Friday, March 26, 2010

I'm one of THOSE people

I never thought I would be that lady. The one at the grocery store.

With her coupons.  All one hundred of them.

But alas, here I am, at the ripe old age of 26, clipping coupons, scanning ads, making lists.

And I love it.  I've recently gotten into "super-couponing," where you combine coupons with sales to get a lot of items for very cheap, or sometimes even free.  And so far, with limited effort, I've been able to save a nice chunk of change on things I already was going to buy.  I am busy.  So I've kept it simple.  You can make a full time job out of this, going to different stores to get the best deal on things.  But I don't have time for that.  Nor are we really that strapped for money.  So, instead of making it an obsession to get the-best-deal-that-ever-was on every item, I just do what I can in a short amount of time.  It takes me about 20 minutes to cut out and organize what I've got every week or week and 1/2, and so far, I've been saving around $20 a trip.  And that's a big part of a grocery budget for a family of two.  Trust me, I don't make a dollar a minute at the hospital.  This has been a good investment of time for me so far.

My best deal last week:
Target had a sale of "buy four boxes of cereal, get a $5 gift certificate."  I paired that with two "buy two, get $1 off" coupons, and all said (with the gift card), the four boxes of cereal cost me $3.  Pretty good, huh?

My biggest dilemna: 
Trying to still buy/cook healthy things while using the coupons.  A lot of the coupons are for packaged meals/boxed items that aren't so good for the ol' arteries.  Even though they are lucrative deals, I've tried to use them in moderation.  I also try not to buy things I wouldn't normally buy if I didn't have a coupon in order to not spend more money "saving" money.

Now I have my little organizer set up, we buy a paper on Sundays, and I have a few websites bookmarked that tell me where the best deals are that week.  I'm not a fanatic by any means, but I'm trying to be smarter about daily living.   And I try to set aside all the coupons I'm going to use for sure as I make my way through the store, so as to not take any more time in line in front of you at the check out.  :-)

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Go Green.


Oatmeal butterscotch cookies (a few days early) in honor of my brother-in-law's birthday, St. Patrick's Day.

Addendum: Now I remember I have TWO brother-in-laws with a St. Patty's day birthday.  However, only one got the cookies.  And yes, my birthday is the 17th too.  Go Green!

My New Favorite Picture