Tag Archive | food

Couponing Tip- Make Educated Decisions!

Jan23

Take a Moment and Consider the Worth

Excited Student With A Composition Book

 

This Sunday there should be multiple coupon inserts in your Sunday paper.  These coupons provide great money saving opportunities for the wise couponer.  Here’s the shocker…I won’t be purchasing extra papers!  Have you passed out?  Has your mouth dropped open and hit the floor?

I will receive my home delivered newspaper and will gladly use whatever coupons match with great sales for items I currently need or will need in the near future.

Confused?  Perhaps you are scratching your head and asking why I wouldn’t purchase extra papers since there are so many inserts?  The answer is easy… I really am not in need of any of the items the coupons are for.  Although they are great products, I already have them in my stockpile.  As I look at my calendar, I recognize I have just a few limited days before traveling for a week.  How do I desire to spend my time?  Since I am well stocked in the items, I’ve decided to not spend the limited time purchasing, clipping and organizing coupons.  I’ve also decided I will only head to the store for the minimal items, if any, I need prior to my trip.  Actually, my goal is to only stock pile additional items I am low in or need to add.  This is one more benefit of a stock pile!  No grocery store for me this week or next…and no, my family will not starve.  Instead, they will be well fed from our freezer and pantry.  Their daily needs will be provided for from the stock pile.

This is one more way I’ve proven you do not need to become a prisoner of your coupons or shopping.  Freedom is to be had, just like the great deals are.  

Have you checked http://www.moneysavingmom.com or http://www.forthemommas.com to see the sneak preview of this Sunday’s coupons?  You can also peak into the upcoming sales. Gather your information and make educated choices as you plan your shopping trip and stock pile needs.  Your time and money are valuable and worthy of taking a few minutes to educate yourself with these money saving resources!

Happy Couponing!

Coupon Tip- How Much Time Do I Have To Spend To Save Big Money?

Jan17

Another common question, usually followed with, “I don’t have a lot of time to invest in this, can I still save?”

My answer is a resounding, “YES! You can save BIG and spend less time preparing and shopping!”

MP900341439

 

For the past two weeks I have proven this to be true.

The first week I reviewed my Sunday paper coupons at home from the paper we have delivered daily.  I also reviewed the current Weis ad.  I found them both to be worthy of purchasing additional papers so I had more coupons so we purchased our newspapers Sunday morning on the way to church.  After church we went to the local Weis store and clipped and shopped at the exact same time.  I would call this ‘flying by the seat of our pants’ couponing.  If you were there you would have found both Bob and me removing the coupons from the multiple papers, and then finding the coupons we were interested in and clipping them by hand which meant we neatly tore them since I didn’t have my binder or scissors with me (lesson learned).  We didn’t spend much time at the store and still made quite a few bargains and gas points.  I wish I still had my receipt to show you the details.

This past week I once again reviewed my paper at home as well as the ad.  We did our Sunday trek of Bob dropping me off at the Dollar Store to purchase my papers while he made a Wawa run for his coffee.  Remember, always verify they have the correct number of inserts.  I could have walked down the sidewalk to Weis if the Dollar Store didn’t have them all.  After church we grabbed a quick bite to eat, cut some coupons at the pizza shop and then went to Weis.  Great deals were had!!!  Keep in mind the week before I put my coupon binder back together again and I had it with me for this trip.  Again, I didn’t plan the trip ahead of time.  I do have the details for this trip.  Although we purchased many items not listed below, here are a few of the great deals I received:

Ragu Pasta Sauce is on sale- buy 2 get 2 free (limit of one deal).  I didn’t have coupons for this however, who could refuse half price pasta sauce?

Birds Eye Steamfresh Veggies are 5 for $5- I had a coupon for $1 off

Yoplait Yogurt is on sale for 10 for $5 and I had lots of coupons for $1 off 8 and since this is a popular item in our home we purchased quite a bit

Ortego Taco Sauce was on clearance for just .99 and I had multiple coupons for $1 of two so I stocked up.  We’ll be enjoying this in many forms. Always check the dates on clearance items.  This sauce has another year left to it yet.

General Mills Cereal (GM) was on an incredible deal from Weis and then GM made it even better.  Weis gave free milk coupons when you purchase any 8 boxes of this cereal.  Specially marked boxes provided a special deal for free movie tickets- when you buy two you get a free ticket on line.  In addition to this I had coupons $1 off two boxes.  I purchased quite a bit of cereal of our favorite kinds and Bob and I will have free dates to the movies!  Do the math and you will be impressed!  This deal is good for 12 weeks and you do not need to purchase all the cereal in one trip.  Also, there is no limit to the number of times you do this deal.  We purchased two deals worth this past Sunday.

Weis is also running another great deal this week on multiple items (Scott TP, Viva paper towels, Cottonelle TP, Huggies diapers and wipes, Kotex, Colgate, Irish Spring, Soft Soap body wash, wipes, Kleenex, Depends and Poise, Palmolive, and Speed Stick/Irish Spring deodorant .  When you purchase $30 worth (shelf price) you get $10 off toward your next order.  If you do not need $30 worth of these items you can purchase $20 shelf price and receive $5 off your next order. I chose Scott paper towels and Kleenex tissues.   I had coupons for these items, however even without coupons I would have found this deal worthy since we were getting extremely low in tissues and kind of low in paper towels.  By the time you get the $10 toward your next order you save quite a bit!  Remember, at Weis it’s the shelf price they count toward the $30 or $20, not the sale price.  Unlike Giant who doesn’t count it until after all savings- sales and coupons.  This is one more reason why Weis is my store of choice!  

Overall, here are the numbers for this past Sunday’s trip:

  • Out of Pocket (OOP) $125.73
  • Total Savings* $75.83 (includes 2 gallons of free milk which are now in my freezer)
  • Total Movie Ticket Value* $96! (in addition to the total savings listed above)
  • Total Gas Points* .30 per gallon which could save us $8 at the pump!
  • Total Savings including all * above: $179.83
  • Percentage of savings was 70%

NOT BAD FOR NO PLANNING!  All it took was to look at my one delivered paper quickly on Sunday morning, look at the Weis ad, purchase multiple papers (because I found it worthy to) and do a 45 minute shopping trip.  All it takes is a few moments, an organized binder from past coupons (which doesn’t take very long) and a trip to the store knowing what the sales are and then having your eyes trained for clearance items- such as the taco sauce.

As you can see, I really haven’t spent much time on this.  I hope you’ve found this encouraging.  By the way, the sales I spoke of above are still available until this Saturday, January 19th.  

How much time do you spend preparing for your trip?  I’d love to hear your responses!  So would others.

Couponing Tip- What’s the Deal with Newspapers?

Jan11

Where should you purchase your newspapers and how many should you purchase?

Woman with Newspaper

These are two very popular questions I’m asked.  Let’s look at them individually…

Where Should I Purchase My Paper?

Up until recently I have recommended purchasing Sunday newspapers at Dollar Tree since they only charge $1.00 per paper as compared to full price elsewhere.  Depending where the store is located will depend which paper they carry.  In the past I’ve found this to be very beneficial until they began limiting the number of papers each person could purchase.  I found this limiting for myself since I often purchase multiple copies when the coupons are good.  Another problem- they just seem to run out all the time, quite early.  I’m not sure if they are limited by the amount of papers they are permitted to sell?

Another reason to rethink where I purchase my papers happened this month.  I heard, through good sources, there were to be five inserts on a particular Sunday.  I investigated what coupons would be found in them.  I realized I wanted multiple papers since there were quite a few valuable coupons for items I needed to restock.  When I went to Dollar Tree at 10:30am they told me they were already sold out.  After a short conversation they mentioned their papers only had four inserts.  I then went down the sidewalk to our local Weis store (Gap) and checked the same paper and guess what?  It had all five inserts!  Mmmmm… I’m wondering if Dollar Tree doesn’t receive all the inserts in their discounted papers?  I was happy to purchase four papers that Sunday- and they all had five inserts!  Thank you Weis!!

Lesson learned- make sure the papers you purchase have all the inserts in them.  You can verify which inserts you should see at www.moneysavingmom.com or www.forthemommas.com.  I find both of these sites are extremely helpful in my coupon shopping.  In fact, I’ve learned to teethe on coupons with their help.

 

How Many Papers Should I Purchase?

Personally, it varies from week to week.  The Sunday newspapers are my number one source for coupons.  By verifying which coupons should be included in the paper and what deals are on the way I can make an informed choice.  I’ve been known to purchase anywhere from two to eight papers Sunday mornings.  Keep in mind I am an extreme coupon shopper which means I have a large stockpile on hand at all times. For instance, this time of the year we will see many coupons for cleaning items so I know it’s time to begin seeking deals to stock up on spring cleaning products as well as cleaning products for the remainder of the year until next January.  Seem a bit extreme?  Perhaps to the untrained coupon shopper.  However, when I get name brand cleaning supplies for $1 or less at this time of the year then I’d say it’s worth my while.  I won’t need to purchase my cleaning items for an entire year.  For the most part I save a minimum of 75% of the cost.  Although cleaning is not one of my favorite things to do, I do smile when I get to use quality products and saved money for my family at the same time!

How many papers will I purchase this week?  I’m not sure yet- I better go check out my sources to see what coupons will be in them and get planning!  To help make this easier- I have a Sunday paper delivered to my home so I can check before heading out the door for church.  It’s common for me to read through the coupon inserts in the car while my husband gets us to our church in Gap.  Happy shopping everyone! 

 

Extreme Couponing in Excellence Workshop April 14th!!! Registration is a MUST!!

Mar30

REGISTRATION OPEN TO PUBLIC!

Extreme Couponing in Excellence Workshop

is being offered on Saturday, April 14th, 9-4

Taught by Karen Pennell of Sharing From the Heart Ministry

Hosted at Living Rock Bible Church, Elverson PA.

$20 per ticket

PRE-REGISTRATION IS REQUIRED!

http://couponworkshop0414.eventbrite.com/

Isn’t it time you started saving money on your groceries?

Blessings Can Sometimes Happen in the Middle of the Night…

Feb9

Yesterday was a busy day in our home.  I think you’ve probably had days like this, I’m sure I’m not alone.  I started my morning out cleaning because I had a lunch meeting at my home which meant I also needed to prepare lunch.  If you know me, then you know I love to cook.  Preparing lunch was the fun part of my morning.  I made Italian Tomato Bisque Soup (with pasta of course!) and salads with tuna centered perfectly on the plate.  I wish I would have taken a picture!!  The lunch prep mess was cleaned up and I welcomed my guest.  We enjoyed our meal…until I noticed something…my guest didn’t eat her complete salad, instead she was picking things out of the salad to eat.  That’s when I found out my beautiful salad…well- she’s allergic to lettuce!  To make it worse, she loves lettuce.  Way to go Karen- put something she loves in front of her…something she can’t eat.  Uggg…Hospitality failure…  At least she enjoyed the soup and I enjoyed our conversation- or at least part of the conversation.  She was struggling with life and found it hard to focus on God’s blessings.  It became clear that God wanted me to share the ‘what so ever’ scripture with her.

Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable- if anything is excellent or praiseworthy- think about such things.  Philippians 4:8

We’ve all passed through tough times in our lives.  We’ve all struggled in trust issues and faith.  She was no different.

I shared this scripture with her and began to ask questions.  The first question led to a chain of questions.  What was it?  ”What is your favorite season?”  The following questions were related to her answers.  Before you know it, she was alive, sparkling and laughing.  When she left my home a couple hours later she had a glimmer of hope and a challenge to continue the ‘what so ever’ list.

A little later I went into my office to work on Sharing From the Heart ministry and knew I’d be in there a few hours.  Imagine my surprise to come out of my office to find my daughter, Christin, had started dinner and intended to complete it.  Thank you Lord!  She made homemade wings with her own custom sauce, rice and veggies.  WE LOVED IT!!!  Again, no picture…  Since she made dinner, I planned on cleaning up the kitchen but found I was too tired last night.  Plan B was to wake up this morning and clean up.  Imagine my surprise to wake up to a totally clean kitchen and to top it off…a homemade jelly roll made by Christin!  She even cleaned up after that!!  She left me a fun note:

Look, the desert gnomes visited last night & brought us a jelly roll.  And then the chore fairies arrived & cleaned, including the dishes!  You gotta love late night visitors!!

What a great blessing to wake up to!  Today is a busy day and having to clean up would have made a long list even longer.  I wonder if the dinner chef will arrive again tonight?  If she does, I’ll be sure to take a picture!  Speaking of pictures…here’s the picture of the delicious jelly roll I enjoyed at breakfast!

TODAY’S CHALLENGE- Start a ‘what so ever’ list of your own.  It’s sure to bring a smile to your face and spirit! Oh, and share this scripture with someone else and begin with just one simple question- “What’s your favorite season?” and then begin the chain of questions with something like, “Why do you like that season?”  One by one, we can help each other focus on Philippians 4:8.