A few final thoughts

This post is very long overdue, and I'm sorry I've been away for so long. Life has gotten busier and busier, as it tends to do, and with everything going on, I have decided to take an indefinite leave of absense from my couponing blog. I still love to coupon, but find I don't have the time to sit down and blog about all the deals. I feel my time is better spent at this point being the best wife and mother that I can be. I hope you all understand.


As I've mentioned before, if you need grocery deals in the area, I highly recommend using GrocerySmarts. In addition to this, you might enjoy Money Saving Mom for other deals and freebies.

For those of you that know me on facebook, I will try to leave brief messages here and there if a great deal comes along. I hope that will help. Good luck to all of you with your adventures in saving money.

I do want to leave you with one last thought--a quote I read on a friend's blog that I love and hope you will too:

Learn to live with less. Learn to shun envy. Appreciate what you have. If you have less, you will appreciate what you have more.

High Value Huggies Coupons

There are some awesome $3/1 Huggies coupons out there right now. Go to the link here to print of your coupons (print 2 per computer). These were just added yesterday, but I'm guessing their print limit will be reached soon, so I would recommend printing these off soon.

You can also become a fan of Huggies on facebook and get access to print another 2 coupons for $3/1 pack of Huggies.

From what I hear there may be a good diaper deal with Huggies at Walgreens this coming week that these coupons would go great with. I'll update you on this when I find out more.

update: There is a deal this week at Walgreens--buy 3 packs of Huggies diapers at $8.99 each, get $5RR. Use 3 of your $3/1 coupons plus the $1/1 WAGS coupon from the Children's Activity Book put out last fall if you still have it to get your total out of pocket down to $14.97. If you factor in the $5 RR you earn, you have spent essentially $3.32 per pack of diapers.

There is also another link for another $3/1 Huggies coupon (I know--can you believe all these awesome coupons they are putting out right now?!) Go here to print your 2 coupons per computer.

Princess and the Frog

If any of you are gearing up to purchase Disney's The Princess and the Frog blue ray or dvd when it comes out March 16, head over here to find out how to possibly get the blue ray/dvd combo pack for only $6.99 after coupon and rebates.

If you just want the $10 off coupon, you can print it from here.

Enjoy your movie!

Albertson's Double Coupons

In Sunday's paper yesterday there was a one-page Albertson's ad that had 3 "double your manufacturer's coupon" coupons on the bottom. You can pair these with coupons you currently have to get twice as much off. The most they will match per coupon is $1.00, so if you have a MFC worth $1.00 and you use it with one of these Albertson's coupons, you will get a total of $2.00 off.

Since the Las Vegas area seldom has stores that will double manufacturer's coupons, this is a great find for us couponers (other store chains, not found here, double MFC almost always--so sad we don't have these stores here :(

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss

This weekend, Saturday Feb. 27, from 11am to 3pm Lakeshore Learning Store is throwing a birthday party for Dr. Seuss. They will be doing quite a few things during this time:

• Free Crafts for kids
• Storytime every hour
• Face painting
• Games
  

It should be a fun outing to take your kids too.

Also, while you are there, if you see anything you are planning on buying, make sure to make use of their "Buy one get one at 50% off" coupon found on fliers in the store.

And if you can't make this event, they have free crafts for kids every Saturday from 11am to 3pm

The Price is Right

These days I seem to save all my shopping to one day, and on that day I drag my little girl with me to several stores, getting all our deals in a marathon shopping trip. Today happened to be that day. I usually set everything up, take a picture for blogging purposes or just for my own pleasure, then make my husband guess how much I spent when he get home. I decided to do something a little more fun tonight when he got home. I made him play "the Price is Right."

I arranged it all by store and put a tag under each group with the store name and the retail price of all the items on it. As in the Showcase showdown where the closest price without going over wins, my husband had to guess the right price of what I actually spent, without going under. His prize--whatever store he came closest too without going under, he got to pick a prize from that group of stuff. He's become pretty good at guessing, so I wanted to give him a real challenge. I don't think the Wipes or tuna from CVS or mascara from Target were really calling his name, so he was more interested in getting the oreos from Smiths or gum from Walgreens.

Here are the results:

Smiths:
Total Retail Value--$33.99
Total Spent--$11.34
Chris' Guess--$12.68
% Saved--67%

CVS:
Total Retail Value--$27.96
Total Spent-- $1.46
Chris' Guess--$10.38
% Saved--95%

Target:
Total Retail Value--$34.15
Total Spent-- $14.38
Chris' Guess--$18.35
% Saved--58%

Walgreens:
Total Retail Value--$17.12
Total Spent-- $0.63
Chris' Guess--$4.73
% Saved--96%

and the prize is . . . the Double Stuffed Golden Oreos (compliments of the coupon for a free package I got from Oreo's facebook account). Yum. I hope he shares with me.

Here is a breakdown of some of the deals with details of where to get the coupons if any of these things are things you want or need.

Walgreens: (I had a $3RR that was about to expire and I needed to quickly use it, so this is what I ended up getting with it)

• Hunts tomato sauce--on sale for $0.39 each after in-ad-coupon. Use the $1.00/3 cans manufacturer's coupon found here (must play the game) to get these for $0.06 each. (Can print it twice but have to play the game twice to do so)
• Mentos gum--on sale for $0.99 each. Use the $0.55 MFC from the 2/21 Smart Source to get these for $0.44 each
• Goody Hair bands--on sale for $2.99 with $2RR earned on purchase. Final price essentially $0.99
• Packets of Seeds--on sale for $0.20 each with in-ad coupon--a great filler item if you need one (to understand why you need filler items, go to my post here)
• Select Movie Candy boxes--on sale for $0.49 each--also pretty good if you have a sweet tooth (like me!) and need a filler item.

Target:

• Kraft cheese--use the $1.00/2 MFC from the 1/24 Smart Source with the $1.00/1 Target printable coupon to get these for $1.34 each--ok deal (usually you can print the Target coupons twice but for some reason I couldn't. That would have made these $0.84 each it would have let me--maybe you'll have better luck).
• Kraft Parmesean Cheese--on sale for $3.55 this week--use the $1.00/1 MFC printable coupon found here (print twice) with the $1.00/2 Target printable coupon making them $2.05 each
• Rimmel Mascara--Use the $3/1 coupon from the March All You Magazine making it free.
• Swiffer Sweeper and Refill Pack--On sale for $8.99 this week--Use the $2/1 Target coupon found in the 2/21 Red Plum and the "Buy a Swiffer Starter kit get a refill free" MFC from the 2/7 P/G making it only $6.99 for both the Swiffer Sweeper Starter Kit and the Refill Pack.

CVS:

(I did invest a $7ECB from my shopping from last week, but I had gotten that from shopping using a $10ECB that I earned by simply doing an online survey for CVS--it seriously pays to register on their website--they periodically email you ways to earn ECBs!)

• Huggies Refill Wipes (184+ count)--ringing up as $2.50 this week--hidden deal! If you have any huggies wipes coupons from home mailers (I had a $0.50/1) use them, getting them for $2.00. You can also log on to your Upromise account and click on the huggies wipes coupon to get $1.00 deposited in your child's upromise education account when you buy 2 packs. Update 2/24/10--Huggies refill wipes are no longer ringing up at $2.50 anymore, only the small packs are.
• Bumble Bee Tuna--on sale for $0.49 this week--buy 5 and use the $1.00/5 printable coupon to get them for $0.29 each.
• Softsoap--on sale for $0.88 this week--use the $0.35/1 printable coupon to get them for $0.53 each.

Smiths: I'm not going to spend much time on this one since their deals end tonight. Sorry. I'm late in getting out this week to Smiths and saved my shopping trip to their final day. Just be aware of the BOGO Purex coupon in the 2/21 Red Plum that you may want to use when they go on sale again (I ended up spending $0.95 each--making it about $0.03 per load of laundry)

I am most excited for my swiffer sweeper. I've gotten these a couple of times, but used them as part of bridal shower "cleaning supply" gifts. Now I have my own...and it's red (it's a limited edition one--and I like it so much better than the green! :)

Old Navy V-Neck Shirts

Old Navy has their V-neck shirts on sale this week for $5 each, down from $14.50, as well as some tank tops and other children's clothing and Men's tees. If you are ready for spring like we are here in Las Vegas, then this is a perfect opportunity to pick up some shirts for the nice weather. (They are kind of hidden in the store I go to, so if you don't see the ones for $5 at first, ask an employee--don't get confused with the $10 V-neck tees)

To make your shopping trips at Old Navy more worthwhile, make sure to head on over to Old Navy Weekly to get printable coupons. They refresh every week, usually sometime on Thursday. The really good ones (like $50 or $75 off $100 purchase) usually go fast (like within minutes), but you can find others still there throughout the week. They make you work for the coupons, though. You have to click on different things to find the hidden coupons.

Example for this week:

To get the 15% off coupon do this: click on the blue stripped tank, then the pants below it (a 10% off coupon will pop up) but then click on Amy's face that appears in the blue box for the 15% off coupon to appear.

My total for the 2 shirts: $8.50 plus tax--a 71% savings over the retail total of $29.00.