Loving Being Frugal

I've been meaning to write about my latest love: couponing! I continue to be amazed about paying less (or nothing!) for an item just because I handed the clerk a piece of paper.

This love has been growing for quite some time. After researching and playing around a bit, I am almost at the point where I refuse to pay for certain items. Like deodorant. I currently have a stash of seven roll-ons and four sticks, each of which cost me less than 10 cents!! What a rush! And I'll never pay more than $1 for a box of cereal again. There's just no need with the sales and coupons available. I have approximately 20 boxes in my son's closet (because they won't all fit in my pantry!), and the most I've paid is 89 cents. Half of them were free!

The whole idea of using coupons has always intrigued me, but I've only recently learned how to use them effectively. Thanks to a bunch of great blogs, I now find out what's on sale, which coupons to use, where to get them, and then I go and save A BUNDLE!

It means that my shopping cart looks a little odd, though.

Take my recent trip to Walgreens, for example. I purchased 11 packages of diapers, four toothbrushes (something else I'll never pay for again!), three rolls of paper towels, four boxes of cereal, and two cans of nuts. With the sales and coupons and "Register Rewards" (money back), the receipt says I saved $49.78. I paid just $3o.83!! If divided evenly, that's just $1.27 per item! $1.27 for a pkg of diapers. Yeah, I'm good.

So, I thought I'd share some of the sites on which I have come to rely, because though I am bragging a bit here, I couldn't do any of it without the help provided by these great sites!

Money Saving Mom is by far my favorite. She alerts you to various deals, and outlines how to shop at CVS, Walgreens, and Rite-Aid. She often lists the best deals at Target and Wal-Mart and other national chains.

BeCentsAble has a feature called Grocery Gathering that I rely on heavily. It lists which blogs outline the best deals for local stores. (i.e., there are two blogs listed that tell me what to buy at Bloom, two for Giant, about ten for Safeway, etc.) I click on the blogs, scroll through the listing of the best deals and which coupons to use, print off my list, and off I go!

Ebates pays as you shop online. It takes just an extra click or two to find out if the site I need is associated with ebates. Very simple! I had a $10 off coupon code for JCPenney (it's actually still valid, if you're interested: GR8DAD), so I went to Ebates, searched for JCPenney, and then I was in. Easy as pie. I got $10 off at JCPenney, $5 for signing up with Ebates, and 40 cents for doing the shopping through Ebates. They pay you a percentage of your purchase.

What has been especially fun is that ED and AM, my 10 and 9 year olds, are getting into it. They are great helpers in the store! I give them the coupon, and they find the item. They are excited about it, too. "Wow, Mom! You mean just by giving them this coupon, you can get stuff for free?" AM helped me find a bunch of deals at Target the other day. With the sales, manufacture coupons, and Target coupons, we were almost paid to take items off their shelves! She came bounding in the door, shouting to D to come see our haul. I've never seen a nine year old be so exuberant about mayonaisse and salad dressing!

Mother's Day Card

Fill in the blank card from my 3 1/2 year old:

I love my mom because she gives me food.
She makes my favorite food which is mac n cheese.
Once day when I am a grown up I will buy her a cheezit.
God made mommies because I don't know.
My mommy drives slow.
When my mommy prays I feel good.


I can't wait for the cheezit!

Check Your Books at the Door

My friend has her children hand over their books as they walk in the door from school every day. WHAT!? you ask? Yes, it's true. The children are not allowed to read until their jobs, homework, and even sometimes playing with friends is done. She doesn't have to kick her kids off the TV or the Wii; she has to limit their reading time. I use to say that if you have to have a problem, then that's the one to have!

Until I entered her world.

Staying up two hours past bedtime...
Using the bathroom for 30+ minutes...
Setting up a camp chair in the sun because mom said "Go outside"...
Fibbing about how much homework is in the backpack...
Missing dinner and asking, "Why didn't you wait for me?"...

TO READ!

It's still not the worst problem in the world, but it can get annoying at times.

But here's the rub: I know how they feel. I would rather read than do the laundry or the dishes, too. And I stayed up until 3am one night last week to finish our bookclub book. Obviously, I'm being punished by having children take on my bad habits! :-)

Moderation in all things, right? I guess I need to adopt that as my motto.

You're not feeling down, are you?

Click here.

I dare you not to smile!

Have a happy,
me.

MARCH

March started off with three commemorations: my birthday, AM's birthday, and our house's birthday! Four years ago we moved to the east coast. We still aren't quite used to the climate. I wonder if this will be the year I figure out how to garden.

The birthday girls:On my birthday nine years ago, I was doing all I could to relax and keep that baby in, so she could have her own birthday. (Of course, at that time we thought she was a he. We never did get a Caleb--unless you count our little nephew.) She cooperated, and was born at one in the morning!

This year, our birthdays fell on a Friday and Saturday: perfect! My honey pampered me on Friday (even took the day off work!!), and we pampered AM on Saturday. We went to the National Aquarium in Baltimore in the morning. It was really fun. Then we came home and rested a bit before partying some more in the evening. (We had gotten up early and the birthday girl got car sick.) She requested lasagna, garlic bread and root beer for her birthday dinner. Quote from our nine-year-old: I really liked the presents. I loved my dinner. I especially liked the root beer. It was sooo good! I also went to the aquarium which I saw many animals, and I also got sick which that wasn't good."

Here are some photos of her day:




The professional photo at the top of this post was taken a week before her birthday. It is very appropriate--she's an avid reader!

Shimmy, Shake & Wiggle

Turn up your volume, and get ready to chuckle!



This girl's got STYLE!

Here's one more, just so you can watch baby sister do her own little wiggle:

mua ha ha ha ha ha ha

this is j's blog and d managed to get in and make a total mess of it!!! weeeeee!!! i can write anything here and she won't know it until someone else points it out - she can't take this stuff off can she? the thought that this scribbling of mine is going to be permanent is too exciting for words! asd;lfkjaokrwoirew9ogv bv!@#$$%^&. when she catches me at this i can just blame it on... the kids, definitely the kids... yeah, that's the plan - they spell better than i do anyhow. she keeps such a pretty blogometry that having a schmear of vestigial humanity every now and then won't hurt. i didn't go to work today because i put in too many hours and no overtime for this feller. does this email to everybody who is interested? i sure hope so - you know, spread the love hither and yon. sorry to get your hopes up people - just d. i have nothing neat or interesting to say other than it is nice to type something i don't have to turn in to a professor or a government official. i got to sleep in last night and thus i find myself with lots of energy. i thought i could either do something productive or i could screw up j's blag. i figure we don't stay in touch as well as we should, and by we i mean me because j does most of the envoy work for this house. so this is me making a notional effort to reach out. did you know that by the time it takes you to read this sentence, 20 million nutrinos have passesd through your brain? and by the time you have read this sentence they are half way to the sun? that's a quote from "coming of age in the milky way" - i read it at snow college.

wait a second - how does this work again? that's right, i get on here and i post something about the family. here goes: N is recently going through a growth spurt and by growth spurt i mean east german-esque growth spurt - this girl is only a few pounds lighter than L and a couple inches shorter. she is still as energetic as ever. three and a half with a new haricut to cover the mane mangling she pulled off last month... made j cry. she posted the pix. N is the kind of kid for whom we have used the kid leash on one occasion - in spite of the memories of the spastic kids i recall requiring restraint to keep from getting hurt. N is on the leash to spare the health and wellfare of any poor unsuspecting child she wanders too close to. my sister used one on one of her rambunctious boys and the image made me laugh - i thought we could get a bunch for all the cousins and they could pull a sleigh or a coal mine cart. AE is growing enormously also but she still has the hands of a neonatal but her hair has finally changed into reall person hair and not that whispy spider-monkey hair new borns start out with. she has caught onto the fact that she must weep, wail and gnash to get any attention. she will put on an apocalyptic-proportioned hissy to ask for milk. don't get me wrong, milk is tasty and loverly but a palsied convulsion? really?? i only do that when i want cheez its because they have real cheese AND milk - never just for just milk. rooky. AM is the reluctant prodigy - i have to threaten with a circular saw and branding iron to get her to sit and make a pathetic pantomime of piano practice once a week - she then takes off to her lessons and her teacher says she is doing so well... after having practiced once she aparently can play a whole song all the way through without looking at times. just to keep her on her toes, when she plays a song perfectly i say "yeah, but can you play it backwards? don't be lazy." one of these days she is going to pull that off and i am not sure what i am going to do - maybe demand she play it with broken fingers, her toes or with someone else's hands... it's tough being the lesser mortal in a house full of lovely people - you have to work so much harder to pretend you are worthwhile - sigh. L is a very gentle and tender child who is so enthusiastic and genuinely good - so i am making sure she toughens up, carries weapons to school and knows how to kill a man with a wet noodle and doll hair - kind of the mcgiver and rambo approach to parenting. she is taking swim lessons and she is really developing some great form - all of my kids can out swim their dad but they don't know that. actually, i am more of a breath-holder - don't knock it, when everyone is at the surface getting really tired and stuff i am conserving energy and staring up at them with my little smug blue-lipped grin. they don't know what they are missing out on. E is the moderator of mighty proportions. often we hear him saying "simmer down" or "knock it off". that is the sign of a kid who knows how to take charge. he is very maticulous about his things and works hard to be obedient. he is a really even keeled (sp?) kid. he is just so eexcited about learning new things and has a quuick mind. he must get that from his mom. julie just came in and caught me so i need to get off- until next time when she leaves the computer unlocked and exposed... ta ta ta toodles may your easter be full of bunnies and sugar hallucinations!

Can I schedule this to post at a later date?
Just trying to figure out all my options...