I almost left a surprise for the mailman.
I stumbled across something fun in the blogosphere, the Bloggy Giveaways Carnival! Hundreds of blogs all giving something away! I thought I would jump in and join the fun, while highlighting a ministry. If you haven't been here before, I'm a homeschooling mom of 4 girls (5 and under!) and I blog about couponing, mom tips, freebies, and Christian Living, with a sprinkling of family updates and other topics. If that interests you, please subscribe (on the right hand side) so you don't miss anything!
Okay, back to the giveaway! I wanted to highlight an important ministry that is easy to support. S.O.U.L., which stands for Shine On Us Lord, is part of the SOUL Light Link Ministry in Quito, Ecuador. It is a card making ministry run by international women in prison there. These women have found new faith in Jesus and making these cards is their only source of income, which they need to buy basic necessities, like blankets and toiletries, which are not provided by the prison.
BUY IT: Would you like to purchase some cards? Not only would you be supporting these women in living an honorable lifestyle, you would receive some gorgeous, unique, handmade cards as well! You can choose from packs of happy birthday, all occasion, inspiration, friendship/thinking of you, thank you, and Christmas, and are all blank on the inside. They are sold in packets of 5 cards for $10. $2 per card is a bargain these days, and these cards are handmade! If you are interested in buying a packet of cards to support this ministry and help these women earn money in an honorable way and stay on a path that is pleasing to the Lord, mail a $10 check with a note about what you would like to purchase to:
I made a quick Target run to use some coupons that were going to expire at the end of the month. I keep my eyes open for coupons that say "$1 off ANY" because that means I can use it on a trial size. The coupons usually beep at the register because the item is .99 and the coupon is $1 off, so I politely point out to the cashier that I do have the item and that the coupon says "ANY" and doesn't exclude trial sizes, then she manually clicks the coupon through. I don't use coupons that say "exclude trial sizes" or have a minimum size (like 4 oz.), but I don't have a problem using coupons that say "any size" on trial sizes. The manufacturer knows which products are out there and which coupons are out there, and puts limitations on their coupons accordingly.
So here's what I scored, mostly to bring along on our upcoming vacation:
NutriPal Bars $2.99 (minus $1 coupon)
Mr. Clean Magic Eraser .99 (minus .50 coupon)
Shout Wipes .97 (minus $1.50 printable)
2 Tide .97 each (minus 2 $1 coupons)
St. Ives Lotion .97 (minus $1 coupon)
2 Kids Crest w/ toothbrush .99 each (minus 2 $1 coupons)
Total OOP after tax: $2.18
Note that I would have had overage if I had only bought the travel-sized items. I personally prefer to buy an item (like the NutriPal bars) to use up the overage. It's possible they would pay me money out of the register, but I've never tried (and would probably feel weird). I've gotten a negative balance at CVS before, but they just adjusted the amount of my coupons to bring my total to $0.00 instead of paying me overage. So that's why I prefer to buy something else to use up the overage. I figure I'm raising enough eyebrows already!
So when you go through your coupons to see which ones expire this weekend, see if you have any that would be okay to use on a trial-sized item!
When Ted got home from work on Friday, I asked him if I could run to Walgreens quickly after dinner so I could use the $5/$20 coupon. He replied, "No."
Okay. . .
I was taken aback, but he isn't an unreasonable man, so I decided to trust him and keep my mouth shut. Not easy for me. He could probably tell I was wondering, so he finally spilled the beans and told me he had a surprise for later.
Hmm, a surprise?!? That's all he would tell me for the next hour and a half. A little after 6pm he told me that a friend was coming over to babysit and we were going to see the movie Fireproof!
I can count on one hand the number of movies 
we've seen in a theater since our kids were born (In 2004 we went to see The Passion of the Christ and Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, and in 2007 we saw Evan Almighty), instead being patient until we can rent them for free from the library and watch them after the kids go to bed. But Ted knew I really wanted to go and see this one, thereby lending some support to Sherwood Pictures. We really enjoyed their first two movies, Flywheel and Facing the Giants, and the reviews of Fireproof sounded great.
OH. MY. GOODNESS. Let me tell you, this movie is all you have heard and more. It is awesome. The Kendrick brothers deliver a movie that is both tough and tender and presents the power of Christ to change lives and save marriages. It deals with respect and love and SO much more. I'd say more, but I don't want to give away the whole movie!
If you haven't seen it already, I really encourage you to go. If you can't go now, DEFINITELY rent it when it comes out on DVD, or better yet, buy it. It's a movie I want to add to our collection. Seriously, it was THAT good.
I did take advantage of the $5/$20 coupon today. Here's what I scored:
*L'Oreal Age Perfect Radiance Perfector (minus $2 coupon)
*Almay One Coat Mascara
2 Gallons of Milk (kids drink lots of milk)
*4 Bags of Fun Size Peanut M&M's (minus 2 $1 printables) - I also had a Wags coupon that didn't work
*AirWick Freshmatic (minus $4 printable)
*2 Glade Plug-Ins (minus BOGO printable)
OxiClean (babies make lots of stained laundry!)
*Scrubbing Bubbles Toilet Cleaning Gel (minus $2 printable)
Total OOP after coupons and tax: $41.24
*Submit for Oct. and Nov. rebates: $37.48
Total after rebates: $3.76!!
Isn't this fun? How did you take advantage of the coupon this weekend? Leave a comment!
Seriously, she loves sucking on her feet, her booties, her hands, anyone else's hands, her burpcloth, her bib, you name it. . .but NOT on a pacifier. We keep trying it now and then, since friends have told us their child didn't take one until 6 months, but so far, it's a no-go.
Mark your calendars for another free dinner! Thanks to the "Steal a Base, Steal a Taco" promotion, get Go to Taco Bell on Tuesday, October 28th from 2-6pm and pick up a Free Crunchy Seasoned Beef Taco! One free taco per person.
Thanks to Taco Bell and Freegrabber!
It's a good time to use the newest Walgreens coupon! The new November rebates are out! An easy scenario for you to take advantage of this coupon and make some money:
L'Oreal Age Perfect Radiance Perfector $19.99 (minus $2 coupon from a few weeks ago)
Almay One Coat Mascara $6.99
(I haven't been to the store, so I don't know the exact prices on these, but this is the rebate price listed online--however, even if they are on sale, you have $4 of wiggle room to still be able to use the $5 coupon)
$24.98 - $5/$20 coupon = $19.98 OOP
Get full November rebate for both items = $26.98 !!!
So go make you some money!! :-)
I've mentioned the "Grammie Bibs" that we are extremely thankful for here and here, so I wanted to show you a picture of what I mean. My mom custom- made us some serious bibs for serious spitters. Yes, she does have clothes on under that bib, but they are being carefully protected! Thanks Grammie! We've gotten A LOT of use out of these bibs!
Here's H posing with a couple of her ladybug friends. She has one on her hand and one on her back leg. They were everywhere that day, which meant that even after they helped rake the leaves, the girls didn't want to jump in them for fear of squishing their many ladybug friends! Clearly more looking going on than jumping!
The ladybugs weren't quite as plentiful a couple days later in the backyard (though G is clearly focusing on one in the picture on the right), so in the leaves they went, happily getting buried as we raked around them!
This is my favorite accidental shot of the day: G throwing leaves at me! I don't know how she got the leaves up so high, and I love that you can clearly see the smiling faces of G, H, and Ted. Click on the picture to enlarge it so you can see the sheer joy on their faces. H, G, and M spent the next 20 minutes throwing leaves at me, trying to get another shot like this one. We didn't get another good one (the timing was off, or the leaves weren't high enough, or the picture was blurry. . .), but we all had a great time laughing!
And a couple days later. . .we left the leaves in a pile and the girls have had fun going out there to play in them. I took a few pictures of them, then came back in to put some laundry
in the dryer (since my washing machine works again!), and when I came back out, M was walking around with no shoes and only one sock! I've looked everywhere for it, but I'm afraid either the lawn mower will find it or it will be raked into the compost pile. Maybe it will become a home for some animals this winter, kind of like the story The Mitten.
Naptime is sacred at my house. Kids really do need down time, as much as they don't want to admit it. And it's a non-negotiable for MY sanity!
I also don't like to argue about it- - "But I'm not tired!"- - or have kids yelling down every 5 minutes saying, "Is naptime over yet?" and "Can we get up now?"
SO. . .I burned a CD with soft classical music (compiled from classical CDs I own) that is just over 1 hour long. The girls don't have to sleep, but they do have to sit quietly and read books until the music is over. If, after a warning, they are still goofing around and not being quiet, I turn the music back a few songs and reiterate that it is QUIET time.
I've been using the naptime CD for over 3 years now (I have more than one so we can switch things up a little bit) and it works really well for us.
Do you have any tips for naptime?
Erin at $5 Dinners wrote a post on making your own "Never Pay More Than" list. This is the same idea behind the price list I made, but I like her name for it better, and I think it more accurately reflects what I'm willing to pay for things I buy frequently. A price list would list the lowest sale prices of items, but a "Never Pay More Than" list would reflect what I'm really willing to pay for certain items while combining coupons with sale prices and rebates.
Some things I could add to my "Never Pay More Than" list would be:
Toothpaste: FREE
Toothbrushes: FREE
Pantiliners: FREE
Shampoo: FREE
Glade products: FREE
Kleenex: 60 cents a box
Cereal: 50 cents a box
Bottled or Frozen Juice: $1
Cleaning products: $1
Diapers: $7.49 jumbo (for Huggies, then submit for $1 back from Caregiver's Marketplace!)
As Erin mentions, your list might differ slightly from mine based on what you buy and where you shop, so you have to make your own. Start writing down the deals you've scored on various products and see if your list goes down in price over the next few months!
He's not into couponing, but my honey deserves some credit for saving our family money this month in another way. . . He fixed our broken washing machine!!
Last month our washing machine started burning a bit, the agitator was sluggish, and the spin cycle wasn't fast enough to spin all the water out, leaving me with sopping wet clothes. Not good for a family with 4 kids, one of whom is a baby who frequently soils her clothes and goes through bibs like nobody's business! It quit on a Saturday, so Ted took the sopping wet clothes (along with 2 other loads while he was at it) to a local laundromat. I called a local repair shop on Monday and they came out on Wednesday and replaced the belt. He said, "If it isn't the belt, then it's the transmission and you might as well buy a new machine." OUCH. We prayed that wasn't the case since our washer is only 6 years old.
By now the laundry was really piling up again, and it was working when the guy left, so I promptly threw in a load. It started the burning smell a little bit, so I called the repair shop again, but the guy had left for the day. The guy I did talk to said that maybe there was some residue that had to finish burning off, and that it was probably fine. It made it through that first load and spun it alright, so I stripped the beds and washed the bedding, doing several loads over the next two days. I was extremely thankful to have a washing machine again, and I was trying to be careful not to overload it.
However, on Saturd
ay morning, while doing a load, it completely stopped. Dead. So this time I took the sopping load (and 2 more while I was at it) to the laundromat. We lam
ented having to buy a new machine, thinking this one should have had some life left in it. Ted got online and did some research. He didn't think it was the transmission. He proceeded to take the machine completely apart. We figured if we had to buy a new one anyway, we wouldn't be out anything!
Over the next week, he spent several evenings diligently working on the machine. He thought he discovered the problem, the brakes (did you know washing machines had brakes?) and ordered a new one as well as a special tool he needed. We waited for several days for them to arrive, and when they did, he set to work. We prayed a lot and kept our fingers crossed. . . . He took the whole thing apart, fixed it, and put it back together, and it worked! It didn't leak! It didn't burn! And best of all, it washed and spun my clothes!
I'm being very careful with it, only doing small to medium loads, and sometimes I have to lay my hands on it and pray it through the spin cycle, but it works! Bless his heart, I know it was hard work and there were other things he'd rather do with his time, but he's my hero for making my washing machine work again!! Thanks, honey! You win this month, having saved our family probably $400!
Walgreens 101 from Money Saving MomJess made a comment that I thought was worth it's own post:
I LOOOOOOVE the rush of a good deal, but in this season of life, my goals with couponing are: 1. To save enough money to get the things we need while staying within budget.
2. To never let my love of this "hobby" to replace my love of Jesus and service to him.
3. To never let the time spent on this hobby replace time that should be spent being a wife, mom, and friend.
Excellent goals. Being good stewards of what God has given us by saving money with coupons is important, but we have to check ourselves and make sure we aren't letting it consume us. We need to keep our priorities in order.
When I got started with couponing, it was overwhelming and I did spend too much time looking for deals, printing and clipping coupons, and then making multiple trips to several stores a week. It was a rush, but I had to get myself in check. Now I have become content with limiting my trips to 2 hours a week, total. This means I have to skip some stores each week. I shop at CVS and Walmart once a month or less. I shop at Walgreens about twice a month. Yes, there are deals to be had every week, but in this season of my life (which is very busy!), I pick and choose which deals are most worth my time and effort. I appreciated Crystal's post on Making CVS Work for You, where she talks about shopping for what you need and sticking to a budget, both in your money AND time. Remember, time is money!
Thanks for the reminder, Jess!
Inspired by Crystal's post, I decided to try to let go of some control. In helping me to cut out coupons, the kids can feel that they are contributing to the family. I figure it can fit in with homeschooling, too, because it works on cutting, sorting, and even some math. I trusted H to cut well, and she did a great job. M just got some scraps to practice cutting, and I gave G some coupons that I wasn't planning on using to see if she would be able to stay on the lines. She did a pretty good job, but she needs a little more practice before I would trust her with some of the more valuable coupons. All in all, it went well, and I know it is good for me to let go of some control.
I talked to a friend last week about having her kids help her with the couponing. They are several years older, and could really get into this. She said they are trying to save up m
oney for a Wii and would be really motivated! So if you're reading this, E and J, good luck! :-)
Mom Tip: When teaching young children to cut with scissors, remind them that "thumbs stay on top", both the hand that's holding the scissors and the hand that's holding the paper. For some reason, preschoolers automatically want to hold both the scissors and the paper with their thumbs on the bottom. In the picture with M you can see me trying to teach her this. They need to be reminded many times.
As you scan the ads today and scope out the sales, evaluate the sale prices to see if they are real sales or "fake sales". How do you tell a real sale from a fake one? Start a price list for the items you most frequently shop for. You can either start writing down sale prices and then track them over the next 2 months, or you can go through your receipts from your past shopping trips and start making a list of the lowest price you paid for an item. Your price list is going to look different from mine because we may shop at different stores or for different types of items, so keep this in mind. I just started my price list, so it is in process and may not have the lowest sale prices reflected yet, but just to give you an idea, here are a few prices I've got on my list.
Produce:
Grapes .99 lb.
Potatoes .25 lb.
Baby Carrots .88 lb.
Meat:
75% lean hamb 1.89 lb
Chicken Breast 1.98 lb.
1 % Milk 2.50
Yogurt .35
Crescent Rolls 1.66
Shredded Cheese 2 lb 6.99
Tortillas 1.05
Grocery:
Spag Sauce .98
Pasta .88
Pasta mixes 1.00
Crm Soup .49
Oatmeal 1.79
Cake 1.00
Frosting 1.00
Bread 1.00
Chex Mix/Bugles 1.00 (get free with dbld cpn)
Mtn Dew 12 pk 2.00
Cereal .50 box or FREE --Sept. Deal: 6 boxes - $10 off & $4 milk
Frozen:
Garlic Bread 1.99
Pizza 2.50
Bag Veggies .88
Get the idea? Start your own list and think about putting it in your coupon binder so that you can write down a few prices while you are in the store. If you have it with you and see an item on sale that wasn't advertised, you can consult your price list to see if it is truly a good price or not. Hopefully this will help you get started! I hope you find even lower sale prices than I have, and if you do, please let me know so I can adjust my list accordingly!
I have a confession to make. Although I do LOVE couponing and it is exhilarating for me, it can also make me crazy. That's why I called my series "Crazy for Coupons". It has a double meaning sometimes.
I'm not a perfect player in this coupon game. Sometimes I do get flustered, especially if I am in a hurry or have kids with me. I also still get embarrassed because of having to ask for rainchecks (often I just skip it), and especially if there are people in line behind me. I let people go ahead of me all the time because of my many coupons and multiple transactions. The other night I kept letting people ahead of me at Walgreens, and then I asked if someone could check me out in cosmetics so I wouldn't hold anyone up. I know I shouldn't be embarrassed about using coupons wisely and saving money, but. . .
However, I'm not ready to give it up, because it astounds me how much less I have been spending. And despite the red cheeks, it is a fun game to play!
Here's a warm soup recipe for a crisp fall day! This soup is really easy to make and my girls actually eat it, so it's a winner at our house! Our girls like to mix in sour cream.
Black Bean Soup
2 cans black beans, undrained
1 cup chicken broth
1 small onion, chopped
1 tsp minced garlic
1 jar (16 oz) thick and chunky salsa
2 tsp lime juice
1 tsp ground cumin
1/4 tsp crushed red pepper (opt)
1/3 cup plain yogurt or sour cream (opt. stir-in)
Place 1 can beans with liquid and broth in blender, cover. Blend until smooth. In large pot, saute onion and garlic for 4-5 min. Add blended bean mixture, remaining beans and liquid, salsa, lime juice, cumin and crushed red pepper. Bring to boil. Reduce heat to low and cover. Cook stirring occasionally, for 25-30 min. Serve topped with yogurt or sour cream if desired.
0 grams total fat, 10 grams fiber, 5 grams sugars, 12 grams protein.
I went grocery shopping tonight and did my two transactions in order to double my 10 coupons. I had it all mapped out and even got the scoop this afternoon from Money Saving Mom about the Glade catalina deal. My first transaction went from about $33 down to $18.48 (savings of 54%), and my second went from about $30 down to $8.25 (savings of 74%). This is an overall savings of 63% for the trip. Pretty good, right?
Yes, it is pretty good, and I am happy about it, but I am SO a coupon NEWBIE! Tonight at the grocery store I met the COUPON QUEEN. She saw my coupon binder, and I was more than a little conspicuous because I had a photographer following me around for next week's newspaper story. She said she used to have one of those photo binders but now has SEVEN in her car in a suitcase. WHAT? Yup, it's true. She showed some of them to me. Some of you have said I should teach classes. This woman is seriously considering it, and for good reason. She wouldn't divulge all her secrets, but she did tell me she had been couponing for 25 years and has probably saved over $200,000. Yes, you read that right, and the comma is in the right place. She showed me several receipts from her shopping just today, and the totals were .28, .00, -1.07, -.14, things like that. "They actually took money out of the till and paid you?" I asked with my mouth hanging open. I turned to the photographer and said, "you are taking pictures of the WRONG lady!"
Now, she had been shopping ALL DAY and sometimes buys 10 copies of the newspaper for the coupons, and I don't have the time right now to devote to all that, but I'm sure I could learn a thing or two from her! I've only been doing this since mid-July, and I feel like I've already come a long way. Some of you have just started, and hopefully you also feel like you've come a long way. It's all about spending less, and I hope you are feeling good about it. Hold your heads high and carry your coupon binders proudly! Shout your good deals from the rooftops (and post them in the comments!)! You are now a member of the elite, the serious couponers! Welcome! And just think about where you could be 25 years from now. . . . !
So you have your coupons clipped and organized into a system. You've got the ads in front of you and have scoped out the sales. Now it's time to plan your attack! :-)
After I have clipped and filed my coupons, I pull out the ads for the stores. I go through each ad and circle items that are on sale that I think I have a coupon for or that I think are a good deal. Consult your price book (if you've started one) to make sure your sales are good ones (and not "fake sales"). Then I go through my coupon book and pull out the coupons I'm planning to use for each store. This week I had a pile for Walgreens and my grocery store. I start a list for each store and keep the coupons with each list. Some people use envelopes for each store, but so far I have just been paper clipping my coupons to my list. If you see a sale, you can always check the online coupon database to see if there are any internet printables for those items.
I often do multiple transactions at each store to maximize my savings, so I write down what I plan on purchasing in each transaction, along with the coupons, so that I can keep track of what I am doing. You may not need to do this, but it makes things easier for me to plan ahead of time. I like to make sure I have all my ducks in a row so I don't forget anything! (I'm kind of a control freak--Surprise!) :-)
Once you have your lists and your coupons ready, go for it! Take your coupon binder with you into the store, because you never know what you'll find, maybe a clearance item or an unadvertised sale--and you have a coupon to make it sweeter! Now go save you some money!
Here is F's 4 month update:
Height: 25 inches (75%ile)
Weight: 11 lbs 12 oz (20%ile)
Head: 42.5 cm (90%ile)
She got shots today and didn't like it one bit! She still spits up a lot (we're very thankful for the extra large Grammie bibs!) but is a generally happy baby. She loves to watch her big sisters, who love to watch her back. Her eyes are still blue, but I'm not holding my breath because the other girls' eyes all started out blue and all turned brown somewhere between 6-9 months. Her favorite toys are her hands and feet, and she likes to chew on her bib or burpcloth. This month she has started using the exersaucer and we got out the highchair so that she can join the family at the table for mealtimes (she didn't like being left in the bouncy seat all the way on the floor!). She has rolled from her tummy to her back, but prefers to roll from her back to her tummy! She has been finding her BIG voice lately, talking VERY loudly at times--lots to say, I guess! Her daytimes are becoming more predictable, but she is still getting up twice a night, which I'm hoping will end soon!
Get lunch or dinner on the cheap! 
My sister-in-law is a vegetarian, and every time she comes over she brings hummus. The kids eat it up! (okay, we do too!) I've bought it before, but I've never attempted to make it. Jennifer made it look so easy, I just had to give it a try. I don't have a food processor, so I used my blender, which worked just great.
Ingredients:
1 can of chickpeas, extra virgin olive oil, salt, and a little ground cumin. Blend well.
M's speech therapist came over and we inspired her to go home and make some, too! Yummy!
Cameron and Linda let me borrow their crock pot cookbooks, since I am determined to give this crock pot thing a try. I used it to make some applesauce with some of the apples we pic
ked last weekend.
I cut up a bunch of apples with my handy Apple-Peeler-Corer-Slicer from Pampered Chef. I love that thing this time of year! I put the apples in the crock pot, added a little sugar, sprinkled in some cinnamon and nutmeg, a little bit of lemon juice, and a couple cups of water. The recipe said 3-4 hours on high.
My dilemma: The apples weren't done by bedtime. I don't have one of those fancy "smart" crock pots with a timer on it, so I was lamenting that I'd probably have to set my alarm to get 
up in the middle of the night to turn off the crock pot when Ted said, "why don't you plug it into one of those timers we have for the lamps?" I said, "you're so smart honey!" to which he replied, "you don't need a smart crock pot, you already have a smart husband!" :-) So true!
So I set the timer for a few more hours and went to bed. Of course, since I haven't left a crock pot on all night, let alone plugged into a timer, I was still nervous about it. I didn't want to wake up to burnt apple mess, so I still checked on it in the middle of the night (F was up to eat anyway . . . such is life).
The apples were done by morning, but I knew the applesauce was too chunky for my kids to want to eat it, so I quickly ran it through the blender and it turned out perfectly! The girls loved warm, homemade applesauce with their breakfast.
October is Fire Prevention Month, and the Home Depot is offering a free kids workshop to make a whistle fire truck on Saturday, October 4 anytime from 9am-noon. This is free and no registration is required. Ages 5-12.
Thanks to Freebies4Mom!
I wasn't planning on going to Walgreens this week, but they got my attention with another great coupon!! Get your $5/$20 coupon here and get ready to save (or even make) some money! If you want some ideas as to how to make money with this coupon, go to this post or this post and look at the comments, too.
Here's my plan to take advantage of this deal:
2 packages of Huggies $9.99 each (We need these)
1 package of Kotex $5.00
Lypsyl (if they have it) $1.99
Subtotal: $26.97
Coupons: $1.50 off Huggies x 2
$1.50 off Kotex Walgreens coupon
$1 off LypSyl
$5/$20
Total OOP: $16.47
Submit for $1.99 October Walgreens rebate
Submit to Caregiver's Marketplace for diaper rebate $2
Get $5 RR for next transaction from Kimberly-Clark
Total after rebates and RR: $7.48
Which is what I would pay for only 1 pack of Huggies!
I got the Kotex coupon in a sample I ordered from Walgreens that I told you about here. I got the LypSyl coupon from a campaign I did for BzzAgent, and I have a few more if you want to make this a small money-maker for you! Just email me and we'll arrange a way to get the coupon to you.
Thanks to Staci and Amber for being the first to email this to me! I know they're making some money shopping at Walgreens, too!
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