Happening #2: Geekachicas.com is in the midst of their 12 Days of Geekmas. I've got several more articles to write in that series, but as filler (and to kill time), I've been posting the geeky equivalent to the 12 Days of Christmas song. I need to post Day 6 today- and I should just go ahead and write and auto-schedule the rest of the days for publishing. A few Dear Cthulu-Claws posts to write as well, then I should be done with most of GC writing for a week or two.
Happening #3: I have been involved in the Cold Hands, Warm Heart Swap this year. I'll have a post on it later, but I received my package from my swap partner- Aime over at Sense and Sensibility- today.
Happening #4: A month or so back, I entered into a Cookie and a Story contest over at MyFirstKitchen.Net. To enter, we needed to send her a memory of when we baked cookies. My entry was accepted as a finalist. Each day this month, the site will be featuring one of the finalist's stories. Today, they are featuring my cookie baking memory! Later this month, the polls will open for voting. The person that the fans vote as the winner will get a lovely kitchen prize pack. I'm really honored to be chosen as a finalist.
Happening #5: I saved over 80 percent on my grocery bill with coupons today. I didn't need much from the store- I ended up spending less than $10 total for a full cart of items that included soda, ice, ice cream, snacks, and toddler items that I would normally have never bought. Most of the coupons were for free plus overage items and most of them stacked with store coupons so I ended up getting a lot of merchandise for free. Add in several catalinas that took $2 each off my grocery bill, and it added up some nice savings.
Happening #6: I broke out my new-in-box Foodsaver vacuum sealer that I bought on clearance for $19. I was so excited to be putting it to good use finally. Now that I know how easy it is to use, I can easily see myself hitting up the green grocer holiday sales for fresh green beans and broccoli to blanch and freeze. Fresh is so much cheaper than frozen, but sadly, won't get used in a timely manner unless I manage to only buy what I'm going to use that day. So, with the vacuum sealer in use now, I can take advantage of a lot more sales.
What do you use to coupon? I know there are a few websites around. I'm looking into saving more money at the grocery store (since I'm there so often).
ReplyDeleteAdorable picture! I'm glad you have so many happenings happening :)
I don't really do more than skim the coupon sites for the occasional "fill out the form for a freebie in the mail" thing.
ReplyDeleteI keep a running list of most the coupons I normally use and then, I match them up in my head if there's a sale.
I know, not very effective for most people, but it's just the way I've always done it.
Some days I go to the grocery store and nothing is on sale or I don't have matching coupons. But, at least I didn't waste time trying to match obscure coupons for products that we'd never use. : )
Last week I went to grocery store and spent 540 dollars or so on somewhere around 1500 in groceries. It was just good timing- everyone was buying turkey so no one was looking at the marked down steaks. Everyone wanted celery so no one paid attention to the reduced price stack of sugar pumpkins left from Halloween. Everyone wanted pre-made centerpieces so I snagged a few packs of day old, non-arranged flowers for a song.
I have learned the hard way that when you shop, try to stick to the perimeter of the store as much as possible. Do not enter the main aisles unless you have a list and don't stray from the list. If you can make it, you don't need to buy pre-made 90 percent of the time. (I'm not saying to make everything from scratch, but do you really need to buy five packs of taco seasoning or a chicken salad kit?)
It works out.
But, if you are looking for a good website to check out couponing- I highly recommend MoneySavingMom.com. Not only does she break down amazing deals, on the right side of her site is an application that allows you to search 100s of grocery stores and match coupons to sales.