Who loves Cookies?

Yep I do! And this awesome, yummy-loking Cookie recipe over on Carla's Let's Get Cooking Blog sure look like something I could definitely give a try! While you are there, check out the awesome give away Carla is having, and tell her I sent you!

Making Money? Never been easier!

Wow.. today was a money making day! I am excited about my purchases today. It was all about Rite Aid! I am truly growing to love that store!


(left out of photo, one box Zantac)

I bought all these things:

2 boxes of 8 count Zantac
5 packages of Duracell batteries
2 tubes of Crest Pro Health toothpaste
2 rolls of Packaging tape
1 bottle of Garnier Fructis Shampoo.

Total paid out of pocket: $21.61 (after coupons)
Total Rebates: $35.54

Total spent after rebates? ZERO. Totral Profit: $13.93!

You can't beat shopping and making money off of it at the same time!!!

Keeping Track.

OK, so I haven't really been keeping track of my savings vs. spending, so starting right now I am going to keep up with everything I spend, ow much it was worth, and total savings. I hope to find out that I am really racking up a lot of savings!

Today, I went to Walgreen's because they had a 15% off coupon for today only. I bought 4 bottles of Starbuck's Frappucino, 4 bubble envelopes, and a bottle of Garnier Fructis Hairspray. After the 15% off and the coupons I had my total bill was $2.26. I then received $2 in Regster Rewards to use on my next purchase! This made the whole thing like spending 26 cents!

Totals: $16.50 worth, paid $2.26, received $2 in RR Grand Total: 26 cents!

I will keep a running tab and at the end of the month will update on the grand totals!

Mega Score!!!

Today's coupons saving: $18 worth for $2.50.

All personal care items... all will be used to make gift baskets for Christmas! Can't beat that can you?

Wednesday Super Doubles Savings!

OK, so today... I scored and BIG! Harris Teeter was having Super Double Coupons, which means they will double coupons up to a face value of 1.98. Woo hoo! I can finally use those $1 and more coupons and make it really worth something!

Off this morning to Harris Teeter I go... while I didn't do super super awesome, I am thoroughly happy. I bought $96 worth of groceries for $32. Not too shabby... sorry, I forgot to take a picture, but I did get several things for "free" after sales and coupons!

This evening I go back... and wow, my score was AMAZING! I brought home $55 in groceries (pre sales and coupons) for $6.06. Taht is right folks SIX dollars!!! I cannot believe it! I am shocked, and now totally hooked on this coupon game! Here's my score this evening:

3 boxes Kellogs Mini wheats

6 cartons of Breyers Yo crunch yogurt (free + money maker after coupons!)

2 bottles of Sunny D Smoothie drink

a box of True DElights granola bars

3 boxes of Blue Bunny Ice cream cone treats (these were FREE after coupons!)

a tube of Aquafresh toothpaste (free after coupon)

Secret deoderant

A bottle of Starbucks Frappucino drink

A jar of Peter Pan Peanut butter

and a bottle of Dawn Dish detergent

Monday Coupons and Savings!

Today I think was not a bad day! I hit several different stores, and got lots of deals and rebates coming my way!

Staples:
Backpack 39.99 -$10 coupon =29.99 I will get 29.99 back in Staples rewards!
Electric Pencil Sharpener 10.00, will get $10 rebate making it FREE!
Pack of Mechanical pencils 2.99, will get $2.99 rebate making it FREE!
PAck of Highlighters 4.99, $4.99 rebate =FREE!
Pack of Gel pens 4.99, $4.99 rebate =FREE

So basically for tax only I got about $63 worth of stuff for basically free!

Then on to Kroger:

Here's a picture of my items:

I got:
4 bags Quaker rice cakes .99 each on sale (no coupons)
5 2 liter bottles of coke .99 each on sale (no coupons)
a 3.5lb bag of cat food 3.99 on sale ($1 coupon)
2 cookie icing squeeze pouches .82 on clearance (no coupons)
1 bag of chex mix 1.99 on sale (50 cent coupon doubled to $1)
1 bag of Cheerios snack mix 1.99 on sale (50 cent coupon doubled to $1)
1 box of All Bran cereal 2.49 on sale ($2 coupon)
2 boxes of Kellog's Cereal bars ($1 off 2 boxes coupon)
1 Bottle of Kraft Ranch dressing 1.69 on sale ($1 coupon)
2 (4) packs of AA Duracell Batteries $3 each on sale (75 centsx 2 coupons)
1 tube of Colgate Total Toothpaste 2.50 on sale ($1 coupon)
1 Tube of Aquafresh Toothpaste 2.50 on sale (75 cent coupon)

So as you can see all my items were on sale, and I used coupons for most. BUT in addition, Kroger had a promotion where if you buy 10 of certain items, you get an immediate $5 off at the register. So you guessed it, I bought 20 and got $10 off.
My total bill for all this was $20.13. My Kroger plus card savings was 19.34, coupons were 20.25. Not too shabby.... $60 worth for $20.

Then on to Target.
Bought 10 bottles of SoBe water for $1 each. Got a $5 Target GC. Cashed out that purchase for $10.
Next purchase...
Always infinity pads 3.99 onm sale ($4 coupon)
6 Kashi individual cereal bowls $1 each on sale (had 6 $1 coupons)
Alexia snacks 2 for $5 on sale (used a 75 cent off 2 Target coupon and 2 $1 off one coupons)
So I knew I was paying with the GC, and wanted to spend the whole $5. I bought then 2 packs of notebook paper for 50 cents each, and 2 (4) packs of spiral notebooks for 60 cents each.
Total bill as 4.95 after coupons, I paid with the GC< and have 5 cents to spare!

Let's Talk Coupons.

Do you use coupons? Are you a coupon Queen? Do you save more at the store than you spend?

I am just getting into using coupons again after a long hiatus. I remember back in the day (ok, about 10 years ago) using coupons all the time, but for some reason, I stopped. Why? I don't know. I like saving money. I really like getting things for free!

While I am nowhere NEAR the coupon guru as some of you ladies out there, I am learning. So What I want here is some of your favorite tips and sites you use for couponing!

Some sites I frequent are:
Frugal Coupon Mom

Coupon Mom

Coupons.com

So please share with me here your favorite sites you use!

Raising my Hand!

Yep... it is official, I am raising my hand to join in the world of SLACKERS!

I am an official card carrying blogging slacker!

I am not even going to say that from here on out I will try to do better, that I will try to blog more. I know it won't happen! I will say that you will see a post from me when you see one, and if per chance I happen to have one say 2 days in a row, please don't have a stroke. I promise not to do anything so silly as let's say keep up blogging everyday, ok?

So here I am. It's Summer time! The kids are both (finally) out of school. We have had a vacation at the beach, and now it is time to just do what I enjoy most about summer. Sleep late, relax, watch movies, and lounge at the pool. It's a hard life, I know, but someone has to do it, right?

This week I intend to get some scrapbooking done as I haven't done any yet this month! June was a geat month, I got 26 (or was it 36??) pages done! I can't remember, but I know I was very productive. Just ordered some new photos from Snapfish.com, and so my inspiration will arrive in full force soon! Come on over to Scrapfreak.com and join us in the Summer Points Challenge Lots of scrapping and great fun to be had!

OK, so time to sign off. I have to watch my favorite show Army Wives, but maybe... just maybe you will see me checking bak in again soon... but don't hold your breath!

A new Haircut!

Timothy finally decided to get his hair cut shorter! I Love it!!! Isn't he handsome?

A couple more Photos...

Another Great photo...

And this one is my baby boy!!! Ain't he cute (all sweaty and everything....)

Long Time No Blog!

OK, not gonna apologize for not blogging lately... I am just gonna jump in here to show you a few pictures I have taken with my new Baby! Yep, that's right, I got a new camera! It is the Olympus SP-565UZ. It is a 10 MP, 20X optical zoom camera... All I can say is wow! I like what I have seen so far!!! Here's a few photos I just took playing around...

The first one is taken with just the zoom.... this is my bleeding heart, I can't wait for it to get bigger and bloom!

This was taken with the macro and zoomed in. (I talk so technical huh? LOL) It is the red bud tree, which actually has purple blooms.

The last 2 were taken on super macro setting. I love these oh so close up shots!!! My poor pitiful hyacinths only half bloomed this year, I am assuming cause of the crazy weather!

Interesting photos..

So... Katie took this photo of her eye...



I thought it would be fun to play around with... and even my old as crap Microsoft Picture it came up with some cool effects!!




Kinda cool huh? Wonser what Katie will think? LOL

Quartet Competition

So this year's competition.. no surprise. The girls took 2nd place again. I am so proud of them all, but they walked away very frustrated! I just think they were gorgeous!!!

Here's Katie before we went...



And here are the girls with their medals...

***WINNERS***

Yes I said Winners, Plural!!


I have had so much fun this past week with the cupcake craze! Thanks everyone for leaving comments!!!

So, I have numbered all the comments (one per person Beffy..LOL) and put you all in a hat. Here is are the winners and their comments:



Casie said...
Those look sooooo good!! I'm still resisting the urge to make some though... must stay away from the cupcakes... must try!!! Hee hee...



And.....ironically......


cakescraps said...
Your cuppyckakes look sooo good! Well, I mainly want the icing. And i'm trying really hard not to just go make a batch and eat it with a spoon right now!


SO Casie, and Carla.. PM me your addresses and when your super duper giftie gets to me, I will mail it to you. It may take awhile, but I want you to know I picked out the most special gift you could imagine... want a peek??? this is just a sneaky peeky...




And just to make it more exciting, cause there is enough for THREE winners, well, I chose one special person to also send the giftie too.. so it'll be a big ole surprise!!!

Adventures in Cupcakes

So, for days I had been wanting a cupcake. Kristin over on Scrapfreak had the cutest cupcakes made for her by her sister for her birthday. This started my obsession. Then the Pioneer Woman site posted the most awesome looking cupcakes ever. That really got my obsession going. So much so that I knew I had to have a cupcake.

The tragedy struck. I received a letter in the mail from my doctor and lo and behold my cholesterol was high. Bye bye cupcakes... you don't belong here.

After that, it seemed everywhere I turned, all I saw were cupcakes, people making cupcakes, eating cupcakes... it was pure torture! All of my friends over on Scrapfreak added to the torture by teasing me. All I saw were threads with my name and a cupcake somewhere there... whether it was avitar cuppy cakes or pictures!


What's a girl to do? Well, I will tell you.... you run to the store and you buy the fixings for cup cakes! That's right, I am not strong... I have no will power. I needed my cuppy cake!!!

It was a joyous process from start to finish... I cheated, I will admit it. I used a box mix for the cup cake itself. But I mean really, they are just as good right?



They came out so goldenly, perfectly, yummily delicious looking!


So, next the icing. Well, after reading the ingredients in the Pioneer Woman's chocolate icing recipe, I knew there could be no other icing to make. I mean come on, did you see the ingredients in that stuff??



I will say this was about the easiest icing ever made... but I do understand now why she made mini cuppy cakes. That stuff has enough sweet in it to send you into a diabetic coma!!! Oh and it thickens really quick, so frost them fast!



In conclusion, I will say THANK YOU to all my FREAKY friends for pushing me to make these yummy cup cakes!!! (and on Friday, when weigh in day rolls around, you owe me...but we'll discuss that later! LOL)

So if you're now wanting a cup cake, I will invite you to come on over and have one... I have a few left!

And for everyone of my friends who leave a comment here... I will add your name to a hat for a nice RAK from me! You have until Friday AM to get your comments in!!!

Some February Pages!

Seems like I am on a roll so far this month! Hope I can keep up and get all my pictures scrapped (that I have printed...) Here are three I did this week!

More pages..

so to fill in the blanks since I have nothing exciting to post, I will share afew more pages I have done recently!

CHA Goodies!

Paper Trunk is having an AWESOME giveaway on their blog... Check it out here... Paper Trunk

New stuff..

Thought I would share 2 pages I have done this week... since I have nothing much to talk about! LOL

Snow Day!

Wow, we haven't had a sno day in AGES! I was so excited to wake up this morning to lots of white fluffy stuff on the ground! As of now, it is still snowing! Here are a few pictures I have taken this morning... I will go out and take more later when it stops snowing!

A few Pages!

So, obviously not much going on for us, I haven't blogged in awhile... Oops... But hey, I did scrap some last week! Here are a few of my current pages!!