The Great Thing About Home Depot

Did you know that Home Depot takes competitor coupons? My husband and I found this out about a year ago and have saved hundreds of dollars over the course of the year. In fact, we saved $100 just the other night!

My husband has been wanting a table saw for quite some time, and has watched Craigslist for the right deal for months. He finally came to the conclusion that he wasn't going to find what he was looking for on Craigslist. He did some research and decided that he wanted a Ridgid table saw (Ridgid is only sold at Home Depot).

The table saw costs $500 on never goes on sale. There is occasionally a rebate available, though, plus we knew we could look for a competitor coupon.

Then, a few nights ago, my husband randomly decided to look through a AAA magazine we get. He noticed a Harbor Freight coupon for 20% off a single item with no dollar limit! I convinced him that it was time to get the table saw.

We had to borrow a pick-up truck and go to two Home Depots, but we came home last Friday night with a $500 Ridgid table saw for $400 (bought completely with Christmas and birthday money, yay!).



My husband couldn't wait to get it out of the box:
...and he's already gotten a lot of use out of it!

We use Tru-Value coupons all the time, as we get $2 off $10 and $5 off $25 coupons from them in our community mailers every month or so. The 2010 Entertainment Book for our area also had a 15% off Menards coupon and 10% and 15% off Harbor Freight coupons. Perfect for all of the home remodeling we've been doing!

What I Got for $1.49

I picked up some amazing grocery deals lately by combining sales and coupons. Check it out!

My grand total for this deal was 99 cents! I picked this up a couple of weeks ago at the local Piggly Wiggly, which I never shop at. I read on a blog that there was a great deal available if a person had some $1.60 off a bag of nut clusters coupons. I had received a bunch in the mail, so I cashed in :)

I got all of this for 50 cents last night! Whoo-Hoo! I love when things work out just right.

I had noticed a really good deal in our Copps/Pick N Save ad yesterday. I thought about trying to make a deal out of it on Wednesday (double coupon day at Copps/PNS), but then noticed that a bunch of coupons I needed to get a good deal were expiring on Oct. 11th. I talked the hubby into grabbing some backpacks last night and taking our nightly walk to the grocery store :)

I thought we were going to get these items for 25 cents each after coupons, but I had a free item coupon for the Rice Krispies. The cashier took off the full price for the Rice Krispies, which is how my total got so low.

There you have it. I got everything in those two pictures for $1.49. Deal shopping is so much fun!

The Frugalest Strawberries Ever!

Two nights ago, at about 9:45pm, my husband and I were in the kitchen, just about ready to head to bed. Suddenly, our doorbell rings. Very odd. My husband goes to the door and there stands our elderly neighbor with a box of fresh strawberries!

Our neighbor's name is Dot and she's a real sweetheart. She explains that her daughter is visiting from out of state and they went strawberry picking that day. They picked more strawberries than they could handle, so they dropped the extras off with us! So thoughtful!

The coolest part of the story is that I was just telling my husband last weekend that I wanted to go strawberry picking so I could freeze some fresh strawberries. I thought it might be cheaper than buying frozen bagged strawberries at the store. Instead, free strawberries showed up at our doorstep :)

Here's a picture of the strawberries I froze:


I re-used two frozen strawberry bags I had kept in the freezer after using them up. They are crammed full, with the extras going into a Ziploc bag.

This is what I make with my frozen strawberries:


Yummy!

Part Time Update and More Free Stuff!

First, an update on my hopeful move to part time work from full time work. The job share position is now officially on my company's website as an open position. According to my boss, the hr department has already received 24 applications. They found four that they phone interviewed and only one was interested in the small number of hours we're looking to fill (16/hrs a week). We'll see what happens!

Also, I received more free stuff in the mail! Check it out:


I got this sweet box of stuff from a community that I am a part of called BzzAgent. I haven't been very active in the community, so this is the first thing I've gotten. I might have to get more involved :)

Fun Mail Day

I received a ton of fun stuff in the mail today!


Here is what I got:
- Two $2.00 Purina coupons that I received after emailing Purina and letting them know how much my cats love their food!
- Two Home Made Simple coupon books. I'm not sure how I got two of them, but I'm not complaining!
- Nexxus shampoo and conditioner samples - but no coupons :(
- Two samples of Pamprin and coupon. Only one of the samples is in the picture because I used the other one already - how's that for perfect timing!
- $5 off any purchase at Famous Footwear coupon
- the best of all: three coupons for free items!!! I got these from a Kraft sweepstakes. It includes a coupon for a free Nabisco Cracker item, a free Planter's Peanut item, and a free Kraft Cheese item.

I love awesome mail days like this :)

Recipe Websites and 100th Post!

I'm a picky eater and usually just buy the same couple of things to eat for dinner all the time (namely, potatoes!). My husband, on the other hand, likes everything (except beets and sauerkraut). I have been spending some time over this past year and four months of marriage locating recipes that are easy to make and that my husband will love. I've found quite a few winners. The problem is that a lot of recipes call for just a little bit of a fresh produce or dairy item that I buy and then most of it goes to waste.

I'm going to try to get better at locating different recipes that use some of the same vegetables. For example, last week I made a chicken rice casserole dish for my husband that called for fresh celery and onions. Of course, I had to buy a whole bunch of celery even though I only needed 1/4 cup of it!

Determined to not let all of that celery go to waste, on Sunday night I went internet searching for an easy recipe that had celery as an ingredient. I ended up at All Recipes, which seems to be one of the largest databases of free recipes out there (this is not a paid advertisement, by the way!). I was able to do a search by ingredient. I found another casserole dish that looked easy, but it also had chicken in it, so I thought it might be too much like the original dish I had made.

Searching around some more, I came across this Golden Potato Soup recipe. It looked pretty easy, and I definitely already had the potatoes on hand ;) It even calls for onion, so I was able to use more of that up!

I made it tonight, and it was a definite hit. From now on, whenever I make the chicken rice casserole, my husband will know that potato soup will be for dinner a few nights later :)

I really love the idea of grouping recipes together to keep food (and money!) from going to waste. The next time I make a dish that calls for a produce or dairy item that we won't use up, I'm going to go looking for a matching recipe to make later the same week.

Does anyone else do this? Do you have some favorite recipes that you like to "lump" together? I'd love to hear about them (with links if they're online!!!).


ps- Wow! This is my 100th post on Family and Finances. Craziness :)

I Love Fresh Tomatoes!

I grew up out in the country, and we always had a large garden in the summer. I have now lived in town for five years, and I sure miss that monstrous country garden!

Though I will probably never have a garden as big as the ones I had growing up, I am growing edibles at my house. A very nice raspberry patch came with our house when my husband bought it three years ago:

The raspberries have just finished up, but it's an ever-bearing raspberry patch, so we should have more berries this fall. Mmmm, mmmm!

This spring, I planted two "large tomato" plants and one "cherry tomato" plant. I love cherry tomatoes and have been enjoying them for about two weeks now.


My husband really likes the larger tomatoes. We just took the first two off the plant last weekend (in the picture below) and my husband had them in tacos. He was very happy.


At my first "city" house, I tried cucumber plants, which are another of my favorites. Between the deer and the rabbits (I had a wooded ravine in my backyard, so I had deer in the middle of the city), I could NOT keep the cucumber plants alive. I haven't tried them at my new house, but I think I'll give it another go next spring. We don't have deer here, just the rascally rabbits. I plan on having my husband build a wire mesh cage around the plants to protect them from the rabbits. I have no idea if that will work. Any tips?

New Countertops Equal Happy???

I drive past a cabinet and countertop store on my way home from work every day. They have an electronic billboard out front that they seem to like to change regularly. It's very nice of them to change it up often, but I found their last two messages to be fairly annoying.

A couple of weeks ago, the billboard proclaimed "Be The Joneses". Oh, brother. Give me a break! Does anyone really fall for that? Check this article out before you run out for new cabinets if you fight with wanting to "be the Joneses".

This past week, the store had a new message for commuters. "New Countertops Equal Happy" the sign declared when I drove past on my way home last night. Are you serious? Do they really expect me to believe that? An inspiring article I read this week demonstrates that there are those out there that really know what does equal happiness.

Have you read any billboards lately that made you roll your eyes? I'd love to hear about them in the comments!

Winning Things Is Fun!

A big thanks to Ron at The Wisdom Journal for the book, Smart Couples Finish Rich. I've started on it, but haven't had much time to read this summer. I'll have to bring it to work, I seem to have more down time there than I do at home!

As made obvious by the shoes, the email I received was in fact a legitimate one! Thanks, Old Orchard! The shoes are New Balance. Everyone I know LOVES New Balance, but they never seem to fit me right. I'm still deciding if I like these enough to keep them. I'm thinking they might work well as gym shoes this winter. For now, I love my Merrell's too much to even break in the New Balance shoes!

Favorite Blog Post 6/20/08

If you enjoy the Drugstore Game, you have to check this out (and even if you don't, you still need to check this out!).

Money, Love, and Change wrote a post this week about a website called AnySoldier. It's a way to send items to our troops that they are requesting. You can search for what you want to give (ie. shampoo, toothpaste) and it will list troops that are requesting these items! I had no idea that our troops needed things like toothbrushes, deoderant, tons of little things I get free quite often!

I love that I can help our troops in such a tangible way. I hope to send my first package out next week!

Things I Do That Aren't So Frugal and/or Green

In my last post, I listed a couple of things that I do that are green and/or frugal. Now that I've tooted my horn, it's time to confess. Here are some things I do that are NOT so frugal and/or green. I'm open to suggestions for improvement!

-I make microwave popcorn many mornings to take to work for lunch. After the popcorn is popped, I put the bag in a plastic gallon-sized bag, twist-tie it, and bring it to work. I do this so that a) the popcorn stays fresh and b) I can dump the popcorn into the baggie and not get my hands as buttery as if I was sticking my hand into the greasy popping bag. I'm using a lot of single-use items in this process, so it's not very green or frugal, just convenient.

-I buy boxed potatoes. I absolutely love Betty Crocker's herb mashed potatoes and scalloped potatoes. They are quick, easy, and so delicious! I try to stock up when they are on sale and I use coupons (feel free to pass on any coupons you have!), but these are still not very frugal dinner choices. On top of that, the excessive packaging makes them not very green. (I know, I know, they're not particularly healthy, either)

-I take long showers. I blame this on my hair. When I occasionally shower with a shower cap and am not washing my hair, I can be done in 5 minutes. I wash my hair during almost every shower, though, so it takes me a good 15 minutes. I guess I could fix this by getting my hair chopped, but my husband loves my hair longer and I enjoy wearing it in a ponytail, so long it remains. That reminds me, I am definitely due for a trim!

-I own a sports car. I love my 2000 Ford Mustang, but it's a bit of a gas hog for it's size. I get about 19 mpg city and 23 mpg highway. This isn't horrible, but my brother-in-law gets 45 mpg in his Prius! With gas prices what they are right now, I'm pretty envious. My Mustang has been paid for since 2003 and it's given me very few problems, so it doesn't pay to replace it at this point. When it gets replaced in about 3 more years, though, my husband and I will be taking gas mileage into consideration.

I'd love to hear your confessions in the comments or write your own post, let me know, and I'll link to it!

Frugal/Green Things I Do

I made a list of a few things that I do in my everyday life that are frugal and/or green. Then, for my next post, I'll make a list of some things that I do that are NOT frugal and/or green. If you want to join me in this, feel free to leave a link in the comments and I'll post your link in these articles! On to the list!

-I love chocolate pudding. I used to buy those convenient individual serving cups (which aren't recyclable in my neck of the woods). Now I mix up a batch and separate it into little tupperware containers to take to work for lunch. Cheaper and greener!

-My husband and I use our bath towels and hand towels for about a week before throwing them in the wash. We're already clean when we use these items, anyway, and we hang them up so that they are dry on time for their next use. Cheaper and greener!

-We have a programmable thermostat and actually have it programmed. In the winter, we have our thermostat set at 69 degrees when we're home and 63 degrees when we're gone or sleeping. We also set it to hold at 63 when we're on vacation. In the summer, we mostly just leave the air conditioning off (remember, we're in Wisconsin!). We'll only turn it on when it gets really hot and humid, and even then usually only for sleeping comfort. For the most part, the AC doesn't run. Cheaper and greener!

-I use reusable grocery bags. I used to have trouble remembering them, even though they were in plain sight in the backseat of my car. Just a few weeks ago, a friend showed me her awesome ChicoBag. I found a local retailer and picked one up. The ChicoBag fits into a tiny sack and stays in my purse. I still need to remember my other bags when I'm on a big grocery shopping trip, but the ChicoBag works for most of my shopping. This isn't necessarily frugal, but it's definitely green!

What do you do that's frugal or green? Leave a comment or do your own post about it!

A Reason to Declutter

A couple of months ago I lamented about having a lack of ambition to declutter my house. Well, I've found something that works really well at giving me some ambition to tackle my house clutter - a rummage sale!

My husband's brother and sister-in-law are planning on selling their home, so they are cleaning house and wanted to have a rummage sale. Since they live out in the country and we live in town, they asked to have the sale at our house. We agreed, of course, and thought of a couple of things that we wanted to sell, as well. Then, a couple of nights before the rummage sale, I decided to clean out my closets of unused clothing and go through a few boxes that hadn't been gone through since I got married and moved in almost a year ago. I couldn't believe how much I found!

The rummage sale was this past Saturday. My brother-in-law and sister-in-law did quite well. Since my husband and I didn't have nearly as much stuff, we only made $45. Still, it was well worth it for the decluttering I accomplished (all of the unsold items were boxed immediately and taken to Goodwill). There's so much room in my closet now!

So, if anyone else out there needs a "push" to get some decluttering done, have a rummage sale!

Warm Delights and Pine Trees

How's that for a blog post title?! I better explain.

Warm Delights
I got the most awesome "freebie" in the mail yesterday: Betty Crocker Warm Delights minis! Mmmmm, chocolate :) Check it out:


Unfortunately, the offer is no longer available. If you enjoy getting free stuff in the mail, though, my favorite blogs that list freebies are Mommy Gets PAID and My Good Cents. Check them out and maybe you can get free chocolate in the mail, too!

Pine Trees
A guy came to our house today and took out a large pine tree in our backyard. He had to do it by hand since you can't get machinery back there. Pricetag: $275. The other estimate we got was for almost $1000, so we were pretty happy to pay $275.

The money came out of our New Siding/Home Maintenance Fund. It wasn't really a necessary expense, but the tree was oversized for our yard and I really want to plant some lilac bushes back there!

Bonus Material
A friend of mine sent me this really neat article titled All In A Days Work. Definitely a must read! I've always felt that we Americans are getting the short end of the stick when it comes to work/play balance. I thought this article made a good argument for a shorter work week. What do you think? Does anyone have a plan for getting American employers to implement this? Do we all threaten to move to France or Norway? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments!

Got Milk?

Photo by muffet

I posted a couple of weeks ago wondering if I should switch at least partly to powdered milk. I got some great comments and someone said that powdered milk prices vary by region, so I decided to price it at my local store (ok, it was Walmart).

What I found out was that powdered milk is actually more expensive than "real" milk in Wisconsin! I guess it makes sense since I live in the Dairy State, but I was pretty surprised. A gallon of milk here costs $2.79. A box of powdered milk is $6.98 and makes 8 quarts (2 gallons, per my husband!). That means that powdered milk would be $3.49/gallon.

I guess that decides that!

Milk and Miscellaneous

Milk
I wrote a post last week mentioning how much milk my husband and I go through. I received a couple of good comments about it. I thought I would mention that I do drink water, as well, though not as much as I should. I tend to drink more water in the summer when I often have an actual craving for it. In the winter, I crave the creaminess of milk. Still, I should work on this one!

Also, someone mentioned mixing half real milk with half powdered milk. I'm a little leery of liking that since skim milk is already so watered down. The comment did make me think, though, about mixing up powdered milk for baking. Does anyone do this? Can you taste the difference? Is powdered milk a lot less expensive than real milk?

Miscellaneous
The CVS and Walgreens rebates are finally paying off. I felt like I was spending a lot of money during the first month, but now I'm reaping the rewards by paying for everything with Extra Care Bucks and my Walgreens gift card. Check out the stuff I got today! I paid about $1 out of pocket, the rest was paid for with coupons, ECB and my gift card!

The Budget-Busting Meme

I've noticed that there's a meme going around asking people to list their top 5 budget busters, so I thought I should join in the fun!

1. Vacations
Being newlyweds, my husband and I are still working on "frugalizing" our vacations (I think I just made up a word!). So far, our biggest issue seems to be that we vacation where friends are living and then take them out to eat. This is going to be our big expense with the vacation we're taking this weekend to Raleigh, NC and Washington DC. We'll be staying with a friend for two of the nights (which saves money), but we'll be going out to eat a lot more because of that. We're going to try to be a little more frugal than the last time we visited this friend. I'll let you know how it turns out!
Also at issue has been the number of vacations we've taken. We're working on that one, too. :)

2. Milk
My husband and I love milk, and we drink a lot of it. I buy about 4 gallons of milk a week just for the two of us! The good thing is that we drink less soda because of our love of milk. The bad thing is that milk is more expensive than soda. This is a budget buster I can live with since I'm pretty sure we'd drink more sugary drinks if we didn't give ourselves free rein with the milk.

3. Bath and Body Products
This one is all me. I like the Bath and Body Works shower gels, lotions, and hand soap that have the same scent, and Bath and Body Works isn't exactly the cheapest option out there! I combat this budget buster by trying to only buy what I need when I need it, and to watch for sales and coupons. I also add some water to the products when they near the empty mark to help them last longer.

4. Scrapbooking Supplies
Another one that is completely my fault! If I could own every scrapbooking sticker that Hobby Lobby sells, I probably would :) I try to keep this one under control by only going to Hobby Lobby when I need something in particular. I also try to go when the scrapbooking supplies are on sale.

5. Tools
Like many men, my husband loves his tools. We're working on a bathroom remodel, so we've bought quite a few tools since we've been married. The nice thing about tools is that once you have them, they should last a long time. I feel like we're in the "acquiring" stage now. I'm hoping we'll soon move to the "maintenance" stage of tool ownership. Considering the look of awe and wonder on my husband's face every time we walk past the tool section at Home Depot, that might be wishful thinking. ;)
I'm a very strong proponent of quality when it comes to tools, though. I always encourage my husband to buy the high quality tool once he's informed me that he can't possibly live without *insert tool here*. We also agree to have a large tool purchase (like a power tool) become his birthday or Christmas present to save some money (and frustration on my part). It works for us!

Here are some other answers to the budget-buster meme:
What Busts Mrs. Micah's Budget
Mommy Gets PAID's Budget Busters

Now it's your turn!

...Ok, So I Lied

It's confession time! I told you two weeks ago that I was giving up on CVS Pharmacy. That was before I read about this deal at Money Saving Mom. I couldn't help myself, I had to check it out!

I stopped by CVS on my way to the grocery store and, what do you know, they actually had the deals I was looking for!

Here's what I got:

This is how it worked:

2 Covergirl Foundations: $18.98

1 Pepcid EZ Chews: $7.99

-$1.00 Covergirl coupon

-$9.49 Buy one, Get one free Covergirl coupon

-$2.00 Pepcid coupon

-$5.00 CVS $5 off $15 coupon

=$10.58 with sales tax

In return I got $17 in Extra Care Bucks plus I have a mail in rebate for the Pepcid EZ Chews that will net me $5.09 after postage. I spent $10.50 and have $22 to spend later.

I couldn't resist!

I'm Giving Up On CVS

For the past couple of weeks, I've been checking out a lot of blogs on saving money and getting good deals on my household shopping. I've discovered that drug stores like CVS, Rite-Aid, and Walgreens can provide some nice free-after-rebate items and other good deals if you do it right.

There are a ton of Walgreens in my area, so I've been having a lot of fun finding all the freebies and other good deals at Walgreens. There are, however, no Rite-Aids in my area and only one CVS.

After reading sites like Be Thrifty Like Us, I *heart* CVS, and Money Saving Mom, I decided last month to check the local CVS out. It's on the other side of town and not very convenient for me, so I went there when I was in the area for other errands. I went in the middle of March and noticed that all of the "freebies" were gone. Not too surprising, I guess.

I went back to CVS this past Saturday because I had found out that Extra Care Bucks on Softsoap were printing early. I was able to find and buy some Softsoap and got $9.98 in Extra Care Bucks! I was pretty excited.

Today, the April freebies started. I went to CVS after work and they were completely out of everything that was a really good deal. I was pretty bummed. I guess that's what happens when you have one CVS for about 150,000 people. I used up my $9.98 in Extra Care Bucks on some groceries and went home dejected.

So, that's my story and that is why I'm giving up on CVS, for now at least. If I find out about any more good deals that are printing out before being advertised, I'll still probably head over there to pick them up. I'll stick to Walgreens, though, for my monthly fix of freebies :)

Should I Declutter?

I have been reading a neat blog, Unclutterer, and it has gotten me really thinking about all of the "stuff" in my house.

I used to live in a 679 square foot house that literally had no closets in it. Although I longed for closet space, one of the things I liked about the house was that I couldn't bring anything into it without getting rid of something else to make room for the new item.

Last summer, I got married and moved into my husband's 1650 square foot 3-bedroom home. It's a beautiful house (that's it above), and I especially love that there is a ton of built-in storage.

After I moved in, we had a huge rummage sale and got rid of all of our "doubles". Our house is now pretty uncluttered; in fact, we have empty drawers and shelves! Even so, I feel like we could really get rid of a lot of excess stuff.

How do you get the ambition to declutter when your house is more than big enough for all of your possessions? Do you even bother? Any advice?

ps- We don't want to downsize since we're hoping to have kids in a couple of years.