Couponing....and ON BUDGET!!!!!

I was so lucky to be able to sit down this morning with two great women and discuss some great money-saving couponing tricks of the trade. I was pretty much prepared for my weekly shopping trip before heading there this morning, so I was not able to put my new found ideas to work just yet. However, I did set out this week with a strict goal of staying on budget even though I had to purchase some more expensive items like vitamins, pull ups, meat, and probiotics.

Being an avid Publix shopper, this week threw me for a loop because I decided early on that I was going to do ALL my shopping for this week at Kroger. This was motivated by the 10% off coupon that came in the mail to me last week. With my budget generally being in the range of $80-85 per week, that was an automatic savings of $8 or more. There was no way I was passing up FREE MONEY!!!!

This week, for those that don’t know, Kroger is running a BUY 10 selected items and get an automatic $3 off plus get a $2 off voucher to use on your next shopping trip. Through utilizing my coupons and this store offer, I was able to purchase all 10 of my items for a total of $19.02. These items were: (2) Campbell’s Chunky Soups, (1) large Aluminum Foil, (1) Jar Ragu Spaghetti Sauce, (1) pack of Oscar Meyer Hotdogs, (1) 4-pack Dannon Activia, (2) Degree Deoderants, (1) Purex Detergent, and (1) pack of Overnite Pull-ups.

Kroger is also running a deal this week on Tyson Chicken Breasts for $1.99lb. I was able to plan my meals according to this sale (Southwestern Chicken one night and Chicken with Egg Noodles another) all for a little more than $7.00 for all the meat. Kroger also has Stouffers Family Size dinners on sale this week for $5.99 therefore I scored with my $2 off coupon from last Sunday’s paper and purchased a Veggie Lasagna for this week for only $3.99. Throw in the garlic bread and salad fixings and dinner is on the table for well under $10!

If you are in the market for Vitamins or anything of that nature, then Kroger is the place to go. If you are not loyal to a name brand, you can always secure the Kroger brand Vitamins and Minerals of all sorts for BOGO! This is quite a deal when you think of how much one bottle of Vitamins actually cost. In addition, this week Kroger has Disney/Marvel Gummy Vitamins for kids on sale BOGO. Use the $1 off coupon from last Sunday’s paper…or use both $1 off coupons and secure these for $5.99 or $4.99. That’s awesome for 120 vitamins total!!! I also purchased the Kroger brand probiotics and got myself a 2-month supply for $8.99 because they were also BOGO! Other name brand probiotics can run from $13.99 all the way to $24.99 for only 1-month supply!

All in all this week was a success! I spent a total of $79.69, saved myself $60.46, for a grand total percentage of savings at 44%. My budget this week was $82 so I came in just under budget and also picked up a few items that were not on my original list. Aside from the above mentioned items I also purchased: grapes, bananas, zucchini, squash, a lemon, (2) cream of chicken soup, egg noodles, yellow rice, 12-pack diet pepsi, 2 cans chicken, gallon milk, American cheese slices, frozen garlic bread, salad veggies like pepper and cucumbers, honey graham sticks, and Dove Bar soap for my sweetie!

Can’t wait for next week to put some newly learned tricks to work and we shall see if my percentages improve!
Happy Couponing Everyone!!!!!

Happy Couponing

I almost did it….I was almost able to beat myself at the coupon/money saving game this week….but ultimately I was not able to make it happen. I originally had $86 to spend this week for my family. I set a personal goal to only spend $80 but ended up with a grand total of $86.83. Not too shabby in hindsight since I planned an extra special meal and dessert for Valentine’s Day night and bought the “have to have” red sprinkles to decorate my son’s sugar cookies for his class for Valentine’s Day!

Wouldn’t we all be a little bit richer if items such as fruit, vegetables, dairy, and meats were ever able to be purchased with coupons? My haul this week included strawberries, asparagus, zucchini, green onions, a large bag of baby carrots, a dozen eggs, 1 quart buttermilk, shredded cheese, sour cream, 12 oz of cream cheese, and 1 ½ lbs of top round steak….all of which I had to pay full price for. Fortunately places like Publix usually have great deals on a “fruit of the week” and their meat selection is usually phenomenal…not to mention their awesome buy one get one free deals. I would imagine, even with the discounts I am able to score at Publix, these above mentioned items take up at least ½ of my total cost every single week.

This week I scored some Arnold Country Bread for BOGO and some Breyers Ice Cream as well (hubby will be happy about that!!!!) They did have some other very good BOGO deals but I am married to my budget so I did not deviate and stock my cart with anything extra this week. I was however VERY tempted to utilize my ALL Detergent coupon, which expires in 2 days, but since I am married to my budget I had to let this one go. (side note: for those that don’t know, I am a closet laundry detergent addict….just ask my husband…..we currently possess 12 bottles and I am DYING to add to that!!!!)

Overall this was a rather successful week. Besides the staples that I mentioned earlier and the BOGO deals, I was also able to score a few frozen lunches for myself, snuggle dryer sheets, large bleach, butter sticks, golden mushroom soup, rice, a small thing of merlot (for cooking), heavy whipping cream, spaghetti noodles, paper towels, powdered sugar, white baking chocolate, prosciutto, splenda, coconut, Lays BBQ chips (for FREE!!!), cherry pie filling, a 12 pack of sodas, and those special red decorating sprinkles for one SUPER little man!!!

Total saved this week was $23.00. Could have been better….have had better weeks in the past but with Valentine’s Day coming I focused more on making my little loved ones a really awesome Valentine’s Dinner complete with a Cherry Frosted Red Velvet 3-layer cake (homemade )

And now that my mission for this week is completed, I am off to enjoy a very quiet evening alone watching “Mommy” shows and relaxing!
Happy Couponing Everyone!!!!