Money in the bank

Lately I've been in the mood to save money. I guess it's a good mood to be in :) Last month we had to buy a new phone for Tom since his old one died. There was a $50 rebate on the phone, which I was excited to put into savings as soon as we got it. I forgot that Verizon has struck a deal with the credit card devils or decided to do their own part to stimulate the economy. Instead of a nice $50 check addressed to me, we got a prepaid $50 Visa debit card. But they can't trick me! I deposited $50 of our weekly budget into savings and used the $50 rebate card for our regular weekly purchases. Every little bit counts!

Weekly Savings

Not my best trip ever, but stocked up on a few things that we needed. This is from last Monday. We usually go to Dom's today, but they just didn't have anything good on sale and we don't really need anything. I did stop at Aldi on the way home on Friday and pick up some milk, eggs, and fruit.

Dominicks

Spent $30.48
Saved $42.55

Bought:

4 lb bag frozen chicken

2 Ritz/Wheat Thins Toasted Chips

2 bags shredded cheese

1 apple

2 lbs of asparagus

Strawberries

3 frozen pizzas

4 bottles Kraft salad dressing

2 Pillsbury Crescent rolls

1 Greek yogurt

1 jar Mayo

I heart CVS and Izze's!

The magic coupon machine at CVS spit out a couple of awesome coupons for me the other day, so I decided to use them to stock up on some more Izze's for dirt cheap.

Spent $5.87
Saved $16.52 Bought:
3 4-packs of Izze's
1 Physician's Formula lip plumper/gloss

Here's how I did it! The magic coupon machine gave me a $5/$15 coupon, and last week gave me a coupon for $6 off any Physician's Formula cosmetic. I noticed on Sunday that Physician's Formula cosmetics are all 40% off this week so I began formulating a plan.

Physician's Formula Lip gloss $6.77 after 40% off (originally $11.29)
3 Izze's at $3.49 each
Equals $17.24 + tax
Minus $5/$15 coupon
Minus $6 Physician's Formula CVS coupon
Minus $1 Physician's Formula manufacturer coupon
Equals $5.24 + tax

Old couch, New couch: Pics

Before After

Weekly Savings: I've relapsed

Man, ever since those awesome Target Freezer Deals a few weeks back I've relapsed into a complete deal junkie. After today, I promise it's going to be JUST the weekly Dominick's trip and maybe a bi-weekly CVS trip (to keep the ECB's rolling). Earlier in the week I went to CVS, the rest of the deals are from today (I ran out this morning before it started raining and thunderstorming!)

CVS Trip #1

Spent $3.57
Saved $17
Received $7 in ECB's
Bought:
1 bottle Irish Spring hair and body wash
1 Dial lotion for men
2 Herbal Essences Shampoo & Conditioner

Jewel

Spent $11.91
Saved $21.75
Bought:
2 Six and a half pound chickens
6 Propel Zero
1 Heinz Ketchup
2 Bullseye Barbeque Sauce
1 Kraft singles

CVS Trip #2

Spent $2.81
Saved $9.00
Received $6.99 in ECB's (and some awesome CVS coupons that I'm going to go back and use later in the week!)
Bought:
1 Four pack of Izze's
1 Five pack of Allegra Allergy
1 CVS Green bag tag (WHY have I not bought this before?! Every 4th time you use it you get $1 in ECB's. And I always use my own bags anyways!)

Walgreens

(Don't get too excited about the prenatal vitamins. I'm NOT pregnant. I just couldn't pass up the awesome deal and why wouldn't I stock up on these at a rock bottom price? They don't expire until December of 2013 so I have PLENTY of time to use them)!
Spent $8.36
Saved $36.51 Bought:
2 bottles of 90 caplet Prenatal Vitamins
1 Cream of Chicken soup
3 Hunt's Tomato sauce
1 Cadbury Egg
1 Almay mascara

Total Spent $26.65
Total Saved $84.26

New Couches!

This is how frugality can pay off...and be fun! We've been saving money and sticking to our budget for a solid few years now. I've wanted new couches for more than a few years now, but we were patient and kept saving because, let's face it, new couches are most definitely NOT a priority, let alone a necessity.

We are so thankful to Tom's sister for the sectional that we have now. And we have certainly gotten our use out of it! But honestly it's very old and Bailey's hair gets intertwined in the fabric SO easily. The mattress in the sleeper sofa has worn thin and if you sit too "forcefully" in the corner of the sectional it sounds like the whole thing might break. When we moved here I tried to take the cushion covers off thinking I would somehow try to clean them. I unzipped the covers only to find that taking them off would result in completely ruined cushions. The foam had disintegrated and is in a million tiny pieces.

Soooo, we decided it was finally time to buy new couches. It was definitely warranted and we had saved the money to pay cash for them. Originally we wanted to get another sectional, but not knowing the setup of our future (yet-to-be-determined) living space, we opted for a couch (sleerer sofa) and a matching loveseat.

We found a set that we both really liked and bought them a few weekends ago. They are being delivered on today and I can't wait! I would love to say that we're not going to let Bailey on the new couches....but really, who am I trying to kid?

Weekly Savings: Can't stop shopping!

Last week was crazy. I just couldn't stay away from the deals! OK, so I only went to 3 stores (CVS, Walgreens, and Target) but still! I only managed to get a pic of my Target trip.

Target: Spent $11.85, Saved $36.10.

CVS: Spent $10.10, Saved $30.69, Received $7 in ECB's.
Walgreens: Spent $1.32, Saved $16.40, Received $2 in Register Rewards (to use next time at Walgreens).

We are playing catch-up today so no grocery shopping for us. We're planning to stop at Dominick's and Aldi on the way home from work tomorrow. Fortunately, there isn't a whole lot we need. I think I need to take a break from deals this week...although I might run into CVS for a few super cheap items...stay tuned next week to see if I ended up taking a break or not!

Dominick's Trip: New Record?

Today we went to Dominick's for our weekly shopping trip. There was a $10/$50 coupon on their Just For You site that I loaded onto my card before we left...but I wasn't holding my breath that it was going to work. The last time they had that coupon the $10 came off before sale and coupon prices (which is awesome, but kind of surprising), so I figured they would have fixed it for the second time around.

I'm not sure if this is a PR or not (I have to look back through old Publix posts), but at the very least it is pretty freaking awesome:

Spent $28.02

Saved $90.73!!! (That's a savings of 77%!!)

Bought:

4 boxes Cinnamon Burst Cheerios

4 boxes Quaker Oatmeal Squares

1 bottle maple syrup

3 boxes Eggo's

2 Lysol wipes

2 boxes Toaster Streudels

2 bags Ore Ida Hash Browns

1 CPK single size pizza

1 bag sugar snap peas

2 pounds of asparagus

5 pound box of clementines

2 gallons of milk

2 boxes Celestial Seasonings tea

2 bags Fresh Express Spring Mix

Weekly Savings

In addition to my CVS Izze madness, I also went to Dominick's and Jewel this week.

Dom's

Spent: $19.93
Saved: $40.20 Bought:
5lb box of clementines
3 cans tuna
2 Lipton pasta sides
2 steaks
3 bottles Ken's salad dressing
2 jars Pace salsa
1 loaf wheat bread
several heads of broccoli

Jewel

Spent: $21.84
Saved $42.32

Bought:
4 boxes spaghetti
27 cans of tuna
12 bags of egg noodles
4 boxes ziti/rotini
8 cans of Red Gold tomatoes with chili peppers/cilantro
1 red pepper
2 sweet onions

I'm so excited because we were literally on our last box of pasta! I had been waiting and hoping for a good sale to stock up! (I'm used to getting it for free or close to free at Publix). Also, I've been on the lookout for egg noodles to go on sale FOREVER and they are usually never included in the sale. Each bag was only $0.50 (after coupons) so I figured I better stock up!

February Challenge Weeks 3 & 4

Eek! Sorry I've been slacking on posting about the remainder of my February Challenge...I'm sure all 3 of my readers have been waiting anxiously for the results!

Week 3: Not so great :( We would have only spent 66% of our budget during week 3 but we found khaki's on sale and Tom desperately needs new khaki's so we bought 3 pair...making us spend exactly 100% of our budget.

Week 4: We still managed to save SOME money, but spent 56% of our budget.

Overall I think I would call our February Challenge a success! While I didn't save 2/3 of the budget like I was originally hoping to, we still saved some money every week (except for week 3). This is a huge improvement because (like I mentioned in my first post), we consistently spend 100% of our budget every single week. If we can turn this February Challenge into a monthly event, I'm hoping we can sock away more money every week and reach our goals a little faster!