Mail Call

Have you got anything good in the mail for FREE lately? I have!! I got the free freezer tote from Sam's Club that I have used on many HT trips already.I got a cool cereal cup from Fruit Loops that you can freeze the bottom of the cup to keep milk cold, the top holds the cereal, and has a fold able spoon clipped in the top. Everything you need for a small cereal snack for a young child. I got a two pack of pull ups, and a 3 pack of the new Pampers cruiser diapers. David got a kick out of the fact that I got the FREE Gillette Fusion razor for texting a Spanish word(We still don't know what the word meant)to Gillette. And last but not least. I got two coupons from Excedrin for a Free bottle of Excedrin. I know sometimes sample and freebies are not what you expect when you get them. Sometimes you get two drops of a new lotion sealed in foil, or something the kids can break in two seconds. But SOMETIMES you get a freebie that is worth creating that "gmail" account so your main email account does not get clogged with junk mail from these companies. But trust me. Check your junk email account at least once a week. Sometimes you get coupons in there. They are normally much better than the ones you get in the paper every week.

Also remember your friends when you see a freebie offered. A friend recently told me she got a free sippy cup in the mail. Her son no longer uses them, so she passed it on to a friend. I still have one in diapers (how I wish he wasn't) so I can use the free diapers they are offering now. Maybe you no longer have one in diapers, but do you know someone who does? I promise you I have never had someone tell me "no thanks" when I offered them something that I got for free that they could use. If you see a product for free (even free with coupons) think about who other than you could use it.

I feel very blessed to have been able to offer free things to friends and family. With times being as tight as they are right now we have all had to cut back on LOTS of things. The price of something are just not in our budget anymore. If you are one of my "coupon" friends , think of all the free stuff we have gotten lately. I feel like Proctor & Gamble has stocked my cabinets. Do we really need all of this body wash, lotion, makeup, & razors that we have gotten for free? I just opened a bottle of softsoap body wash I had left from a CVS deal from last year. There is no way I will use the 10 bottles I have in the cabinet anytime soon. Think of your friends and family right now. If you put together a basket that contained a small sampling of your stock pile and gave it to one of these people, how would it make them feel. How in turn would it make you feel? Sometime a small jester like this is the exact thing a struggling friend might need right now. You might not think it is a big deal, but they will think so. I am not suggesting emptying your cabinets, just sharing your blessings from God. I never thought of this as a blessing until recently. A couple of friends and I were talking about using coupons. One of my friends said that she had gotten some free lipstick & had given it to her SIL who is a single mom struggling to make ends meet. Would she have spent $6 or more to have bought it for herself? I doubt it, but would she take it for free, sure. Sometime women just need to feel pamper (I know I do). Maybe that free lipstick made her feel great when she put it on. Maybe it made her think that she had someone in her life that loved her enough to think of her and get this lipstick just for her. You never know what impact you might make on someone with such a small jester. Perform a Random Act of Kindness this week. I promise you that YOUR life will be just as blessed as theirs will be.

OAMC Update

Well my first attempt at OAMC had a good turn out I think. The first thing I cooked was the BBQ pork. I was able to get enough for two meals of BBQ pulled pork. The I cooked the two small chickens. This yielded enough meat for only one meal, so I learned to buy bigger chickens! But I was able to turn the left over juices into a 2 lb jar of chicken stock overnight. So basically a free box of chicken stock now in the freezer too. The last thing was the Italian chicken. It tasted great. However it was surprisingly dry. I think next time I will shred the chicken to keep it more moist. I also used the second half of the jar of Italian dressing to cook potatoes as a side last night. I think next time I will try to cook it all in the crock pot together to see how that turns out. so overall it was a good 1st experience. I am continuing today with a couple of more things. Today I am cooking double batches of spaghetti sauce, chili, and taco meat in the crock pots. That should yield 6 more meals. I also have 2 more meals I have all planned out for later today. It might happen it might not. But there is always tomorrow. At the end of this 2 (MAYBE 3) day cooking days I am hoping to have 11-12 meals in the freezer for use in the coming weeks. Check in tomorrow to see if everything turns out as planned.

I'm sticking with the PIG!!

I have been reading and study up on OAMC (Once a month cooking) for a couple of months now. I want to try to do this, but can I really? From what I understand these girls commit and entire day to cooking meals than can be frozen for use all month long. It sounds like a great idea with baseball season right around the corner. I really struggled last year with picking Austin up from the middle school at 5 and then rushing Nicholas to ball practice in Burgaw by 5:30. (We ate a lot of Subway!) This year I want to try something new. Austin still has to be picked up at 5, but since Nicholas moves up to Majors this year he shouldn't have to be at practice until 6:30. I am hoping these easy frozen meals will save us on those days. I am hoping I can throw the frozen meals in the oven, go get Austin & by the time I get back from picking him up dinner should be ready & waiting. This should cut down on the amount of fast food we normally consume during baseball season.

I have been really thinking a lot about how I can accomplish this huge feat. I have come to the conclusion I can't. I can not devote an entire day to cooking with 2 small children underfoot, two older children needing to constantly be somewhere, and a husband that is trying his best to keep our family afloat by taking side jobs on the weekend. So after much thought & prayer I have decided to take it in small baby steps. Sounds good right?

I looked up all the sales this week and found that there are some great deals a Piggly Wiggly this week on meat. I am not a normal PW shopper. But you can't beat the sales on meat. So after dropping Ashlee off this morning, Hayden & I headed on over. Here is what we ended up with:

19 lbs of boneless pork chops

15 lbs of pork shoulder (for BBQ)

8 lbs of Ground beef

8 lbs of chicken thighs

16 lbs of whole chickens

17 lbs of chicken breast

We got all of this for under $90 dollars. This will feed my family for at least a month, if not more. Bonus was a free dozen eggs because I was one of the first 50 customers for the day. You can't beat FREE right??

It took me about 30 minutes to break down the packages into sizes for our family. Which was when I got the great idea to start my cooking today. Remember small steps. I started by adding BBQ sauces & marinades to some of the packages. That way I can just throw the packages in the crock pots and already have them full of flavor. Then that lead to getting out my crock pots to start some meals for the next week. I have 3 crock pots, I know it is a lot, but one I have had for 10+ years, one was David's, and my Aunt gave me that has been shoved in the back of my closet for at least 4 years still in the box. So after opening the box and getting all 3 set up I had to decide where to start. Today menu will be one crock pot of BBQ pork, this one roast will be enough to feed my family 2 meals of BBQ. Two meals down, 2 more Crock pots to go. Next crockpot is cooking 2 whole chickens (they were small). This will be for Chicken Tacos later this week, and I get to try out the new crock pot recipe I found to make homemade chicken stock (to be used in later recipes). The third crock pot will be for Italian chicken. I dumped 6 chicken breast and half a bottle of Italian dressing in and am hoping it turns out good. All three of these recipes I got from Moneysavingmom.com. I will let you know how they turn out later. Well off to pick Ashlee up from Preschool. Check back later to see if I got anything else cooking.

Harris Teeter Totals for the week.

There is no way I am getting together everything I bought this week from HT for a picture. My table would be over flowing. But I will give you final tallies because it was so much fun. I was very shocked that they decided to do another Super Doubles so soon after having one last month. But I was grateful for every little bit of stockpile I was able to snag. Plus my kids got a bunch of treats that they normally do not get because they are too expensive. Here is hoping that a triples deal is in the works for March. Not that I have room for it, but I am asking my dad to build me some shelving in my garage for stockpile items. So final numbers for the week were:

$399.89 in products
$215.08 saved in coupons
$76.92 saved in sales
Total OOP was $107.89 (Way less than my $125 weekly budget for food)

Total saved : 292.00 or 73.02% (I was hoping for 75%)

Target Trip....they basically paid me to take home FREE products.

I am not normally a good Target shopper. I have a problem getting out of the store without purchasing things that are an impulse buy. This trip was not an exception to that rule. I purchased all of the above plus 2 My Little Pony toys that are not pictured because Ashlee would not let me take their picture. Yes I let my 4 year old tell me what to do. It causes less tears (from me & her)that way. So I did two transactions. The first was for the venus/fusion razors and the olay body wash. This got me $10 in GC to pay for the next purchase of the remaining items.

Totals for this trip were:

$93.42 in products

$51.66 in coupons used

$14.00 in sales from Target

$10 in GC from 1st transaction used on 2nd transaction

That brings my total OOP to $17.76 for the trip plus I have a $5 GC left over, plus $22.94 in refunds due.

Finally Tally:

17.76 OOP

-22.94 refunds ($15 Olay & $7.94 for the Quatrro razor)

-5.00 GC still remaining

10.18 PROFIT for the day plus $93.42 worth of FREE products.

It's always a good day to get paid to shop!!!

Todays Shopping Trip

Well todays trip was not as good as I expected. But it was all my childrens fault!! I was forced to spend an extra $8.54 on pop tarts that were not in the plan. But how can you say no to such sweet faces? Plus the Valentines candy was on sale & I had a coupons (also not in the plan). I still have a week to make a better trip so check back later to see if I can beat myself. Here are my totals:

$130.22 Shelf Cost
$85.36 - Coupons Used
$20.86- Sales from Store
$24.00- Total OOP Spent

TOTAL SAVED= $106.22 thats almost a 82% savings!!!

On top of the $24 oop that I spent I will have $17.89 worth of rebates to submit. So ALL of the above for $6.11!!! Considering the Pop Tarts cost $8.54, and I had tax of $4.60. I call it a good day. But I still think I can do better!!!

My $0.38 trip to CVS

Well it has been a long time since I have had a deal this good. I almost didn't go to CVS this week because I didn't see anything I really couldn't do without. But after reading a couple of blogs I found some good stuff. Here is the break down from the purchase....

2- Cover Girl Powders @ $6.00

1- Aussie Hair Spray @ 2.99

1-Colgate Toothpaste @ 2.99

Used $1 off Colgate, $1 off Aussie Spray, $1 off Powder, and a BOGO Powder.

Total before Coupons: $17.98

Total Coupons Used: - $9.99

Total ECB's Used: - $9.00

Total Tax: $1.39

Total OOP was $0.38 and got all $9 in ECBs back!!!!

I needed this coupon boost to get me back in the swing of things right before Harris Teeter starts Super Doubles tomorrow. YAY!!! Check back tomorrow to see what kind of deals I can snag there.

It's been a long weekend.....

This is what we woke up to on Saturday morning. The kids were ssssoooo excited. They had a small window of time to play in the snow because we already had plans to leave that morning to go to Greensboro for Andrew's Baptism. But thankfully Ashlee and Hayden got to play in the snow at Grandma Pat's house that afternoon. She didn't get as much as us, but that was a good thing I think. We got to Greensboro just in time to hang out with family before we had to get dressed for the baptism. It was a beautiful service. We then went to hang out with the kids a little longer before the after party started. I was so grateful for all the help David's brother & his family gave us. They graciously let the kids hang out with them while we attended the events, and put up with us crashing at their house. We had a ball!! It is so nice to get to hang out with them and be able to catch up and just be relaxed. Thanks again Vic & Angela!!!

I can honestly say I can not believe how time has flown by this last year. As Andrew's mom pointed out it has just been a year since we transferred that beautiful baby to me to take care of for 8 1/2 months. It was one of the greatest experiences of my life. It has been an added bonus to be able to continue to stay in his life as much as I have. I truly love him & his family as I do my own family. It was wonderful to be able to cuddle up with him for a while and see his eyes light up when I spoke to him.