Monday, August 31, 2009

If Crocs aren't your thing....

Perhaps you'd like to get some Simple Shoes for super cheap? Well The Thrifty Mama just posted about some great clearance deals HERE! I took advantage of the Crocs deals so I will probably have to sit this one out :)

Don't forget to use Cashbag and get 7% back! If you haven't signed up yet use this link HERE to sign up! They give you $5 just for signing up. Once you get up to $10 in savings they cut you a check or drop it into your Paypal account! Woohoo!

Once you sign up go to the store list and look for Simple Shoes. There you'll find the clearance section with all the great deals!

Saturday, August 29, 2009

Crocs Deal!! Woohoo!!!!

**Sorry I just realized the link wasn't working. It is now!**

So The Thrifty Mama posted THIS great Crocs deal! It's a BOGO on select styles and The Thrifty Mama posted a discount code!

I saw some on there as low as $14.99 for kids. So you could get 2 pairs for as low as $11.25!! Shipping was free! I got a pair for my almost 3yr old and myself for $18.74 shipped. The pair I got was regularly $35 so I paid nearly half price for mine and got my daughters free!!

I should also add they have GREAT customer service! I ordered from them once before and one of the items I ordered had an issue which they contacted me about. They sent me a free pair to compensate. It was awesome of them!

Friday, August 28, 2009

$39.99 Dell Pocket Video Recorder!

Here is the DEAL!!

I want one myself, but my husband isn't as excited about it as I am. So I figured I'd pass the deal on to you! Thanks to The Thrifty Mama!

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Free Nursing Covers, just pay shipping!

So I saw this deal on my new love A Full Cup. It's a great site similar to hotcouponworld, but somewhat easier to navigate.

Anyway if you are pregnant or know someone who is, check out this site Udder Covers. Add one to your cart and use the code backorder1 and it deducts the cost of the cover ($32)! So free plus $8.95 for shipping. Great shower present! Now they did this a few months ago from what I hear. Most people got theirs no problem, but a few did not. Once they contacted the company they did fix the problem. So make sure if you do not have the item within 2 weeks of when you expect it (many on backorder) you contact them.

As with any online store, do a little googling on the company before ordering. Sometimes those with good or bad experiences are not on the site the deal is posted on. This way you are protecting yourself and getting a great deal. Some deals just aren't worth it, so always check it out!

Saturday, August 22, 2009

The Weekly Giveaway from Cloth Diaper Blog!!

Feed Your Stash Friday: August 21-28, 2009

These are great Giveaways! Even if you don't cloth diaper now, how about some free stuff to get started? I am hoping to win something new to try! Great blog too!

Check them out HERE.

Friday, August 21, 2009

Shaws trip 8/21...Saved 82%!!




All this for $11.11 :) and I received $10 off my next purchase (catalina's). How you ask?

Well, I had:
$10 in catalinas from last weeks promotion
Free box of Rice Krispies coupon
2 $1 off Rice Krispies
3 $1.50 ($.75 ones that doubled) Morning Star
5 $1 ($.50 doubled) Lipton Tea
$1 off Propel

The carrots, scalloped potatoes, propel, bagels, jello, laundry detergent, canola oil spray, and mushrooms were all reduced items.

The Rice Krispies and Morning Star generated the catalina's. I spent $25 shelf price on those items. The cereal was $4.49 shelf price on sale for $2.50. The Morning Star had a shelf price of $4.99, on sale for $3.33. $28.44 was the shelf price for those items. The sale price was$16.99, $7.99 after coupons, free (if I use all $10 in catalina's) or $2.99 (if I use only $5 in catalina's). The Morning Star Chic'N Tenders did NOT generate the catatlina even though it should have ('all varieties" and it was in the size listed).

Overall I saved at least $49.xx. I say that because the reduced items are manually put in so their regular prices are not accounted for by the register. I bought 24 items, works out to $.46 an item!

Now I plan on going back again this week for a few more items.

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Shaw's Scenario for 8/21

Ok so I have a guesstimated scenario for this week with 2 products. I know there are tons of other product coupons out there so keep in mind this is only one possibility.

Buy:

5 12oz Rice Krispies $2.50 each
1 Morning Star Products $3.33 each
______________
$26.94 shelf price (assuming the Morning Stars are $4.49 also)

- $2.50 FREE box of Rice Krispies coupon from Vocal Point
-$4 ($1 off Rice Krispies from Vocal point)
-$1.50 ($.75 off Morning Star's doubled)
_____________
$7.83 new total

Now I have 2 $5 catalinas that I can use. I would use 1 here and pay $2.83 out of pocket. I will then get $10 to use on my next purchase!

This isn't the best deal out there, I will tell you that right now. I am trying to stick with what I want to have in my house. I would love 10 boxes of Pop Tarts, but my hips would not :)

I would like to find some Hunts can, Ro*Tel, and Pam coupons. I could also use some more popcorn.

Shaws deals starting 8/21

In case you haven't received your Shaws circular for this upcoming week (starting Friday), I will inform you now, there is another good catalina deal!

Catalina's are the funny little printers that randomly (or so you thought) prints coupons, promotions, etc. Well turns out they are generated by what you buy and the promotions going on. So this upcoming week you can get yourself $10 in catalina's good on your next purchase (aka do the deal more than once and use your catalinas!)!!

So take a good look at your back page of your circular. You see something like "Spend $25 on these products, get $10 off your next purchase". This "$25" is based on the regular price or shelf price as it's called, not the sale price. This is good news since that is a higher price, making it very easy to get to $25!!

Look HERE for the discussion on Hot Coupon World about the deal! Some good info will be posted there throughout the week with deal scenarios, where to find coupons, and issues (if any). They also have a scan of this weeks ad if you haven't received yours yet!

So far I'm planning on using my Morning Star $.75 (which will double) off 1 coupon and my Vocal Point (check them out HERE) loot of a FREE box of Rice Krispies!!

The 12oz Rice Krispies shelf price is $4.49 and the Morning start is right around that price (maybe $4.69, forgot to look at them today). I will use the $10 in catalina's I have from this weeks deal to make my out of pocket really low!

Look at Hot Coupon Worlds coupon database for other coupon match ups and ALL YOU magazine (sold at Walmart) has plenty of these coupons most of the time!

More specifics to come. Just wanted to explain the deal for all the newbies!

Monday, August 17, 2009

The Thrifty Mama Forums are launched!

Go HERE to check out The Thrifty Mama's (my fav blogger who got me hooked on coupons and blogging!) new forum. I was part of the beta testing and it was a great place to connect with other thrifty peeps and share ideas. There are tons of other areas to look at too. Two of my favorite things are the Domestic Diva section where people post recipes and the craft section where people share patterns, etc.

Right now she has 3 great giveaways you can take advantage of. Just go register at the link above. Check out the forums. Post a few comments, questions, ideas (I think 5 is the minimum to enter the contests) and then go enter the contests!

I am a fan of forums in general because they are pretty instant and full of great information! This is just the beginning of The Thrifty Mama forum so it's a smaller community at the moment. Check it out and let her know what you think!

My Whole Foods Love is Over!

Well I'm sorry to say I'm not a huge fan of Whole Foods from a coupon stand point. I do love how helpful and super friendly everyone is, and if there was one closer, I'd probably frequent them more. However, they have now annoyed me with their coupon policy. Why you ask?

Well quite frankly, they have no policy. That could be great or terrible. So far it's been terrible around here. I know other bloggers have had mixed experiences with them, so definitely check out your local store. Speak with the manager if you can. I went on a quest to find out their exact policy and was essential told they leave that up to each store to decide what is best for their customers. Unfortunately in my area, it seems they aren't very interested in couponer's. There are 2 stores within 5-7 minutes of each other and I was told 2 very different policies leaving me more confused.

Now the email that was sent to me made a reference to some couponers hoarding the Whole Foods newsletters so that is why they let the stores decide what is best for that location. I don't know about you, but my locations have so many newsletters they still had tons of June/July ones when I went today. My stores seem to want to allow the very minimum for couponing.

At any store you can run into this problem, but it's very frustrating when you can't even get a definite answer from their corporate office. I do like to follow the stores guidelines and try to avoid hassle at the register. This is kind of hard when I have no policy to go by, it all depends on the manager on duty that day. So far I have only met what seem to be supervisors.


My wish would be for them to embrace couponers a little bit more. No they may not think they are a great customer to have, but they are getting the money back I am using in manufacture coupons. There is no difference between me and a person who pays full price. They should allow coupon stacking since their store coupons do not say manufacture coupons. They could allow more than one store coupon in a transaction because they do not say 1 per transaction. If they do not want to do these things consistently, then change your wording.

Couponers are fickle. We do not continue to shop at places where we feel hassled or treated like we are trying to rip them off (like I was treated today "I can't give you this for free"...well honey you aren't. You were getting a $1 back from the manufacture, so what's the difference??).

Now I'm not dumb enough to think some people do not take advantage of things. Of course they do. I am doing things the right way and that's how I advocate doing things for sure! But there is a middle ground here. I was just treated like an idiot today and honestly I ended up schooling them about how other stores work (including the one a few minutes away).

Bottom line is, I'll probably only be going to Whole Foods when they have some really great deals going on. Otherwise I'll save myself the hassle.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Cheap Thomas Trains!!

So if you have a toddler, you know how insanely expensive Thomas trains are! My daughter has only seen the show a handful of times, but we have a Toys R Us down the road and she is ALWAYS playing with the train table whenever we go in there. A while back they had a coupon for a free train. You could choose from 3. Well we ended up with all 3 because everyone I know printed a coupon for her.

Anyway, Learning Curve is having a sale and they have a promotion for $20 off your $40 purchase if you are a new customer. You can find all the details HERE. There are plenty of other toys to choose from if you can't find enough Thomas items you want.

All in all I got 10 items for $27 shipped! My total without the sale and promo would have been $89!! With Christmas coming up and my daughters birthday, I am taking advantage of any sales I find!

I found a train table on clearance at Target for $25 (was $99) and then she got her free trains. Basically all of her train items and table cost me $52 and were regular price at $222! It definitely pays to take advantage of the sales!

And thanks to The Thrifty Mama for posting a great deal!

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Great Product!!


Ok this is yet again another "organic" post. Sorry, but I had to share. One thing I am doing to be green and thrifty is cloth diapering. I had tried a few diapers in the past and some were better than others. This time around I was going to go with BumGenius 3.0's which are a fantastic diaper, but in my research I found GroBaby diapers. These were not out a year ago when I was buying diapers for my 1yr old, so I was interested to see what all the buzz was about.

Well I found nothing but great reviews. A few negative points here and there, but they were relatively minor. I began looking at the cost side of it (of course!) and found a few things.

1. The GroBaby system was cheaper than many other all in one/one size diapers out there, for me. To buy other pocket or all in one diapers I would have to buy 14-18 diapers to last me 2 days. That would cost anywhere from $252-$324. Going with GroBaby I spent $230.55. Of course that's not HUGE savings over the other diapers, but the packages I bought came with extras that I couldn't get with other systems. I put together 2 packages which allowed me enough diapers for up to 3 days. The numbers I figured for the other diapers (14-18) were based on 2 days, perhaps with an extra diap or two if you are looking at the higher number. Now I still wash diapers every 2 days, but if we have a big day I won't be strapped and my diapers are getting less usage so they should last longer. If I wanted that same situation with other diapers I would have had to spend the $324 range.

2. Like I mentioned above I bought 2 packages. I kind of made my own. I found the "full time" package they offered to be overkill for a 1yr old. We go through 6-8 diapers a day. Using the GroBaby I go through 2-3 shells a day and about 6 or 7 soakers, 1 booster for night time. The "full time package" comes with 10 full set ups (so 10 shells, 10 boosters, 10 soakers), 14 soakers, and 6 boosters. That package is $354.28. It's a great package for younger babies that is for sure, but more than what we needed. So I bought 2 smaller packages. In total I have 7 shells, 15 soakers, and 9 boosters. It costs me over a hundred dollars less and is perfect for us.

So far they have been fantastic! They are easy to use. They clean nicely and are very absorbent. I honestly only have a few small complaints. One is that they seem smallish. My 1yr old is probably going to grow out of them long before she is potty trained. A bit disappointing since I really like them! I have been using their detergent (bought it to get to my reward level, see below) and it's great too. I highly recommend anyone who is thinking about cloth to give these a whirl! Even if you are already into to cloth but haven't tried them. Check them out on facebook too. They have a lot of giveaways and seem super nice!

Now to the rewards thing. I ordered from Soft Cloth Bunz (www.softclothbunz.com). Quick delivery and awesome rewards program. Order from them and your purchase can help you get free stuff from the site. My order qualified me for a $10 gift certificate. They also had the best pricing for the GroBaby packages.

Anyway, I just wanted to share my love for GroBaby!

A Thrifty Mom

”Photobucket”

Here is a great blog I've been checking out for a while. Lots of good deals and giveaways! Check it out and let me know what you think!

A Thrifty Mom

Interesting Promotion...

Yeah I know I've been posting a lot of organic/natural things lately. But I just keep coming across those types of deals and want to share them. If you are a couponer and eat well you may have purchased (or may in the future purchase) Bear Naked Granola products. I bought 2 bags the other day at Stop & Shop because I noticed they were on sale for $3.99/bag (regular $4.79) and I had $1 off Whole Foods coupon for Bear Naked (Stop & Shop takes competitors coupons) and $1 off Bear Naked coupon. $2 for a great granola is fantastic!

So I was reading the bag today when eating it and saw they had said "don't throw this bag away" and they referred me to a website. Well if you go HERE they explain why you should send your bags back to them. They will either donate money to a local school or you can acquire points and get a T-shirt or bag. It takes about 5 packages to get a bag and about 6 to get a T-shirt.

I just found it interesting!

Friday, August 14, 2009

Vocal Point, Thanks Sara!

I was just reading my good friend Sara's blog and she posted about Vocal Point. If you haven't signed up on their site, now is the time. They send great coupons (both via email and snail mail) and product info, etc. It's a great way to find out about new products (like the new bounce bar, which they just sent coupons for) or get coupons for products you use now!

This week I received two mailings from them. First was a Rice Krispies one with a coupon for a free box of cereal plus 4 $1 off coupons. Then today I received another with 1 $2.50 Bounce Bar coupon and 2 or 3 $1 off as well. They don't send a lot of junk only quality, high end stuff you use already. They are constantly sending printable coupons to your email too. Again not overwhelming, but I LOVE it because often it's Kashi coupons!

Anyway, check it out! They have forums and chat all that fun stuff too. I am just in it for the goodies! Vocal Point

Girls LLBean Shoe deal!

This is a great sale for anyone looking for Girls shoes (sorry no toddler sizes in this style). The Thrifty Mama posted this deal a few days ago with this free shipping code 3012422. I'm not sure if the code is still working, but there are still a few sizes left in all 3 colors. LLBean has great quality in everything. I would grab a pair but it would be several years before my girls would be ready for these sizes!

Check it out HERE

Another great giveaway!

Feed Your Stash Friday: August 14-21, 2009

Every week this blog gives away some cloth diapers or diapering accessories. This week is all about Fuzzi Bunz. Check out the giveaway here. Great blog, great giveaways! Oh and you can enter even if you've never tried cloth diapers! Great way to get your feet wet!

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Looking for some healthy deals?

Well The Thrifty Mama (see my favorite things on the left :)) posted about this blog yesterday. I checked it out and it seems like a fantastic resource for organic and other health foods. The Thrifty Mama has also started a Whole Foods posting once a week which has enlightened me to all of the deals I can get there! I honestly didn't realize how well I could do at Whole Foods!

I found this all very exciting since my youngest has issues with dairy. I always try to eat well, but it used to seem impossible when I started couponing. Deals and coupons seemed to be on foods I was trying to avoid. But now I have found I wasn't looking in the right place :)

Between Whole Foods postings on The Thrifty Mama (and the Amazon deals she posts!) and this Organic Blog I can find plenty of deals! The Organic Deals blog has TONS of coupon resources too.

Just like other stores you can stack the Whole Foods coupons (you'll find the Whole Deal Newsletter booklet ALL around the stores loaded with coupons, grab a few they have tons!) with manufacture coupons to really get significant savings on items weekly. I have also found their prices to be better on some items then my local grocery chain.

Tonight I went to Stop & Shop and bought Bear Naked Granola. It is $4.79 regular price, $3.99 on sale. I used $1 off of Bear Naked products Whole Foods coupon AND a $1 off of Bear Naked products manufacture coupon. I saved a total of $2.80 a bag by buying when it was on sale and stacking coupons.

$5 off Fisher Price Trio Set

This may come in handy for the early Christmas shopping I am doing! I did try the Trio set out and they seem to be very easy to use for little kids and come in cool sets. I'm not sure how great of a deal this will be or how long the coupon is good for, but it's worth printing anyway! Sometimes Toys R Us has buy 2 get 1 free sales around the end of Oct where a few coupons like this would be fantastic!!

Go HERE to print.

Hey there, I'm BAAAACKKK!!

Ha! Just when you gave up on me :) I will probably be posting a lot of deals I'm seeing around the web, but I will always link you to the original post and give props to those who did all the leg work! I do have a few deals of my own findings :) but with less time these days, I am mostly following their lead!

Ok here is a great deal at Amazon that may expire soon since it is a great deal! Check it out here!!

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Great Giveaway on Cloth Diapers!!

Feed Your Stash Friday: (3) BG OS + Baby Legs!

So I have been very busy and continuing the search for money saving ideas. One thing I am doing is cloth diapering. There are so many cloth diaper choices out there, but one way to get started is to try a staple like the BumGenius One Size diapers. If you cloth diaper already, this is a great conest! Follow this link to talk about your cloth diaper stash! You could win 3 BumGenius One Size diapers AND a pair of Baby Legs! It's a great blog and they have fabulous contests!