We didn’t walk this morning. I just didn’t feel like getting up and going right out. Kinda weird. and definitely not me. Oh well, it’s good to mix it up some.
I had applied for the Covid-19 LLS grant of $250. I received the Visa card and used that for groceries so that was a huge saving.
I am getting my first Instacart order today. I’m supposed to keep my phone with me so I guess I’ll turn on the ringer so I can hear if the shopper calls me. I’ll update once I get the order and let you know how it is or was. It definitely was NOT frugal and there is a tip which I hope was enough. I’m guessing they get paid to shop and gas so the tip is on top?? Anybody have an idea about the tip? I did 10%which was hefty.
Our county( Placer) is opening up certain things soon. I’m against opening anything too soon and won’t be going out to stores. I canceled my gym membership as I can’t see myself going back before next year or whenever there is a vaccine. I’m not a shopper so except for Target, Home Depot, and the store I don’t really go into stores. So I’ll keep doing curbside pickup.
I made a yummy pasta salad for dinner last night with grilled chicken, bowtie pasta, artichoke hearts, olives, and a salad mixed in. It was good. I always leave the chicken on the side so B doesn’t get it in his. Tonight is supposed to be pizza night but I’m going to use stuff from the freezer. I have one frozen pizza and maybe do some bruschetta with tomato on the side. I’m trying a different No-Knead bread recipe today. It’s the NYT one. So far I’ve done the King Arthur one and the original Jim Leahey’s. They’re all basically the same but a little variation.
The Cecil Brunners are amazing this year. They always come out for Mother’s Day.
Beeswax candles in the morning sunlight1
Another view.
Tahoe Girl 
Your options may be more limited than ours. However I chose InstaCart because we are generally faithful Aldi shoppers, and Aldi was a store InstaCart shops..My first couple of deliveries were fine. The last made me decide not to use InstaCart anymore but commit to Walmart Grocery pickup after creating a grocery list online.
With this last InstaCart order I learned some hard truths. First InstaCart not only charges a service fee, but also increases the cost of the groceries. Then of course there’s the tip. Sadly based on initial happy results I prepaid for a year thus getting deliveries at a discount. However on this shop the shopper added two items to my bill that were not on my list, nor substitutes nor did I receive the two items. Yes, there was a courtesy $3.49 refund on the grocery shop but that did not cover the cost of the two items, plus the service charge and the tip, plus taxes are based upon the grand total.—a total where the costs are higher. I know these things because I received my paper receipt which was $78+, however on the InstaCart bill on the site I access with my credentials the total before service fee, tip before taxes was $95+. So yes, in the end it was much higher. I contacted Customer Service and they advised Aldi increases the prices—nope. Nor did they acknowledge the purchase of items not listed or sanctioned by me.
No, I do not work for Walmart but am presently only using them.The InstaCart fiasco is one reason. But their positives far outweighed my experience with InstaCart. I go online to either their website or their app. I shop and create a list, then I check out—but that does not mean I am purchasing at that moment. It means I can then choose a pick up time. (They recently opened earlier slots for our age group.) I can continuously add, change quantities or delete items up until about 6 hours ahead of pick up. Sometimes especially on high demand items there are limits on numbers one can get for a specific item.We started out being certain we wanted what we wanted, but over time we accepted you can’t always get what you want but we found sometimes/often we got what we needed.(Thx to The Rolling Stones).Our groceries are generally fruit, vegetables, almond milk, cereals, nuts, some dairy, marinara sauce and whole wheat pasts, oats, rice and dried beans.This week DH helped me make a double batch of Forks Over Knives So Possible Burgers. I convinced him with all the salt and additives in commercially available vegan/vegetarian burgers we would save money and eat much healthier by making our own.
Since I do not know how close Walmart is to you this info may be of little use to you. But it was trial and error for us too so I wanted to share. Especially in light of the fact we may be social distancing far longer than anticipated or far longer than our state and county may mandate.
It’s funny in a way because last fall I was doing Walmart pickup almost every week. They are about 20 minutes from us. It was splendid. Then I just got out of the habit. When I checked on doing it lately the wait times were days out so I guess I just stopped looking. The Costco order was great. I didn’t do any substitutions since I wanted Lundberg Organic rice and they were out. All in all, more expensive but worth not having to deal with Costco for now.
I would assume that the tip is the income. I always give a flat 20 percent minimum. Also.if they are out of things they may text you and offer substitutes. Which is why I do instacaert instead of pickup where they usually don’t substitute.
I did look it up and it says they usually get paid @ 10-12 an hour. I’m not sure how the driving fits in with gas. I was very happy with my order and upped my tip to the nice young man. I will do it again as I still don’t want to face Costco yet.
how was the pasta salad? I am always keen to hear of good recipes for such.