Freebies

I get almost ALL of my freebie information from posts by MoneySavingMom. She always has a lot of useful information on her blog.

Well just this week (and it's only Wednesday) I've received 2 freebies. The first and most exciting was a free Swiffer Sweeper. Yes, I said FREE! These usually cost around $10.00. This is by far the best freebie I've received yet.

I also received a free sample of the new Orville Redenbacher 100 calorie snacks in the mail yesterday.

It's always fun to get home and check the mailbox. I don't know if it's going to have a special surprise for me or just bills! ;}

Coupons & samples

I got an e-mail from Tide and it had several coupons you could sign up and get by mail and a Bounce sample. You can get them by clicking here.

Christmas in July!

I have subscribed to and visit frequently Imommies.com which is a great website for getting information about discounted (sometimes free) stuff. One of the recent things posted was for Restaurant.com.

Restaurant.com offers discounted gift certificates to restaurants in your area. All you have to do is punch in your zip code and it provides you with a list of restaurants where you can get gift certificates.

I hit the jackpot yesterday. I was able to get $250.00 worth of gift certificates for $27.00, which included a gift certificate for my aunt that lives in the Chicago area.

We have several people that we give gift certificates to for Christmas, and since I usually start my Christmas shopping early, I thought this would be a good place to start with the bonus of saving LOTS of money.

Being Green-er!

To me being Green is about recycling and reusing things you already have and conserving energy whenever possible.

I have purchased some energy efficient light bulbs and am using them to replace the old bulbs as they burn out. (I'm caught between going green and saving green right now). We also purchased an HE washing machine and dryer when we bought our house. We have a programmable thermostat and keep a/c temperature higher during the day when we're not home, so we are not cooling an empty house. I've also started turning on only the light in the room I'm in, turning it off as I leave the room, and opening the blinds during the day. (You must know, I have always been someone who turned on every light in the house because I was going to go back "in there".)

My latest "green" idea came for someone else's blog (sorry, I can't remember who). The question was asked about what people were doing with all of the plastic shopping bags you get from CVSing, etc. Someone wrote that they use them for their "smelly" garbage. Well, I had so many of them and nowhere to recycle them, I decided to start using them all the time. I even found a garbage can at Target specifically for those types of bags.



I usually only have to take one trip out to the "big" can a day.

Not only am I recycling the bags (being green), but I'm also saving money by not spending money on trash bags (saving green).

More home grown

I have been pretty successful with my Roma tomatoes, so I decided to try some more vegetables.

This time I bought seeds: cucumber, lettuce and baby spinach. In less than two weeks my cucumber seeds have sprouted and grown much faster than I anticipated.

While I don't have any buds on them yet, I am very optimistic about have lots of cucumbers to eat.

Small Talk

I am always amused by some of the small talk people come up with in short casual situations, such as riding in an elevator, in the check out line, etc. Sometimes its quite humorous and if you're at work, it breaks up the day, especially if you are having a bad/long day.

This brings me to the comment I just heard. I was walking toward the door to the building that I work in and there was a lady on the other side. I could tell that she was trying to push open the door. The problem was, she needed to pull. After she realized her mistake and opened the door, I jokingly commented "pull". She said "Yeah, the OTHER pull".


At least it made ME laugh!

Budget Shopping

I have put myself on a VERY strict budget (which includes DH, 4yo, 12yo & pets). I am only buying what is absolutely necessary.

That being said, you may not thing that the things I purchased yesterday as absolutely necessary, but...

BIG LOTS

I was browsing through the Big Lots thread at Hot Coupon World and saw that they had underwear for $2.00. It is a 3 pack of Hanes little girl underpants size 4T which we desperately needs because 1) 4yo is going to a sleep over camp next week and I will need to send extras because she still has "accidents" and 2) our dog is a magician and can find little girl underpants and chew them up without me even knowing how he got them.

Total spent: $2.18 including tax

OFFICE DEPOT

Since 4yo was accepted into "big" school, I hadn't even started supply shopping for her. I have almost all of 12yo's supplies, but I still have a few things to get and I'm meticulously scouring the weekly adds to see what's on sale so I can get everything at a reduced price.

4 transparent pocket folders - $.01/each
4 packs of 150 count loose leaf filler paper - $.15/each

Total spent: $.70 including tax

TARGET

While I was on the Hot Coupon World website, I saw that Target had shoes on clearance. 4yo NEEDS (and I mean NEEDS!!!) shoes for school. I found a cute pair of little tennis shoes for under $4.00.

Total spent: $4.00 + tax