Money Saving Mom

Walgreens has released another $5/$20 coupon which is good for Friday and Saturday only (November 14-15, 2008). Go here to print your coupon.

Mercedes came up with a few great scenarios for using this coupon. Check them out here. And if you have other deal ideas, be sure to leave a comment with your scenario or link.

Also, you can get the Schick Quattro Titanium Razor free at Walgreens through tomorrow. It's only sale for $6.99. Use the $3/1 coupon in the November EasySaver booklet and stack that with the $4/1 coupon in the December All You magazine. (Thanks, Lisa!)

See more deals at Walgreens this week here.

From Golden Corral's website:

Thanks, Jaycie!

The Home Made Simple coupon booklet offer is back!

Go here to request your free booklet full of $27 worth in coupons. These usually have a coupon for a completely free product, too, so you'll want to make sure and sign up while these are available.

Sign up here to get your coupon for a free bottle of Country Bob's sauce.

More Freebies (Thanks to Motherhood Moment for some of these!):

Free sample of Dunhill London
Free issue of Bridal Guide
Free holiday shopping list
Free sample of MYOMed Pro
Free ebook on Grocery Savings (click "no" on the offers in order to get to the download page)
Free ebook on Drugstore Savings (click "no" on the offers in order to get to the download page)

We had a busy week this week and I woke up feeling rather icky this morning so we nixed our plans to go to the zoo and instead are staying home and having a "lazy day". We're doing some cleaning, laundry, a little baking, and mostly just taking it slow and enjoying being together.

I think we might cuddle up under a blanket with some hot drinks and read our current read-aloud, too. Sounds like the perfect thing to do on a rather cold day like today!

And don't worry, I'll also be popping in every once in a while today to post some of the deals which are sitting in my inbox waiting to be shared. I've gotten rather behind on email this week so I hope to have a chance to clear out my bulging inbox during little pockets of extra time throughout today.

If you need a dose of frugal encouragement or inspiration today, be sure to head over to my other blog for Frugal Friday. There's already a host of great links up over there.

You can get free organic milk with a $30 or more purchase at Central Market right now. More details here.

More Printable Coupons:

20% off your purchase at KB Toys.

Arm & Hammer Essentials coupon and rebate

To get the word out about their new Farmhouse Blend, Cumberland Farms is offering free coffee every Friday through December 5, 2008 at its nearly 500 convenience store and gas station locations in the Northeast.

More details here.

Thanks, Frugal Freebies and Deals!

I recently shared about our regular Baking Days (see posts here, here, here, and here if you missed those posts) and many of you were interested in doing something similar. Michelle's guest post below is packed with tips to help you get started using your freezer and cooking from scratch to save money. Enjoy!

Guest Post by Michelle from Leaving Excess

I have always enjoyed cooking and baking from scratch. In my quest to be more frugal, I have been able to utilize my kitchen enthusiasm to prepare wholesome food for my family; adding convenience by making mixes ahead of time or freezing foods to use later. This helps me to save money by not buying reducing the need for prepackaged convenience foods or needing to rely on fast food or take-out meals during our often busy weekdays and weekends.

Recently, many manufacturers have been putting less product in the same package and still charging the same. The stakes on the game of feeding your family for less just got higher. The following are my tips for using your kitchen to save you money.

Tip #1: Work ahead. I love to cook. But I do not love to cook when I am under the gun to prepare dinner in a hurry. Taking time to plan out meals and prepare the foods we will be eating during the week ahead saves me a lot of time, headache, and money. 

For example: I recently committed to making all of our bread at home. The bread machine is a convenient way for me to mix the dough (which I prefer to bake in the oven), but sometimes even measuring all the ingredients feels like too much to fit into my busy day. 

I now mix together the dry ingredients to our family’s favorite bread recipe up ahead of time and store it in the cupboard. When I need a loaf, I just put in the wet ingredients and yeast and press a button. That makes it more manageable for me.

In addition, it saves me time because it is easier to measure the ingredients out five times, put them in individual containers and be done that to drag the ingredients out five different times. I also do this for our brownies, cookies, quick breads, pizza dough, etc.

Tip #2:  Make Extra. When I make a dish for my family that can be frozen, I always make two. I have all the ingredients out, so why not? In the end, you save time, mess and money.

Simply make two of the same dish and wrap one for the freezer. You can put the dish into a freezer bag, work the excess air out, zip the bag, and put it into another bag and do the same. You can also use disposable baking pans, cover the top of the dish in plastic wrap, and then cover the top again in foil. 

This works well for casseroles, meat with sauces, and marinades. For a marinade, I make two batches at once, use the first, and store the second in a freezer bag (double wrap as described above). When you are ready to use the marinade, simply put the frozen meat in with the frozen sauce (in the bag) and store in your refrigerator for a few days. As the meat thaws, it will absorb the marinade. Turn the bag once or twice a day to evenly distribute the marinade. Be cautious when freezing casseroles, as dishes with uncooked potatoes, sour cream or mayonnaise do not freeze well.

Another wonderful thing to make extra of is cookie dough. I usually make a double batch, bake one batch, and then freeze the other.

There are two ways to freeze the dough. First, you can make the remaining dough into logs (about 12 cookies per log, so if your batch makes 3 dozen, make 3 logs), wrap the log in plastic wrap, wrap again in foil and freeze. When you are ready to bake, you can slice the log into disks and bake the cookies that way.

The other way is to use a scoop to make balls of dough. Place the balls of dough close together on a baking sheet and store in the freezer (uncovered) for about 1-2 hours, or until hard. Once the dough is hard, place the dough balls into a freezer bag and double wrap the bag into another freezer bag (being sure to remove excess air). 

Freezing the cookies individually first prevents the dough from freezing to itself and being one big clump.  That way, you can take out just as many as you need at one time. 

I do this with hamburger patties, freezing them individually, then store them in a bag until we need them.  Read the details here. 

I also do this with waffles, making a double batch and freezing the extras to be popped into the toaster on busy mornings. Read about that here.

Making extra muffins (our favorites are Banana Chocolate Chip and Zucchini), packaging them individual, and freezing them makes mornings much easier. Simply toss a bag of muffins into your bag, and by the time you get to work or school, the muffins will thawed and ready to eat.

When freezing, but sure to label and date each item, so that you can find what you need, see what you have and use what you have before it goes bad.

Tip #3:  Preserve Nature’s Bounty. Have you ever seen those convenience bags of pre-chopped frozen onions or peppers? You can easily do this for yourself during the peak of the season.

When you find a great sale on onions, stock up, and freeze some for later. I like to prepare mine a couple of different ways: I like to chop some to be used in casseroles or sauces and I like to slice some to be used in stir-frys or on hamburgers and pizzas. 

Follow the same directions above for freezing cookie dough balls: lay out the onions in a single layer on a baking sheet (you may want to cover onions to prevent the smell from taking over your freezer!), freeze until frozen, and then pour into bags and double wrap. That way, you can take what you need and not have to fight a big clump of frozen mess. Read more about freezing onions here.

This tip works beautifully for red, yellow, and green peppers (ones destined for cooked dishes); woody herbs such as thyme and rosemary; and fruits such as blueberries and strawberries (for baking or smoothies). Again, you will want to label and date your bounty, so you can find and use the food before it expires, generally about 3–6 months for fresh produce, assuming a zero grade freezer and well packaged foods.

Tip #4: Prepare In Advance. Sometimes it is just not physically possible to get home and get a meal ready all at the same time. On those days, I rely on my crock pot to have a hot, nutritious meal waiting for me at the end of a long day. I prepare what I can the night before, chopping vegetables, opening cans of tomatoes or beans, and assembling the dish in the crock pot bowl before storing it in our refrigerator overnight.

In the morning, I finish any last minute details and set the bowl into the cooking unit and let it go to work. Often, I prepare rice in the rice cooker using the delayed function to accompany the crock pot meal. It is such a relief to know that dinner is already done on those busy days! For more crock pot tips and links to hundreds of recipes for the crock pot, read this post here.

Even on days when I am home, I notice that my stress level is much lower when I have menus planned out for the week in advance. Not having to scramble to figure out what is for dinner makes all the difference in my day.

It also enables me to look in my freezer and pantry and see what needs to be used. I can then plan my meals around those items, to be sure I am wisely and efficiently using the foods that I have taken the time and money to prepare ahead of time. When I know I am using chicken in two days, I can take it out to thaw in the refrigerator so that I am ready to go once the dinner hour strikes.

Finally, I would like to share that preparing foods in advance and using the freezer may be heading into the unknown for you, but it is not hard to do. If you have specific questions, feel free to leave a comment on my blog, here on this post, or do a search online with the ingredient you want to freeze or store in the search title. Just put one foot in front of the other and enjoy the journey!

Michelle is a CPA, turned stay at home mom to four, turned somewhere in between.  She challenges the excesses that society tells us we need and experiments with living a simple, uncluttered life on her daily blog, Leaving Excess. 

It's nearing the end of 2008! Can you believe that? It's been a full year for us with many struggles and triumphs. My husband and I sat down this week and talked about our goals and ran the numbers to see where we were at. And we were very thrilled to find out that we were able, by the grace of God, to accomplish all of our goals for 2008!

Here's the list:

Short Term Financial Goals for 2008

1) Have our fully-funded emergency fund in place (6 months' worth of living expenses) by the end of April. As of March 11, 2008--DONE!

2) Switch health insurance plans and open an HSA. We were approved for our new health insurance plans in April and have also set up our HSA. Done!

3) Start up an IRA and invest at least 5-10% of Jesse's income in this. Started in March. (We plan to increase this to 12-15% of Jesse's income as soon as we purchase our home.)

4) Open up a mutual fund for each of our children and invest $50 per child per month in it. Started in March.

5) Save up and invest $30,000 this year towards paying cash (100% down) for a house in 3-5 years. As of the beginning of November, this is also DONE!!

When we listed off these goals at the beginning of the year, they felt very audacious. In fact, we both thought we were being overly ambitious. But, as we've found in the past, it's better to aim high than to be content with mediocrity! And so we did!

Amazingly, through a number of unexpected events and the blessing of God, we were able to accomplish these goals. Yes, it meant some rigid budgeting. Yes, we've made some significant sacrifices. Yes, we done a lot of "living like no one else". But the perseverance is paying off and we're very excited about that.

We haven't sat down and formerly written out goals for 2009, but we do have one already-agreed-upon extremely-ambitious goal that my husband gave me permission to share publicly: We are aiming to have saved up enough money by this time next year to pay 100% down on a home!

This goal looks a little daunting but we've run the numbers and determined that with lots of hard work and scrimping, it might just be possible. One of the biggest reasons we are hoping this goal might become a reality in the next year is because of our recent move.

Not only did moving back home allow us to now be close to our families and back in our home church, it was a substantial career move for Jesse and it put us in a less expensive housing market. These things, coupled with the fact that we'll likely be living here long-term, have given us huge motivation to scrimp and save in order to buy a home sooner than we'd anticipated.

I'll keep you posted on our progress and we'll see what happens!

-----------------------------------
How did you do in 2008? Whether or not you posted financial goals for 2008, please take a moment to post about your financial successes this past year. Then, come back here and leave your link below. If you don't have a blog or would rather share anonymously, feel free to leave your update in a comment. Let's all keep each other accountable to be better stewards of our resources!

Planning to travel over the Thanksgiving or Christmas season? Go here to learn how you can get a free $30 voucher from HotelClub.net and score a very sweet deal on hotel rooms across the country. You might even be able to find a room for as little as $7/night after this voucher! 

If you need to do any shopping at Gap, Banana Republic, or Old Navy stores in the next four days (November 13-16, 2008), you can print a coupon here for 30% off your purchase!

Thanks, Simple Mom!

Kroger stores are continuing the incredible Mix and Match sale this week! You can see some of the deals available here and here. Also, be sure to go here to see some of the great deals readers here snagged last week.

As always, these deals might vary somewhat by region so check your ad to make sure your store is participating.

One of my favorite deals is the ScotchBrite Nail Saver Sponges. They are on sale for $1 and a part of the Buy 10, Get $5 off sale. So, using this coupon, they are free to begin with. Plus, you'll earn $0.50 overage for each one you buy as a part of the mix and match sale.

Select KMart stores are offering Super Doubles again, this time November 12-16, 2008. Supposedly, all Super KMarts are participating this time. You can read more details and see lots of coupon match-ups here.

Kraft salad dressings are on sale 3 for $5 each this week. When you buy 4, you also get a $4 catalina (a coupon you can use like cash on your next shopping order).

Buy 4 dressings, use two $1/2 coupons here, and you'll pay about $0.64 out of pocket after the coupons and catalina! What a deal!

Thanks, Mama of Boys!

See more deals at Meijer here.

If you use artificial sweeteners, you can sign up here to get a free 9-pack sample of NutraSweet Swirl. (Thanks, Freebies4Mom!)

More freebies:
Free tote from Stouffer's Dinner Club
Free Snapfish Photo Book (you pay shipping--might make a great Christmas present!)

Oh and just for kicks, Saving Your Cents sent me her post showcasing some free fun they had courtesy of Cottonelle.

Diabetes Essentials 10-ct. tea is on sale for 25% off this week making each box $4.49. You get $5 ECBs back when you buy one (limit 1). There is also a B1G1 coupon in the CVS diabetes booklet so you can buy two, pay $4.49 out of pocket, and get $5 ECBs back!

Thanks, Everyday Savings!

Speaking of homeschooling, I've been nominated as a finalist in the Home School Blog Awards for the Best Thrifty Blog.

If you have a moment and wanted to head over there and vote for this blog, I'd appreciate it--especially since the prizes look right up my alley! :)

Guest Post by Misty from HomeschoolBytes.com

I'm a homeschool mom to five kids, ages 8 and under. In some minds, that makes me either crazy or heroic, but I do have an interesting household most days. See:

Buying school supplies for a large family means I'm always on the lookout for a good deal. And there are plenty to be had if you know where to look. Here are some of my favorites:

Educational Software

Did you know you qualify to purchase the education version of most mainstream software packages if you are a college student, a teacher, a homeschool parent, or on behalf of your child grade K through 12?  Yes, all you have to do is have a child in school to qualify! 

And these are full working versions of the software for a fraction of the cost. You do need to read the education qualifications for the specific software to verify before purchasing, but usually it just requires an education ID of some sort. A report card or one of the free IDS many children get now from the portrait companies at the beginning of the year works fine. (Homeschoolers, you can get a free eligibility letter from Homeschool Buyers Co-op.)

For example, you can get the latest Microsoft Office Pro for $119.95 on The Academic Superstore, a discount of 70% off the same program sold for $395.99 on Amazon. (If you decide to buy from The Academic Superstore, join Coupon Cactus first and get an extra 1.5% rebate. See this post for more information.)

The only downside is when an upgrade comes along you can't get the discounted upgrade price since you don't own a 'Full Version'. In the past, however, I've found that buying the educational version each time is still cheaper than a full version followed by the discounted upgrades.

Educational Internet Deals

Where to Find Used Curriculum

Teacher Discount Cards (for public school and homeschool teachers)

All-in-all the internet has not just revolutionized teaching with more resources than you have time to get to, but it has done the same with finding bargains to make teaching supplies much more affordable. I'd love to hear your favorite places to find teaching and educational bargains, too!

Misty is a homeschool mom of 5 in Michigan who, among other things, keeps bees in her backyard, had 2 kids while she was in medical school, loves being a stay-at-home mom, and shows everyone her Kroger receipt proudly displayed on the fridge that reads "Total $0.39, Savings $104.53!"  Thank you, MoneySavingMom!  She currently blogs about homeschooling at HomeschoolBytes and alternative health at DocMisty.

There's a new $1/1 Muir Glen organic tomatoes product coupon here. After you print it once, hit your browser's back button to print it again.

The tomato paste is $0.97 at many stores making it free with this coupon. Also, a number of Wal-Mart stores carry the diced tomatoes for approximately $1.18-$1.24 so after this coupon, it's a great deal on organic tomatoes.

Thanks, Lorrie!

More Printable Coupons:

$0.55/1 any Oroweat bread (Thanks, Donna!)
$1/1 Arm and Hammer Essentials

Since there were a number of questions on this week's $40 shopping trip and menu post, I decided to answer them in a separate post for those interested.

Do you know of anyone who blogs about sales at Aldis? Aldis moved my city recently, but the closest one is about 15 minutes from my house (I have 3 other grocery stores within 5 minutes of my house.) So I don't plan to go to Aldis often, but would like to know when they have specials. Any tips or ideas for shopping there?

Aldi doesn't really run many sales but their staple prices are often much lower than grocery store prices. I'd recommend you make a trip or two to Aldi in the next few weeks to familiarize yourself with the store and compare prices.

You might find that a trip there once a month to stock up on staple items will help you to lower your grocery budget. Or you may find that you can usually beat their prices with store sales and coupons. Either way, it will be good to know.

For more advice on shopping at Aldi, check out this article.

I have a question about your meal plan, shopping lists and recipes - how long does it take you to do this every week? I'm in desperate need of guidance in this area - we spend $300 - $500 dollars A WEEK on groceries and other household supplies, yet we never have anything to put together balanced meals! I'm looking for a place to start so any advice you could offer would be greatly appreciated!

First off, remember that I didn't start menu planning and feeding my family on $40 a week last week or even last year. I've been at this for years and the practice really does make a difference.

As for how long it takes me, well, that really depends upon how good the sales are. On dismal sale weeks, I usually try to use what we already have on hand and then hit Aldi for the rest. So the whole menu-planning and grocery-list-writing process might take me 20 minutes or so.

On good sale weeks, I take more time to scour the ad, match-up coupons, find printable coupons, and then make our menu and grocery list. All told, it might take me 45 minutes to an hour. I rarely ever spend longer than that.

My advice for you would be to start our slowly. If planning a week's worth of meals seems daunting, try to just plan a week's worth of simple dinners. Go through your cupboards, refrigerator, and freezer and make sure you have everything on hand to make all the recipes you've chose. Plan side dishes, too. And then force yourself to stick with it! Sometimes the determination to see it through is half the battle.

Also, your family needs to be on board with you. If Mom's determined to shop once per week and stick with a menu but everyone else complains and whines and refuses to go along, chances are you likely won't be able to make it work.

Have a family meeting, let your family members give input on meals and snacks, and work out a plan. And then work the plan! Don't expect changes to happen overnight, but be encouraged as you start heading in a more organized and cost effective direction. You can do it!

Do you add up your price (net of coupons) on your calculator each time you add an item to your cart? I know I would forget something and never quite get my total right! How do you stay so perfectly within budget?

Yes. My biggest help is that I only bring $40 cash to the store. No credit card (we don't have those--thanks, Dave!), no debit cards, no nothing else besides the cash. Believe me, when you know you only have your allotted amount to spend, you usually are pretty determined to stick within the budget!

I usually try to leave a few dollars extra wiggle room and have mentally picked out a few items in my cart that I can always take off my order if I end up being overbudget. That has happened a few times and I want to be prepared.

Ok...spill your recipe for peanut butter smoothies. I bet my kids would love them!

Here you are:

Yummy Banana Peanut Butter Smoothies

3/4 to 1 cup sliced frozen bananas (like this)
1 cup milk
1 Tablespoon peanut butter

Blend in the blender until smooth. The above makes about 13-15 oz. I can drink all of that  for breakfast but I'm also pregnant and nursing.

Word to the wise: Do not give these smoothies to young children who like to make messes. Otherwise, in the process of eating it, they will spill it all over themselves and your kitchen and you'll have sticky banana goo to clean up. Ask me how I know. :)

What is crockpot ragout? Could you share a description or recipe? I love using the crockpot.

Here's the recipe. This is my first week to try it so I can't say whether it'll become a regular at our house or not.

do you have a recipe site? i have wanted 2 of your dishes now...enchilada casserole and another taco dish you made. please share!

No, I don't have a recipe site and I'm afraid I'd not be a very good candidate for a recipe blogger. You see, I'm not one to use recipes very often. After years of tinkering in the kitchen, I've found I prefer to use recipes as a guideline or launching pad rather than a strict standard to be followed.

For instance, the enchilada casserole will be based upon a recipe but then highly modified based upon the mood I'm in, our taste preferences, and the ingredients we have. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but my hubby loves most everything I cook and I do, too. Plus, the creativity in the kitchen helps us to use what we have on hand and spend less at the store. So I guess you could say it's a good problem that I don't like to follow recipes very carefully. :)

Would you consider doing a post about your ENTIRE budget? I would love to see a real world example of a real family's entire budget.

Here's a link to a post on my old blog which has both our bare-bones $1000/month law school budget and our current budget. We've modified it a bit since that post was written, but it's very similar. Feel free to ask if you have any questions. I can't promise I have great answers, but I'll try to answer as best as I can!

If you've recently adopted a dog, you can qualify for a free month's supply of Pedigree dog food with this form here. Good through December 2008.

Thanks, Frugal, Freebies and Deals!

I take it you all like the Giveaways Galore feature because if I don't get it up until later on Tuesday afternoon, I start getting emails asking when it's going to be up. :) I'm glad to know it's something you all look forward to each week.

So without further ado, are you giving something away on your blog this week or found a great giveaway elsewhere on the web? If so, post your link below and let all the readers here know so they can get in on the action!

Your giveaway must be family-friendly and no-strings-attached. In addition, to make it easy to navigate, your link must go directly to your giveaway post. Links going to the homepage of your blog or any other part of your blog besides the direct link to your giveaway post will be deleted.

If you have a Kroger store nearby, find out here how you can get free oatmeal and Colgate toothpaste with e-coupons from Cellfire.

Walgreens has Clabber Girl baking powder and cornstarch on sale for $0.50 each. Many areas received a $1/2 coupon in their 11/09 RedPlum insert which would make these free!

Thanks, Lorrie!

See more deals for Walgreens this week here.

Carrie, who blogs about homes and life in Colorado Springs over at SpringsHomeBlog.com, alerted me to these two deals locals in the Colorado Springs area will want to check out:

::The CiCi's pizza in Colorado Springs has been stamping receipts for half-off your next buffet!  The buffet is usually $5.99 per person, so half of that is a great price. Carrie said that they even have been giving them a half off stamp on orders where they used the half-off stamp already. Talk about a deal! (By the way, has anyone heard of this happening anywhere else in the nation?)

::On Tuesday, November 18th Qdoba Mexican Grill be giving one free entree to the first 2,500 people who bring in a minimum of 2 non-perishable food items to any Colorado Springs Qdoba location. Donations will go to the Colorado Springs Rescue Mission and will be accepted from 10:30am-3:00pm only.