And how exciting...

That I've now been blogging for a week! :)

Not coupon related

BUT! savings related nonetheless! We got a random call today from a debt consolidation place. After hearing their whole spiel, Brian and I both opted not to go with them because we are doing so well on our own now, and plus we just felt "if it sounds too good to be true...." In any case it got me to thinking, so I did call our one creditor to ask what they could offer us, seeing as this other place offered us a 9% APR. I got a lot of good information out of the girl helping me, and learned (much as B and I suspected) that the company canNOT guarantee any rates but that is all in the "fine print". Instead, they get us to sign up with them telling us all these big and wonderful dreams, only to then go back to the creditor and hope that they are willing to work with them. All in all it was an informative morning, on that front. Brian was then wondering about the Soldiers&Sailors relief Act, so we called the creditor again and learned that by submitting a copy of his deployment orders, they will reduce the APR to 6% where it will remain indefinitely! So we are excited for that, and we are excited to be moving forward with terminating the lease on his vehicle. With the APR savings and car payment savings alone, I will be able to make excellent progress toward our debt-free goal!

Wooohooooooooo!

Our first shopping tallies!

Before we started our shopping trips today, I brought all the coupons I'd be using to the front of my binder, still in my little holders. I had the remainder of my coupons with me the entire evening, but left the others sorted by type. I made up a list for Walgreens based on the store ad online, and the same for King Soopers. While we were at each place, we sort of compared prices on everything on both lists, to get an idea of the savings. I sure loved having my binder resting on the cart and going through the aisles saying, "I could save on that! and that! and THAT!" LOL :)

Ok, our first trip today was to King Soopers (Kroger) where we spent 242.05. Oh wait, we didn't! In the first of our three-part shopping trip, we purchased:
- 6 jugs of Similac
- 3 PopTarts
- 2 Lunchables
- 1 box cereal
- Cereal bars
- 5 cans Pringles
- 2 Gatorade (0.69 for the big one)
- Shaving cream
- 4 thing Pampers (thank you, Toni!)
- 10 tubes toothpaste
- B's razor
- Dr. Pepper (3/$12)

All said, in coupons and rebates we spent $134. 96, with an $82 savings! It was "only" 55% savings, but it was a HUGE savings!

Part two and three of our shopping trip today was at Walgreens. Apparently, not a lot of people shop at Walgreens on a Friday night LOL!! So we were able to really take our time and compare prices, etc. I got out my lists and we got our two carts and away we went. So in B's cart I had the Walgreens in-store ad/with coupons and also my binder.

We spent a LOT here.... oh wait! no we didn't! :)
I started with my cart, with my 4 Similac. I had 4 $5 rebates, and 4 $3/1 coupons :) Unfortunately, they have to be rung up each separately.... so in between the first couple a guy came up behind B. So I said he should go ahead with his 1 item. OK - he thanked us, and paid etc. In between our almost last 2 formulas this lady walked up, so I suggested she do the same. No joke, she bought 2 pk cigarettes for like $4 something. She pays with a $20. OK, no problem. Then she says to the guy over her shoulder, "Please give her my change!" and raced out the door! So then we got $15.25 for "free". I couldn't believe it! The employee couldn't believe it either, so as he rang up the next Similac he told me my total ($2) and said, "So... I'll just take it out of this $5, I guess..." Ha! Then after that transaction he said, "Ok, here is your change," and handed me the other $13 and some change. Did my last transaction and coupons, and earned $1 RR. Still trying to figure that one out.

Brian was AWESOME - he was following the ads to the nail, and even at the register was making sure everything was ringing up right. Well it got to the batteries and they didn't ring up right (they rang up at $5.99 - in-store ad said 2.99). So the manager apologized profusely that they were out of those advertised, so he gave us those for 2.99! Also had a $1.50/1 coupon so that was a huge steal of a deal! I'm still trying to figure out RR, but I had finished checking out so I gave him my $1 RR which was cool.

All told, we got:
- 4 Similac
- 6 boxes Kleenex
- 1 gallon milk (on sale) with 1 box cereal (on sale, b/c of milk purchase)
- 3 Mt. Dew/$11
- 2 cases of water
- Hamburger helpers
- 2 Old Spice deoderant
- 4 Old Spice body wash (with coupons, and one with B1G1)
- make-up
- shampoo
- Scope
- 4pkg Pampers

67.57 (B's cart) -- minus 23.12 in coupons and WAGC FINAL total: 44.45
94.17 (my cart) -- 76.59 minus the last $7 from "generous stranger" FINAL total: 69.59
34.96 (Similac) -- minus $20 in rebates, $9 in coupons and $5 from "generous stranger" - FREE!

196.70 for only 114.04 (saved 82.66) or 57.9% savings! wooohoooo, go us!



Saving $82 as each place put a nice $164 in our pockets :)

Getting ready for our first big couponing trip!

Ok! The last three days I have been scouring the internet and my coupons I've been saving since March, and after literally ALL day yesterday I got my coupons clipped, sorted and filed in my brand new binder! I know, crazy to be so excited about such a silly thing - BUT it feels so good to have them all sorted. I had watched several videos on the different methods to sorting coupons, and for awhile I was sorting them by date. For that method I saved the entire store or coupon insert (from the Sunday paper) and filed it by date. This was fairly easy because when I would go to couponmom and just grab the section and search for whichever coupon I needed. This was realllly super tedious, so I saw the other way (which is, admittedly, what Brian wanted me to start with in the first place LOL!) is to clip and sort from the beginning. Had I done this all along I'm certain it would not have taken me so long yesterday! However, having said that this made creating my list SUPER easy, and also our shopping trip itself today was a lot easier!

I'm tallying my purchases and amount saved, for the next post. Stay tuned!

:)

Brian's on board!

It's official, I've got a major support team going! Brian is just as excited about coupons as I am which is totally and completely shocking to me! I'm so glad to have his help in watching for great deals! Earlier this evening he said, "Makes me wanna go back on couponmom and see what other great deals we can get!" I love him!

Ah - and also found a few video links to help me get started organizing my coupons. I have a lot of inserts I've saved over the last 2 months, so now I think I know how I'll sort them to be best for my needs. I'll be posting pics soon!

Today's savings!

Today we saved a little over $30 with coupons and savers card! Brian is really getting on board with coupons and was helping me search the ads for other coupons and deals we could score today! I'm thinking I may switch the way I do my coupons, but I haven't decided yet. Right now I have them saved by date, but it takes forever to go through each paper... I'm debating about clipping them all and saving them in a binder by expiration date. Ahh decisions, decisions!

Goal - 100 meal plan....

In my effort to build a good stock, I'm starting with the recipes for 100 meals to see where the typical "staples" come from (i.e. cream of mushroom soup, spaghetti sauce, etc) to build a good solid stock. I want to eat right while Brian's away, instead of being too tempted to just eat chicken nuggets or grab-n-go dinners each night. I also am starting to take notes on what we seem to go through regularly (B's razors, shampoo, etc) so that I can build a nice stock of that as well. My goal will be a 2 month stock, not anything that will take over our house ;)

I have about 2 weeks of meals so far, in my spreadsheet.... away I go!

Here we go!

OK! Ready to start this couponing journey! So far I have started creating my menu, and it will include almost 80 meals. I listed my cookbooks 1 - 11, and used a random order for the cookbooks. In another column I've used a random order of page numbers. I just put the two columns together, so I can go back through and pick a recipe from that page (if there are multiple listed on that page). Next blog entry - planning my shopping trip for Friday, and shopping my pantry! I'm also going to list a goal each week, for savings, and a semi-rolling tally of my total savings maybe like monthly. I am super excited to get started!