shopping lately..

My plan was to get some great Cinco De Mayo deals, but I didn't end up getting anything related to that.

I went to Chick-fil-A and got 3 free chicken strips (because I am a teacher and it is teacher appreciation week), I also got a free chicken sandwich because of a coupon we got at school last month. (I went through the drive through twice because the coupon said one coupon per visit):)

Next I went to Staples. They were out of the label maker and the post-it notes I wanted, but I still got 2 reams of paper ($1 each after rebate), Chocolates (free after rebate), Glitter shapes (.50 each), Pens (free after coupons). So all this was $3.

I went to Target and got a few things. Only one that I care to photograph- mineral eye shadow for .12 after coupon. The other two things I got in the mail today (free samples I signed up for).
This is what I got at Safeway last weekend. I spent $17.81 after coupons. I got $10 Catalina back, and I will submit a rebate for $2.39. So this cost me $5.42.
Oh, and if your bored and want something to read...I LOVED this post from a husband of a frugal shoppers perspective.

Finding prizes...

I needed lots of prizes for a trip I took with middle schoolers. A fellow teacher gave me $50 to get the prizes. I think made the money stretch pretty far!
Highlights include:

Free Mentos Gum from Walgreens this month, Free after RR chapstick, free lip gloss from a few months ago after coupons, free vitamin water from Target, Free Xtremes airheads from King soopers (with doubled coupons), less than $1 bags of candy (Sweetart Jelly beans) and tons of 50% off toys (after Easter) from Walmart and Target.

My favorites are the mango lotion, the polka-dot blanket, light up deep sea squishy fish, and the Nerf gun.

Shopping April 19

I spent 4 hours planning my trips last night and coupon matching. I spent another 15 min. in Safeway organizing transactions. It was worth it.
SAFEWAY:
For being a store that does not double coupons, I still got some great deals.

I got all this for $20!
They have a "buy $30 worth of participating items, get $10 Catalina (like Register Rewards)" promotion going on. Paired with coupons it made a pretty sweet deal. I did 3 transactions (but the limit may be one per card per day- because the in-store paper said that, but the flyer from the paper didn't say that).
I got a lot of my purchase ideas from moneywisemoms.com and the people who linked to her. You can check it out HERE.
When after my first transaction my Catalina's didn't print...I started sweating profusely and questioning the cashier. He didn't have a good answer and questioned my coupons. I continued doing a second transaction to see if it would print. When we discovered the Catalina machine was jammed and putting a lot of ink in one specific spot I was a little more at ease, but wondering what would happen.
After the third transaction, the Catalina's finally spit out correctly.
(and he wrote rain checks for the other ones so I would still get my money).
In the end, I spend $56, and got $36 back in Catalina's SO I got all this for $20!!!!
Highlights of deals before the $10 discounts:
Caprisun- 1.99
.50 Safeway coupon, 1.00 MC = .50/box
Bertoli pasta sauce 2.00 each
$1 coupon, and $.75 coupon, Buy 2 get $2 Catalina deal = 2 for .25
(I ran out of coupons after a while but $1 each is still pretty good.)
Fruitcups $1.50$1.00 MC =.50 each
Yo-Plus $2.50
$1.50 coupon
=$1.00
Sunchips $3.00$1.99 price Safeway coupon = 1.99
Cheerios 18oz. box 2.99
$1.99 price Safeway coupon= 1.99
Smart Balance butter 2.50 each
BOG sticks for free, $1 mc for other one =1.50 for 2
So...that was stressful, but very fun in the long run!

Next stop KING SOOPERS.

Rice cakes .88
$1.00 MC = Free
Angel Soft TP 1.00
.50 MC doubled = Free
Kroger Salsa .88
.65 coupon = .23
Organic drinks 1.99 each
$1.00 coupon for each from an in-store brochure = .99 each
Kroger cooking spray 1.00
Steamfresh veggies .88 each
3-.35 coupons which doubled = .17 each
Colgate Whisp 1.00
.50 coupon which doubled = Free
Organic Avacados .88 a bag (of 2)
Lindt chocolates (clearance) 1.09
$1 MC = .09:)
My favorite berry bagels 1.99
=7.32 + tax

WALGREENS

Soda 3/$11 receive $5 RR, = 3/$6
I did this twice and put it on my gift card ($0 OP) so I could use the RR for my rebate items for this month:
Physicians Formula 40% off
I got one using my $1 coupon, then the cashier gave me a $5 coupon. I ended up with 2 items (will submit for $10 rebate) and will only pay about $1.
Easter ribbon .49 clearance
Hershey's candy 4/$10
$5 rebate on 4
3-$1/1 coupons for Hershey's dark chocolate
=$2 for 4 bags.

Shopping Week of April 5

I hit a bunch of stores on Tuesday because I had between 5-7:30 to waste in town before my VB game.
TARGET

Vitamin water $1
MC $1
=Free
Fruit snacks $1.58
$1 Target coupon
= .58
Hershey's Bliss 2.99
$1 Target coupon
$1 MC
=.99
Sinus pills (I needed these right then because I had already used my backups.)
4.21 (price drop)
$1 MC
=$3.21

WALGREENS

Most of the deals I got weren't advertised in the flyer that my part of the country recieved, but the deals were still the same as other parts of the country (I guess that means they are un-advertised)...which means the items are in stock!
Playtex $3.99
$1 Easy saver coupon
$1 MC
=$1.99
Oust surface and air cleaner $2.99
$2 MC
$1 Wags rebate
= Free
Edge shave gel $2.99
$3 RR
=Free
Mentos Gum 2/$2
2- $1 coupon
=Free
Shick razors $6.99
BOGO MC (-6.99)
$3 MC
$2 easy saver coupon (took $2 off each razor)
=Free
Thingamagig candy .44
=.44 each (filler for my RR)
A GREAT DEAL!

SAFEWAY

Strawberries 4.88 (for 4lbs!!)
Nestle Chocolate chips 1.99
$.75 MC
=$1.25
Greeting cards .99 each
BOGO greeting card coupon
Buy 3 get a free duck beanie-baby
= $1.88 for 3 cards and a beanie-baby:)

WALMART

Halls cough drops $1.18
MC coupon for FREE item
=free
Doublemint gum $.98
MC coupon for FREE item
=free
Kotex liners .99
$.75 MC
=.25 each
AND...my staples...AWESOME CREAM CHEESE $2.18, and Herpicine L m(SPF 30) $4.88

If you want to know where I find my deals, Target coupons, and other printable coupons or senarios, check out the blog-roll on the side of my blog. Money Saving Mom, Hip2Save and other sites do a GREAT job keeping me updated.

Deals this week

This week I got some great stuff at Walgreens.

I used previous RR to buy the Skintimate (2.99 and received $3RR) and the Chapstick (1.99 and received $2 RR).
I got the basket on clearance and used my Skintimate RR. I got all the Mentos Gum free (and I have a bunch more coupons to use!). I got the candles free because I printed off coupons from the Glade site when they were available and combined them with Easy Saver coupons. Can you believe they were originally 5.99?! Chocolate bar was filler for using RR's. Everything was free but the basket and the chocolate bar!

I also went to the grocery store in under 30 min. (WOW) I got 2 containers of coffemate for .75 each, a container of cottage cheese for free, and shredded and block Kraft cheese for 1.19 each.

Then I came home and got the mail. Look what I got:
Free Samples I signed up for: Walmart formula, All-bran lemonade, Dunkin Donuts Coffee, Fridge magnet menu planner, and perfume.
The Shape magazine I get for free, and the Memory Makers magazine was a birthday present.

Wags and Safeway March 23

More shopping today.
Today I went to Walgreens to use up my Register Rewards.
I spent some money, but I got some great things!

Shick Quattro razor for woman 8.99$4 easy saver coupon
$4 MC
=.99 (plus I got free headphones with it)
Fusion Gamer razor 8.99
$4 MC
$4 RR
=.99
Children's NyQuil 1.39$1.50 MC
=overage
Ritz 2/$3
$2/2 MC
= .50 each
DoubleMint gum 1.29
Free coupon (up t 1.19)
=.10
Kissables .22 clearance
Excedrin 5.99
$4 easy saver coupon
$1 MC
=.99
Advanced Memory Formula 19.99FAR item (+10% bonus)
=1.99 overage

Safeway
Safeway is running the promotion spend $25 in frozen foods, get at $10 RR for your next purchase of frozen foods.
They were also running a deal where if you buy 10 items from select groups, you get $5 off.
I also had a $5 off any $50 purchase or more coupon. (Which I handed to them first, and then took off all my other coupons)
I used a rain check for John's favorite (buffalo chicken strips) to get a super deal on those.
Here are a few of my favorites:

Sparkle after promotion .75
.75 MC
=free
Angel soft TP AP .75
.50 MC
=free
Bertoli sauce AP- 1.50
$1 MC
=.50
Crystal Light and 100 calorie packs 1.50 each after promotion
$2.00 off coupon for buying both
=.50 each
Pasta .75 after promotion
Cheerios 1.50 after promotion
$1.00/2 coupon
=$1.00 each
Ranch dressing AP 1.50
$1.50 coupon right next to it!!!
=2 for free
I also got Steamfresh meals for Two 4.99
(with $10 off of $25 that means 40% off)-1.99
-2.00 MC
=1.00each bag!
John and I had one for lunch. Yummy.

Wags March 15

This week was pretty fun. I sat down in the pharmacy area to finish clipping a few coupons and sort my transactions. I also picked up the "Diabetes and You" magazine for free, and used the reach $3/3 coupon from inside. It was very confusing trying to used my $10 RR (because that means I have to have $10 worth of stuff after coupons. It was a little better because the Reach/Listerine deal spit out a $6 one.



Basically I came in with $31 in RR,
and left with $22 in RR.
So in the end this did cost me $9 (and two dollars on my gift card- I think a lot of it was tax.) I did get a lot of stuff though.

6 boxes of Kleenexes (.87 with in-add coupon, and 2- .50/3 coupons)

Sweetart Jelly beans 2/$3 (2- $1.00/2 printable coupons)= $1.00 each

Vanity Fair napkins .75 clearance (.50 coupon)= .25

6 dove body bars 1.59 (25%off= 1.19 each)
2 dove deodorant 2.59 (25%off= 1.94 each) 2- $1.00 coupons = 8.98 and received $10 RR. I thought it was going to be buy 8 dove items get $8 RR, but I was very happy with $10RR:)

2 bags M&M's 2/$5 ($1/2 easy saver, $1/2 MC) = $1.50 each

Hershey's Thingamagig Bars. 2/$1 I threw these in as fillers, because I needed the money to equal more so I could use my RR. I tried one this afternoon...and they are delicious! PB and Crisp.

Dentyne Ice .60 clearance (.75 MC) =.15 overage

3 Reach floss, 5 Reach Toothbrush, 1 bottle Listerine 3/$9 sale
Used numerous $1 coupons from today, from 2/8 and $3/3 from Diabetes and You magazine.
Did 3 different transactions, received $6 RR from each one. =all for free and .50 overage on one transactions because I had 1.50 off Listerine coupon.

Aquafresh toothbrushes $1.09 on clearance (used 3- $1.00 MC) = .09 each

I was running low on "give-away" toothbrushes in my stockpile, but I am good after today!

Colgate Total 4oz. .87 clearance (used 2- $1.50 and 1- .75 coupon) = $1.14 overage (and none of the coupons beeped!) Of course I could have tried to combine it with the easy saver coupon of $2.50 off each one, but I decided not to because of the hassle it would cause.

Sambucol $10.00 ($10 easy saver coupon) They would not take my $4 MC. Apparently they posted something in the employee lounge for them to not take those coupons. That's ok.

Other fillers: Dry idea 2.29 clearance (2.00 printable coupon)
Curel lotion 3.69 clearance ($2 easy saver coupon, $1 MC) = $.69