Good Day at Kroger

We went out shopping for a while this morning. We went a little further out than usual because we were getting a great deal on batteries. That meant we could go to the good Kroger. We have two in our town, the one closest to us is smaller and a bit funkier. The other Kroger is huge and much nicer. I think I have convinced husband that if we only go once a week it wouldn't be too bad to drive the extra few minutes out to the other one.

This trip was close to $50, but husband's job gave him a $25 gift card to Kroger for Thanksgiving, so we only paid about $23. The bulk of our trip was that ground beef. We had just used our last pack last night for tacos and needed some more. These are manager's special, so it was about $2 for each pack, a little over a pound. They are on discount because they are close to the expiration date, but they are perfectly fine if you put them in the freezer and just pull it out the day you are going to cook it. We also found some discounted lunch meat that I will use for work lunches this week and I got husband some $1 bologna. We also got a good bit of produce- cilantro, lime, and avocados to make some guacamole salad to go with our chicken enchiladas tonight. We also got some tomato, bananas, and bell peppers. We have been buying bell peppers, chopping them up and freezing them so that we just grab what we need when we need it. It has been working really well and tastes just as good as when they are fresh. We got a 5lb bag of potatoes for $1.99, we are going to use that to make chicken skillet this week as well as the beef stew we currently have going in the crock pot. The digiorno pizza was $5.99 and I had a $2 off coupon, so that was a decent deal. My coco krispies were also on sale for $1.99, I'm very picky about cereal and have been wanting some of this!

While we were out by the nice Kroger we stopped by Lowe's to get this great battery deal. This is a 30 pack of AA batteries, on sale for $4!!! That is a great deal on batteries so we got 2 packs. Batteries are also on sale this week at Home Depot, but we realized before we went that it was a combo AA and AAA pack and we really don't need AAA.

Next we stopped at the first of two Winn Dixie's. Guess how much I paid for this? 44 cents!!! Who says you can't save on healthy food! The shredded lettuce is on sale for 99 cents this week, and this bag is getting close to an expiration date, so they had a $1 off coupon on it, making it free. This romaine lettuce is on sale bogo this week for $3.79, there were 75 cent off coupons by the lettuce and since these are also close to date they also each had a $1 off Winn Dixie coupon on them. So about 15 cents per bag after coupons! We are going to be eating a lot of salads this week!

We made a super quick trip to Publix while we were out. The old el paso kits are bogo $3.19 this week. We have plenty of taco kits, but I have been wanting to make some more of these chicken enchiladas. Husband has this deep love for fig newtons, which are outrageously expensive for a cookie! But they are also bogo this week for $3.99, yes regularly $4 for a pack of cookies!

Lastly we stopped at one more Winn Dixie since the first one did not have this kind of lettuce. This is the classic iceberg and this was the last day it was on sale for 99 cents each. These will make great lunches for work this week. We also got a pack of beef stew meat for a little less than $5, it looked really good raw and it looks even better cooking in our new crock pot! They also had hummus on sale bogo for $3.99, and we love us some hummus! This was about $22 and definitely put us over budget this week, but I think I can include the overage into this week's grocery budget and make it come out ok.

Black Friday... at the Grocery Store?

So I decided to go out Black Friday shopping since husband had to work today and I figured I would just get bored at home. Bad idea, terrible idea! The crowds actually weren't as bad as I thought they would be, and I actually spent less than $20, but it was so painful! My old shopaholic tendencies were definitely coming out. So many times I had to say, "I don't need this, I don't need this". Fortunately for me I only had my card with very little money on it, thank goodness I did not take husbands offer of using his card! I finally came to my senses and ran away from the mall as quickly as I could! However, it was Black Friday, so I had to get some good deals right? Fortunately I found somewhere to get a great deal... the grocery store! Winn Dixie to ge more exact, look at what I got for just a little less than $25:

The best deal was this toilet paper. They are 12 double rolls and they are a bonus pack, so a little bigger than a regular double roll. I can tell you from lugging them around that they are heavy! Usually I get these at Publix for $5.50 and use a coupon to get them for $4.50. Well today they are part of the 3 day sale at Winn Dixie for $4.50 each and I had $1 off coupons. I actually went to two stores to get this because supposedly there was a limit on the toilet paper. I should have just stayed at the first store because the people at the second store were rude. The woman tried telling me that they no longer accept coupons printed online. Hmmm, that is interesting because I just used the same coupons at the other store and oh by the way, these are printed from a site promoted by your store! I finally got the manager to come put them in for me. The lettuce was on sale for 99 cents, which is insane, that is the cheapest I have ever seen bagged lettuce. Lastly, the pork chops are buy one get one this week. I bought a pack for $5.50 and I got the other pack, that was $4.63, for free. Now I bought those at the second store and it actually didn't take off the price of my pork chops. I couldn't figure out why it seemed so much more expensive than I thought it would be and they make the stupid receipt so hard to read! I finally figured it out when I got out to the car, so I had to wheel all of my stuff bak in and get a $5 refund, but whatever, not like I had anything else to do today!

Happy Thanksgiving! (Courtesy of CVS)

So, CVS put out their Black Friday ad a couple of weeks ago. It is pretty amazing, lots of free and money-making items. I figured I was going to have to drag poor husband out of the house at midnight tonight. He has to work tomorrow, so he really wasn't looking forward to it. Then this morning I realized that CVS is open for Thanksgiving (sorry CVS employees, that sucks for you) and sales had already started, woohoo! We hit two CVS stores this morning and here is all of the stuff we got!!! We paid out of pocket a little over $27 for all of this, we still have $10 in extra bucks, and yes that price includes that big crock pot! Everything here was on sale except for the salsa (sorry, impulse buy!) and the popcorn, which was only $1 and will go excellent with our movie marathon lined up for today! Here is what we got:

5 quart crock pot (regular $40!) on sale for $18.88, get back $10 ECB

Mars candy bars 75 cents, get 75 cent ECB (Free!)

12 count breathe right strips $5.99, get $5.99 ECB, used $1.50 coupon = moneymaker!

Listerine packs $2.99, get $2.99 ECB (Free!)

CVS batteries $3.99, get $3.99 ECB (Free!)

Advil trial size $2.99, get $2.99 ECB (Free!)

Bayer 20 count aspirin, on sale for 99 cents, used $2 off coupon = moneymaker!

Colgate toothpaste $2.87, get $2.87 ECB, used $1 off coupon = moneymaker!

Cinnamon toast crunch $2.87, get $2 EBC

Pepto bismol $2.99, get $2.99 ECB (Free!)

Cool touch kleenex $1.50, get $1.50 ECB (Free!)

Excedrin 8 count, with free bonus 8 count 99 cents, get 99 cents ECB (Free!)

Finish dish detergent tablets $2.99, get $2.99 ECB, used $1 off coupon = moneymaker!

Carmex $1.39, get $1.39 ECB (Free!)

Planter's peanuts 2/$6, buy 2 get $3 ECB

Wow, that was a lot of free stuff, plus this crock pot is pretty awesome. It is not quite as cool as the one we already have, but will definitely come in handy. After our shopping escapades we stopped at the redbox, two of them actually, to grab 3 movies to watch today. We only had to pay for one, gotta loves those free dvd codes. Now we just have to wait for our beautiful roast, here is a sneak peak:

This is it getting a little sear before...

heading into the crock pot with all the yummy veggies. He has about 3 hours left to cook, but he already looks and smells fabulous!

Getting Ready for Thanksgiving

I normally head home the moment that we close the residence halls for Thanksgiving; however, I am the person on-call this week so I will be staying here! I was a little sad at first to not be able to spend the holiday with my parents, but I went home a couple of weeks ago and I will be heading back in about a month. Husband and I aren't big traditional Thanksgiving people, so we decided to make a roast for Thanksgiving. It is pretty expensive, but totally worth it and I think it is ok to splurge a little for the holiday!

We were going to make a quick trip at Publix today to pick up a couple of things they were out of the other day and then head to Walmart to pick up our roast, but this morning I got a great coupon from Earthfare and that changed plans! I haven't been thrilled with the Earthfare coupons lately, but this morning they sent out a $10/$50 coupon. We weren't planning to spend $50 at Publix, but we decided to get our roast there to make that total happen. That is our beautiful roast right there in the front, it was $20, but looks amazing! Even with our very expensive roast this whole trip was only 35!

We had a couple of cheese coupons left over because earlier in the week they didn't have enough of the kinds we wanted. The cheese is bogo $3.99 and I had 50 cents off of two coupons that doubled, making the cheese $1.50 each. Today that deal was even better because they had a new coupon book in the store for buy two Sargento cheeses and get a free dozen eggs, so both of those dozens were free! The veggies were also a good deal. They are both stir fry mixes and are a pound of veggies. They were $2.59, but on a half off sale and I got 55 cent coupons out of the new coupon book, making them 75 cents each. We grabbed some more lettuce that is bogo this week and also some onions for our roast. I also got some mashed potatoes to try. I really like the Bob Evans kind, they are amazing, but also very expensive! I have some in the freezer for us to have with our roast, but these mashed potatoes were bogo and that made them $2, plus they are 12 more ounces than the bob evans kind. I'm going to give them a try during the week and see how they compare. We rounded off our trip with that pie, another little splurge for the holiday, but it was on 50% sale, making it $4, plus there is a coupon for pie singles inside the box that will come in handy next time they go bogo! Happy Thanksgiving!

First Week with the New Budget

This was our first week working with our new budget we made for ourselves and we did really good. We went a little over our eating out budget, by maybe $4. But we made a good decision and decided not to go out for fancy dinner for our anniversary, which would have put us way over our budget for the week, and got two meals out this week. We also did good on our grocery budget and came in a little under, so the two evened out for the week. We also did awesome for the first week of operation take lunch to work and did not eat out at all for lunch this week! Our new containers that I showed you last week are awesome and have been so good for putting together a quick lunch. We also had an amazing day yesterday in terms of cleaning. I started watching a marathon of Hoarders yesterday and it inspired me to start cleaning. Husband was nice enough to pitch in when he got home from work yesterday. We got rid of a bunch of stuff and our apartment looks so nice and much less cluttered! Ok, on to shopping!

This was our publix trip this week. We were starting to run low on cheese so I was getting a little worried and have been looking for a good cheese sale. This wasn't quite as awesome as the 50 cent cheese I got last time, but still way better than full price. They were bogo for $3.99 and I had 55 cent coupons, making them $1.45 a bag. I got a couple more of the free Dr. Pepper 10 coupons from my mom when I went home last week, so those were free. The chef boyardee was on sale for 89 cents each and I had a $2/10 coupon, so those were 69 cents each. Some of our lunch containers were got are glass, so we can take these for work lunch. The frozen veggies worked out to about 30 cents to 50 cents each. The carrots were bogo and they will go in the roast we are making for Thanksgiving. Salad mix was also bogo. The sausage was 2/$5 and I had a 75 cents off two coupon. One of them was hot sausage, which we put in our jambalaya Friday, so good, but so spicy:) Finally, we bought something we never buy, turkey! I'm not a huge fan, notice how I said we are making roast for Thanksgiving. But, while we were at the store we tried the sample the lady was making, which was turkey chili. It was so good, we had to get some! She used pre-cooked turkey, which was super expensive, but we decided to cook our own, and here is how it came out:

It is turkey, poblano peppers, red bell pepper, navy beans, onions, chicken broth, milk, cheese and some spices. It was soooo good!

We also made a stop at the Kroger this morning. I was shocked that they were still running the buy 4 items get a free gallon of milk promotion. We bought the cheerios, sweet moments desserts, and frozen breakfast items for that promotion. All of the items were 4/$10 and I had $1 off coupons for all of them, so for $6 I got 4 items plus a gallon of milk, that is pretty good considering the milk would be over $3 and because husband drinks it like crazy we would have to buy it anyway. The poblano peppers (which were cheaper since our cashier mistakenly rang them up as jalapenos!) and whole milk were for our chili. Eggs were $1, salad was on clearance, and I was seriously craving some chips and salsa, which were on sale 2/$5.

Operation Bring Lunch to Work, Plus a Shopping Update

Last week I told you how husband and I were absolutely horrified when we sat down to figure out exactly where our money goes each month and we saw the outrageous amount we spend on fast food and eating out. The majority of that is spent for our lunches. So, we have a new plan! Starting this week a $25/week eating out budget and a plan to bring lunches to work. We went to Walmart to get some containers to take our lunches in. I know you aren't supposed to warm plastic containers in the microwave, but I do it all the time because I thought buying glass ones would be too expensive. But today we found these Ziploc Versa glass containers. They were $5.97 each, which I think is expensive. However, there was a tear pad near by with a $1.50 off of two, that wouldn't have been too bad. But then, we looked inside the containers and they had $3 off each coupons inside. Maybe super strict couponers would chastise me for taking them out and using them, but to me I am still buying their product, so why not? So we got them for $3 each! I was also really surprised to see these Rubermaid to go containers for $1.98 each pack. That is a really good deal on food storage containers. We got some bigger round ones for salads, small rounds for dressing, medium rounds for snacks, and some divided ones. While at Walmart we also picked up some essentials and took advantage of a great coupon deal. There was a $3 off hormel party trays coupon available last week. The large party trays are about $10, so that isn't that great. However, they have a smaller snack size that is $5.50 and the coupon works on it. I heard rumblings on the coupon sites that using this is controversial because they are meant for the larger trays. However, when I went on their website they listed the snack trays under party trays, so that is good enough for me! That made them about $2.50 each. They are meat and crackers and cheese, so just like lunchables!

Ok, time for a quick update on some of my recent deals. While I was out of town Kroger had as part of their mega sale the beef gravy for 50 cents when you buy 10. I asked husband to get me some while I was gone and the deal was made even better because with a great coupon I had they wound up being 25 cents each. While I was at home a store by my mom also had the gravy on sale for 58 cents each. Now, this gravy never goes on sale! Usually the cans are between $1.40-$1.70 each, so it was definitely stock up time! My mom also wound up with about 60 cans of gravy:)

Kroger also has a really good deal this week for buy 4 participating products for $10 and get a free gallon of milk. With coupons for $1 off each participating item we bought, we were able to get all of this for $12 plus tax!

Finally we made a really quick stop at CVS yesterday because I had an ECB that was about to expire. The gillette fusion gel was $2.38 and I had a $1 coupon, plus there was a $2 ECB, making it free. Husband printed a coupon for $2/2 combos from the magic coupon machine. So we paid about $1 out of pocket and got back the $2 ECB.

Last One for a Week

I'm getting ready to head out of town for about a week, so no couponing for me! Don't worry, husband has a small list of great deals to pick up while I am gone:) This was our quick trip to Kroger yesterday, where they are having another mega sale. My absolute favorite item is that beef gravy. It is usually pretty expensive, but during the mega sale it is only 50 cents a can! Sadly by the time I got to the store all but one can was gone! That is high on husband's list to get this week. I also have great coupons, which once I can buy in groups of 4 will make them 25 cents a can! The mac and cheese was free and the rest of this stuff, other than lunch meat and milk, was under $1.

Can You Really Save Money Using Coupons? or How I Save $150 a Month on Groceries!

One thing that I hear a lot from people when they find out that I use coupons goes something like this: "I think that is just a lot of work and I don't think you really save that much doing it". My response to this is two-fold:

1. Couponing does not take a great deal of time

2. You really can save a lot of money

Now keep in mind when I talk about the time that you spend couponing I mean couponing like a normal person. The people that you see on Extreme Couponing are insane, say that with me "insane". They talk about spending 50 hours per week couponing. There is no need for that. I would estimate that I spend about 15 minutes a day just checking my usual couponing sites for updates and for each shopping trip (generally one to Publix and one to Kroger per week) I probably spend 30-45 minutes doing that, 5 hours per week would be pretty much a maximum for me. I find that in general I spend less time actually at the store shopping because I go in with a plan and know exactly what I am looking for as opposed to wandering around aimlessly thinking, "hmm...what did I come here for again?".

I can also tell you that YES you really can save so much money! I think when people who don't coupon look at coupons they see, "oh, well that coupon is for 50 cents, why would I waste my time clipping for 50 cents". What they don't see is that coupon doubling or using that coupon for an item that is on a great sale. Plus, little amounts add up! If you buy 20 items and save 50 cents on each item you have just saved $10!
Now, let's talk about saving $150 per month. Husband and I sat down tonight and went through our online bank account statements to see what we actually spend each month. We did this as a part of making a budget for ourselves. We have had something that we called a budget, but really it was just a list of all of the bills we have to pay each month. So we decided to do a real budget. We looked at our expenses for food other than groceries (ie. fast food or eating out), bills, groceries, gas, and entertainment. What we found was shocking and really made us think about what we spend each month. But while we spent more than either of us would have liked on the other categories, our grocery expenses were actually really good. We compared our grocery expenses for this past October ($270) and last October before we had started using coupons ($420), that is a $150/month difference! In addition to saving money we also get more for our money. Before coupons we would go to the store and buy things as needed, never really being able to get things on sale because I had to buy it at whatever price it was because I needed it. We have also been able to try a lot of different foods that we would not have before because they were too expensive. So, if you haven't tried couponing yet, just give it a shot. Even a saving of $20 a week is still savings that you can put toward something else:)

This Week at Publix

We just got back from our weekly stop at Publix. Everything here was $20 and half of that was the chicken. The little tubs of butter are bogo and then with a 40 cent coupon that doubled these were each about 50 cents each. The cereal was also bogo and I had some coupons making them $1.50 each. That is pretty good for a box of cereal, especially because these are larger boxes. The hefty bags are not on sale this week, but I had a rain check from last week, making them about 75 cents a box. The broth was also bogo and about 75 cents each. Lastly, my chocolate chip cookies were on sale and I had a publix coupon for them, so they should have been about $1, but then I noticed later that the cashier rang up the coupon code twice making them free:) I also had a great $3/$30 Publix coupon that I was able to print out last night.