirt to put in it, I'll have something I grew to eat. And you can too. It doesn't have to be huge, just what you can manage.
Funny how a little taste of something fresh can make you rethink the boring, slogging, never ending job of putting food on the table. So worth it.

brownrexx wrote: ↑Thu Oct 27, 2022 11:09 am There are so many ways to save money on food even in these times of high inflation. Gardening, cutting out soda and processed foods and cooking from scratch makes a huge difference.

My main savings come from my eyes scanning for the large yellow clearance labels at WalMart. Today it was chicken leg quarters at 34.7 cents a pound ($3.47/10 lb bag).

This WalMart seems to be run much better than any others that I've visited or heard about. Currently, the store is virtually fully stocked to overstocked. The overstocking of the leg 1/4s is how I got a few bags on sale. Wings, bone-in skin-on thighs, boneless skinless thighs, and boneless skinless breasts are likely about 95% of their fresh chicken business. I see only small quantities of whole chickens, leg 1/4s, and drumsticks, and only small areas are ever reserved for them.

The only items not nearly fully stocked, or overstocked, are frozen potato products, and in non-human food, canned cat food. Those still have about half-filled spaces.

The seasonal aisle, which also has become an overstocked aisle at times, was emptied of Halloween candy today, and Christmas goodies are starting to be moved in. Other than black jelly beans at Easter, I treat myself to one large bag of small Snickers bars, bought the morning after Halloween at half price. They immediately go into the freezer, and I take one out when I'm in the mood. There is no impulse snacking, as they are frozen like a rock, and I must wait for the thaw.

A Little Salt=

I think you said you have trouble walking/getting around? If you can get outside a little, have the other adults help or the grandkids, to do a few simple things. Like Bower said, a small pot of some herbs or lettuce can help a bit. There can be quite a bit of lettuce grown in a beer/soda flat cardboard box, watered by hand. A grandkid can fetch water to you. Set up a few of the boxes and succession plant them so there can be cut and come again salads. Arugula planted once can reseed for a permanent patch by a door, easy to get to and to get water to.

A slightly deeper box, you can grow radishes ( eat raw or cooked in those beans), and green onions, too. Use those grand kids and the other adults, too. time for them to pull along with you a bit. Take a chair out with you to sit in and be the "director".