June Goals Recap

Two goals- that's all we set for the month of June. Here's how it went:

• Pay 1/2 of remaining debt on car- $2100. Didn't happen. But we gave it all we had. I knew we were shooting really high with that goal, but that's ok. We did better than we have in months, paying a total of $1549 on the car. That just makes our goal for a July payoff loom that much larger for next month...
• Earn $200 from side jobs and by selling things. This goal was met last week at $204. We've had some family related distractions this week that kept us from continuing on for more, but that's just fine.

50% success for the June goals. May money RAIN on us in July- like $2671 worth of rain!!

Not much to write

I'm more in the gear for reading than writing these days. Thus, the sparse blogging. I'm reading all I can and trying to master this couponing stuff on as many levels as I can. I guess when I have things to share, I'll write.

Coupon Madness

Ok, so for about a week and a half now I've seriously taken up my new hobby- couponing. With the help of some super frugal bloggers and their readers who share their deals, I'm getting a ton of free and nearly free items. Some of the ones I frequent are:

• The "Cent"sible Sawyer
• Mommy Making Money
• Money Saving Mom
• Centsible Shopper
• Mommy Snacks

I'm not going to turn this blog into a coupon/super-duper deals blog- these folks do a great job of that already. But since it's so new to me and is actually apart of my journey to financial peace, I'm sharing some of my early bargains with you.
I made the rounds tonight- Walgreens, Target and Walmart. Let me tell you, we've got cereal coming out our ears now. Hegazelle joked that we should invite people over for cereal sometime.

Here's what I scored at Walgreens:

• A rain check for $.99 Band Aids from last week along with a $ .75/off coupon= Band Aids for $ .24.
• General Mills Cereal, 3 for $7 this week plus you get $2 Register Rewards along with 2 $1/off coupons= cereal for $1/box.
• Aquafresh toothpaste, on sale this week for $ .99 paired with a $ .75/off coupon= toothpaste for $ .24.

And my Target deals:

• Kelloggs cereal, 5 for $11 this week plus you get a $5 Target Gift Card for buying 5 boxes, one of the boxes has a "Try It Free" manufacturers rebate, along with 2 $1/off coupons= $ .36/box. SWEET!
• Zyrtec Allergy medicine (children's chewables) are $5.49, paired with a $1/off Target store coupon and a $5.00/off manufacturers coupon= FREE+ $ .51 overage! (Target doesn't usually do overage, but for some reason it worked this time.)
• Clean & Clear trial size cleanser is $ .97 paired with my $2.00/off manufacturers coupon= FREE (no overage, she adjusted the coupon down.)
• Colgate Total Advanced Toothpaste is $2.79, paired with a $1/off Target store coupon and a $1.50/off manufacturers coupon= toothpaste for $ .29.

I had other coupons and other items, but the cashier was so frazzled and totally unaware that it was indeed legit to use a store coupon in conjunction with a manufacturers coupon, that I just took those items out and took the corresponding coupons back. I had seven coupons and it TOTALLY messed her up. Had to call her supervisor over for help and everything. It's sort of a drag to have to inform poorly trained employees of their stores coupon policy. Walmart is MUCH easier when it comes to coupons. Which brings me to my...

Walmart Deals:

• $3.00/off any two Post-it flags- found 2 items for $.97/each= FREE+ $1.06 overage
• V8 Fusion @ $2.98 paired with my $2/off coupon= $.98, but FREE with my overage from the Post-it notes!

So the final tally- I got all these goodies for $5.57! I'm sure you understand now why this has become my new hobby! Let me know if you go for any of these deals...once you try it, I'll bet you can't stop!

8 boxes of dirt cheap cereal



The rest of my freebies and dirt cheap loot

Friday Celebration

Yay! We've crossed the 3K mark! Thanks to $204 in extra income, we were able to pay $712 on the car this week!

High...on free stuff

I'm hooked.

I just left Walmart with Honey Bunches of Oats cereal, Kashi GoLean Vanilla Oatmeal, Purina Cat Chow, Zantac 150 and Gold Bond Lotion. And I paid 7 cents for everything! Thanks to Money Saving Mom, that is.

Last night it was one item: Colgate toothpaste. Today it's five items. The next trip could be scary...

By the way, my subtotal before tax was -64 cents. Taxes got me, so I forked over that 7 cents. Plus the look on the cashier's face was priceless. :-D

Take a look at my loot:

Learning Serious Frugality: Starting With Toothpaste

Ever a student, I am now on a quest to learn how to get free and nearly free stuff using coupons & rebates. I've been researching for a couple weeks now- stay-at-home-mom blogs are a fantastic source for such information.
So yesterday, I decided to do one of these deals. I got Colgate toothpaste for 34 cents at Target. Not a big deal, not even a free deal, but it was a start for me. Use the Target coupon here for $1 off and the manufacturers coupon here for $1.50 off. The 4 oz. Colgate Total is $2.84 at Target (at least where I am- others report it at $2.50!) And the answer is yes, they will take both coupons.
Cool, huh? This is my first taste of "The Drugstore Game", and while it was small compared to the pros, it was fun.

Gazelle Turns Tiger

Hegazelle is an animal. I mean, I think he's a different kind of an animal besides a gazelle. A tiger maybe.
Remember our June goal to earn an extra $200 thru extra jobs this month? Well, thanks mostly to him, we are already at $195. He SCOURS Craigslist hourly when he's home and this weekend he worked 2 side jobs earning a total of $140. He worked his tail end off unloading a moving truck into an upstairs apartment on Sunday afternoon; a time he usually spends napping. Mind you, it was over 100 degrees. He sweat until his clothes were drenched. Saturday morning at 7:45 he was helping another lady pack up her apartment to move. Thursday he helped me mow, edge and pull out over-grown mint at a house around the block.
He works hard during the week, yet he happily works after hours to do what it takes to help pay this car off.

Hegazelle is my rockstar. :-)

Green Living means a green wallet

I want to preface my comments in this post by saying this: I am not convinced that man-made climate change is a reality. In my mind global warming is a theory, and a shaky one at that.

Yet I find "green living" to be appealing on many fronts. Let me explain.

I don't care for waste. Wasted food bothers me most. I try to cook only enough food for a meal, because neither of us are good about eating leftovers. I don't recycle, but that's mostly because I have no cans or bottles at my house. Most of what I throw away is too insignificant to make me a dime at the recyclers. I don't buy individually packaged convenience foods. Most green living gurus tell you to steer clear of individually packaged foods because of the huge amounts of packaging that ends up in our landfills. I understand the plight of our heaping landfills, but this is not the reason I skip convenience foods. I skip them because they're STINKING EXPENSIVE! You're paying for that packaging trash! On top of that, what's in the packaging is not likely real food anyway. I just doubt that people who actually have a grocery budget would buy these things.
I also don't care for wasted energy. I'm a miser with the fuel in my car. I walk places when I can. I practice my hypermiling techniques when I drive. At home, I am the light police, turning off lights when I notice no one is in the lighted room. I turn the thermostat up to 80 when we're at work, and wash our clothes in cold water whenever possible. I do these things not to reduce my carbon footprint, but to reduce my power bill! And shorter showers are appealing to me too: not only because I'll use my water heater less, but because the area I live in IS in a serious drought. "Green" or not, water is precious- pay attention to what you're using it for.
Organic and local are two words I wish I could see on every food item in my house. The reason? Organic= somebody didn't mess with my food. It totally bothers me to buy tomatoes and cucumbers that I have to wash for 5 minutes because they are sprayed with some glossy stuff to make them pretty. And who knows what other weird chemicals were used in the process. Local= likely very little processing/preservatives and duh it didn't have to travel far in a truck burning $5.30/gallon diesel fuel. Usually it tastes better too. Unfortunately that first word, organic, usually costs a bunch more money that I cannot justify spending on my current budget. If it only costs me a little more, I'll pay the extra- especially for produce. I'm a farmer's market junkie. Their produce tastes better and is generally pretty cheap. $ .98/lb. squash at WinCo versus $ 1.50/lb local, super-fresh squash (sometimes $ 1.00/lb.)- the farmer's market will win my cash any day. And I just found a new one the other day that's a mile from my home that sells bread, honey, mushrooms, cheese and flowers in addition to fruits and vegetables.

My point is, in many ways, green living saves my pocket book. And if I eat more organic and local produce than I eat fake meat burgers at McDonalds, it might save my backside from becoming too much larger. And both of those sound great to me.

Fuel: A love/hate relationship

Tuesday evening, I began to consider other options to get to work each day. My supervisor lives close enough that I could walk to her house and car pool with her, but she gets to work a lot earlier than I need to be there. I started researching the public transportation system in my area, and I found that the rates were reasonable and they have a route that is nearly a straight shot to the office. After tossing it around, I decided I should just try it tomorrow. I was almost convinced I could do it until my lunch break today. I decided to walk to the nearest Subway Sandwich joint for a cookie (they have GREAT oatmeal raisin cookies) and I was melting in the heat. And it's not even hot hot yet. The nearest Subway isn't even half way to the closest bus stop! So it's either take a chance on smelling bad and feeling gross or suck it up and burn $4.50/gallon gas in my Volvo every day.
Cycling is not an option. Safe routes with bike lanes are few and I'd still have the sweat factor.
I don't know. For now, I continue to burn money. But if I gather the courage to ride that bus I'll be sure to let you know about it.

Speaking of heat, I have a side job tonight- cutting grass again. More money towards that goal of an extra $200 income for the month of June. May they keep coming.

Back from vacation, but ugly

I returned Sunday from a 3 day, weekend vacation. That vacation included mosquitos, many of which chose to dine on my legs, arms, and face. So here I am at work, the face of the company, looking very much like an adolescent. Yes, I look dandy.

Meanwhile, there's not much to report other than the green piggy's movement on Friday to under $4K. Though this is a great thing, it's not quite moving at the pace necessary to meet our July 31 debt-free goal. However, Hegazelle told me I am not to be discouraged. He says while the piggy may stroll thru June, it could likely sprint thru July! So I am holding on to that hope.

Don't forget!

For the weekend I wanted to remind you of the Gazelle Extra Earnings Challenge.
Get out there and make something happen! Besides, you can win that free audio book of The Total Money Makeover. Can't beat free!

June Goals

We don't have many goals for the month of June, but the ones we have set are huge. This is either called focused intensity or a pipe dream. We'll see.

• Pay 1/2 of remaining debt on car- $2100. Even with serious discipline, I'm not quite sure how this is going to happen. But I'd rather shoot for it and fall a bit short, then to aim only for what I'm certain I'll hit. We're looking forward to surprising ourselves.
• Earn $200 from side jobs and by selling things. No clue what we would sell (since the house is nearly bare) but we're gonna need all the extra income we can get to make that first goal happen. Hegazelle is very diligent about scouring Craigslist for odd jobs we can do. Meanwhile, I'll advertise here: Need your lawn cut? Does your house need a good deep clean? Call the Gazelles today, do not delay!