Year-to-date

Here is a cute little bit I put together to show yall the savings I have racked up at Walgreens and CVS this year. I'm quite proud of myself!

More Deals!

Hello, lovelies!

It has been a very productive week for me in the money-saving business. I have learned to plan my purchases ahead of time and I can maximize my merchandise and minimize my out-of-pocket costs. My Hubs told me that if we're saving so much money, we should be able to afford that new pistol he has been drooling over. I simply tell him we're just getting a whole lot more stuff than we would have in the past. I wouldn't really spend over $100 on cleaning supplies. I just get such great deals, I can stockpile them for future use. Which brings us to this weeks' purchases:

Here is my grand total for the week:

Merchandise total: $104.47

I actually spent $16.47

Which gives me a total savings of $88.00!!!!

PLUS...I have $5 CVS ExtraCare Bucks AND $7 in Walgreens Register Rewards left to spend, so it's like I only spent $4.47.

How great is that?!?

What kind of deals have you had lately?

More Cool Sites

I have been on a coupon frenzy yall! CVS and Walgreens are now 3-4 times a week trips for me. Since I’ve started bringing lunch to work, I have an hour to run and check on some deals.
I forgot two very important websites in my last post. Both of these have advance scans of the next two weeks’ sales papers. It’s a cool tool when planning out your deals:

I Heart Wags
I Heart CVS

Money Savers

Yesterday I posted about my AWESOME Walgreens and CVS deals. Most of my intel comes from a short list of bloggers who are sweet enough to do the hard work for me. I have had two requests for these sites so here goes:

Money Wise Moms
STL Mommy
Printable Coupons
It's Hip to Save
Freebies 4 Mom
Bargain Briana
Coupon Cravings
Deal Seeking Mom
Common Sense with Money

Good luck! Tell me about YOUR deals!

Diaper Cake

A coworker of mine is about to be an aunt in July! She is so excited and has been on a baby supply buying spree. She plans on keeping her nephew a lot, and she doesn't have children of her own yet, so she has the advantage of getting a nursery fixed up without being pregnant. Today, our coworkers are hosting a diaper shower for the mommy-to-be and I volunteered to make a diaper cake.

My coworker bought a jumbo pack of Huggies from Sam's Club and I went straight to work. I only used 27 diapers because they were a size 3. If you use newborn diapers, you will obviously use more.

Here are my pictures. The process is pretty self-expanatory, but if you need instructions, YouTube has a great video here.

Super Saver

Yesterday I made my first Walgreen’s/CVS savings run. I have been reading other blogs like It’s Hip to Save and Money Saving Mom. They both have really good tutorials to take the best advantage of these stores’ deals. Here is my list of goodies:

One Box of Raisin Bran
One Airwick Freshmatic Mini- Originally $9.99, marked down to $4.99--I had a $4 off coupon so I got this for only $0.99!
Two tubes of Colgate Total Whitening Toothpaste
Two Axe Shower Gels
One pack of ponytail holders
Six Degree deodorants for me
One Old Spice deodorant for hubbs
Two boxes of Excedrin Extra Strength Gelcaps
Two Olay Thermal Pedicure Scrubs
One pair of basic black flip flops
-and-
SEVEN(!!!) Glade Fragrance Candles (McIntosh Apple is great! Each candle was originally $5.99, but I had $2 off coupons and Walgreens had a $2 off coupon in their monthly Super Saver catalog, making these only $1.99 each!)

In all, I spent just over $39. The candles alone were $42+tax without the sale, so I came out way ahead. My official savings was $103.08. To boot, I still have $6 in Walgreens Register Rewards to spend on my next purchase. My mama (the original queen of saving!) would be proud of me!

Easter Fun

I love Easter for many reasons and one of the biggest is the explosion of color everywhere!

Here are some of the cutest ducklings I have ever seen. A friend posted pictures of some her little girls got, and I still haven't figured out how they get that color! When Hubbs and I move out to the country and have our own pond, you can be sure we will have some psychedelic ducks!

Last night, my sisters stopped by the house with three dozen eggs and asked me to help dye eggs, but Hubbs and I were heading out the door to go to the grocery store. Here are their masterpieces. (Yes, we are 22, 19, and 18 and still dye eggs)

I came across an idea online and decided to run with it. I made baby bird nests for dessert for Sunday dinner. First melt white chocolate chips (1/2 bag) with maybe a teaspoon of Crisco (results in a smoother texture) on a double boiler.

You pretty much have to stir constantly to avoid overcooking your chocolate. If you do this, your chocolate could burn or crystallize.

Mix the melted chocolate in with 1/2 bag coconut that has been lightly tinted with food coloring.

While still warm, mix the coconut and chocolate together.

Press into well-greased muffin tins and form small nests. Let dry for at least 20 to 30 minutes.

Lift nest forms out of tins and place on wax paper to dry more.

Drop a few "eggs" AKA jelly beans into each nest and let dry.

Enjoy your bright spring colored Easter nests!

Well, chickadees, I am out for the weekend! Have a great Easter and remember to be safe!

Catching up

Wow, blog readers! I have been really busy the past two weeks and didn't have any time to post. Here is my two-week wrap up of all of the fun things I have done lately:

The fourth weekend in March (like always!) was the Fireant Festival in Ashburn, my lovely little hometown. Unfortunately for the festival attendees and fortunately for the farmers, God decided to put a little damper (haha) on the drought we've experienced in south west Georgia. Here is what my little town looked like:

Here are a few pictures of what we actually got to do at the FAF:

This is my dad (left) and my old high school guidance counciler (YIKES!) who played James Brown in the annual lip sync contest...last year he was Tina Turner and did Proud Mary.

Here I am handing out medals for the 5K run we hosted. I'm on the Child Abuse Prevention Council and this is a big fundraiser for us.

I worked the booth at the health fair for child abuse awareness and this is our adorable board, if I do say so myself.

While I was doing that, my sweet Hubbs got his vitals checked.

Here he is again, this time with my wig. I was Chubby Checker and I did the Twist! I live with a crazy person. Though, I guess he could say the same thing...

Hubbs' nickname in high school was Goober, so when he fixed up an old bike for a bike safety day in his paramedic class, I gave him some tricked out stickers made on my Cricut. **Notice the Talladegah Nights reference**

And finally, we made lots of noms this month. We have star shaped brownies, strawberry cobbler, and late-night walnut chocolate chip cookies. *We need to start back walking*

We also have a Strawberry Cookoff each year that my mama's in charge of. This year, she was at a conference in Savannah when we needed to tape the promo for our local news channel and she handed the responsibility to me. I took the easy peasy way out and made chocolate covered strawberries. They were as good as they looked, if not better!

Also, please know that after a week and a half of almost solid rain, the Great Dane and the cat start to terrorize each other. Either that, or the Great Dane becomes a trash eating fool...scattering yesterday's leftovers all over your kitchen.