Personality

Noah's personality is really starting to come through.

Give him a pen and a piece of paper and he tries to draw or write. He does this on our dry erase board too. Maybe he'll be an artist one day. Of course he'll need to learn to turn the pen around and get the cap off, but it's good enough for now.

And he'll always oblige me in taking a few silly photos.



Until he's had enough...

And that's about how I feel today too!

Books, Tomatoes and Chores

It was a gorgeous weekend. Not too cold, not too warm, a slight breeze...beautiful. It's suppose to drop 10 degrees this week, so lows at night will be about 23 degrees. We spent much of Saturday morning removing anything left in the garden. The kids wanted to help and by help I mean lay on the hammock and have me get them books. The sun was really intense so I also had to put up an umbrella and get Ben sunglasses. His eyes are more sensitive to the sun. They have a rough life.

While they were relaxing, David and I were picking all the tomatoes out of the garden. Fried green tomatoes anyone?

There are easily over 500 tomatoes. They'll probably take until Christmas to ripen up. Oh well they are red and green, they'll fit right in with my Christmas decorations.

I asked Emily to feed the dog on Saturday night while I was doing dishes and David was wrestling with Ben and Noah. She pitched a huge fit. And I decided their time of doing nothing is over. I had chores as a kid and I never had an allowance. We were all expected to pitch in. And that's what my kids are going to start doing. They are now clearing dishes from the table at meal time and they are doing any other chores that I think they can do throughout the day.

They put away the clean laundry. Notice the costume...Walmart clearance...and we are all done with costumes for next year for $8. Even Noah wanted to help. And by help I mean pull every piece of laundry out of the basket and throw it on the floor.

I even had Em do the windows. Sure she needed David to help her a little bit, but as long as they are trying and not complaining about it, I don't care.

And Ben helped me give those 500 tomatoes a bath. Emily also feeds the dog now at night without complaining. I like chores. I like them even better when my kids are helping me do them.

Couponing 101

If you don't need to coupon, this post will probably bore you to tears. Feel free to just keep on going to the next blog. No hard feelings. Or stay and read and maybe I'll convert you.

I'm writing this to help a few people who have commented or e-mailed about what I'm doing. Basically, what I'm doing is saving a boatload of money.

For example, this was today's stop at the grocery store. There are 2 roasts along with 2 steaks, and the rest you can see. The total for this would have been $73. I spent $19.

I got these items free (left to right):
Taco Bell cherry limeade (okay that was after the grocery store trip)
2 Renuzit air freshener
3 Best Life Butter
1 Toothbrush (couldn't resist)
2 Green Giant Broccoli Steamers
1 Quick Cook Pasta
2 cans of Campbell's Chunky Chicken Noodle soup
Seriously, it was all free. Actually, I made 21 cents on the pasta.
The roasts were on BOGO (lingo for buy 1 get 1 free).
The 2 steaks were in the special "manager's reduced" section. Basically, a sale by date of tomorrow, but they looked pretty darn good to me. Especially the price...they were originally $18, I got them for $8.

In the beginning, I spent hours on this. Way too many hours. It was almost overwhelming. Here are the best web sites that I have found to go to, and to the friends that I sent a different link to, scratch that. I found an even better site. But first things first...the coupons.

Sunday Paper
You need to get the Sunday paper. I pay $1.50 a week and I get Wednesday and Sunday home delivery. If you don't want to subscribe to the paper, you can get the coupons other ways. If you have a Starbucks, McDonalds, Wildflower Bread Company, etc nearby, stop by on Sunday afternoon and you'll likely score several inserts that people have left behind in the paper they read. If you are friendly with your neighbors, ask them. You know who gets the paper, so mention that you are couponing and they may offer up their copies. I also just listed an ad on Craigslist asking anybody in my neighborhood if they wouldn't mind recycling them to me. I did this a few hours ago, so I don't know if anyone will offer their coupons. But there has to be some Moms or Grandmas out there who would love to help out a nice family, such as ours, by leaving their inserts at their front door. It can't hurt right? But honestly, I'm doing extremely well on my one copy of coupons. The rest is just gravy.

Clipping Coupons
You don't have to tell me, clipping coupons is a pain in the butt. Who wants to spend hours doing that every Sunday? Not me. So, I go through once and clip the products that I normally use. I put them in a coupon organizer. The rest of the coupons stay as they are. There are two main coupon companies that publish the Sunday inserts, Red Plum and Smart Source. Write the date on the front of each insert, 11/7 or whatever. Put them in a shoe box or file folder.

When you look at the blogs I will list, they will tell you exactly where to find the coupon. Such as RP (for Red Plum) 10/17 (for Oct. 17). All you have to do is go to that insert, find the coupon and cut it out. A lot of times, they will have a link to a printable online coupon.

Now, you don't want to buy a bunch of stuff that you won't use. If it's free, I'll get it no matter what. I can always donate it. But don't be afraid to switch brands. If you buy Wishbone salad dressing normally, but Ken's is a great deal, try it. I'm not brand loyal. I'll go generic in a second for the best deal.

If you are in Arizona, by far the best site I found is Juli at Bargain Believer. She seriously spoon feeds you the information, eat it up!

Nationally, there are several sites I like.
If there is a deal at CVS, you can find it at Simply CVS. One time she even mentioned that when you buy the razor check the package for a free shaving cream coupon. I wouldn't have even noticed because a few thieves had stolen the front coupons, but low and behold in the back was a razor with that exact coupon on it. Nothing gets by Cheryl. Also, CVS is one of the most coupon friendly stores out there.

I don't get to Target as much as I'd like as it's an hour round trip, but I still like Totally Target. Target has tons of online coupons and they allow you to stack them with a manufacturer coupon.

If you are not in Arizona and looking for local grocery store deals, go to Be CentsAble. It's a web page that lists web pages. You can search your state and find what store you go to and you'll find numerous sites to look at.

And I can't not mention The Coupon Mom. I had seen her on Oprah a long time ago and she helped get me motivated and learn the basics. You have to join her site (for free), but she does have some great info and a coupon database. But, it's not as thorough as my local site that I listed above.

You must be organized. I use a small card box that I made tabs for each section out of index cards. I sorted it by the way my Fry's is laid out because I shop there most...produce, bread, baking... After baking, I have several sub categories, cake and cookie mixes, flour & sugar, then the rest just go behind the basic baking tab. It makes it way easier to find what you are looking for if you are organized. I also have tabs at the back for all the different stores I shop...Fry's, Walmart, Safeway, etc. This way if I read about a deal for a store, I'll pull the coupon and put it behind that stores tab. When I'm there, I already know what I'm looking for.

I look at the web page to find the deals for the store I'm going to. I print up any online coupons. I load coupons to my Fry's card. And I'm all set. Always bring your coupon box with you as there is almost always unadvertised specials that you have a coupon for.

Couponing is not for wimps. If it were too simple, everyone would do it. It takes a little work and time and it'll pay off for you.
It certainly has for me.

Pinching Pennies

Another month has come and gone and I'm keeping up with my couponing. I'm trying to cut our previous spending of $935 per month. I was very successful last month, and managed to save almost half on our grocery bill.

I knew this month would be harder. We were going to be on vacation for a week which meant eating out and trips to California's higher priced grocery stores. I tried to bring what I could, but space was limited in our mini van just with the necessitates. I'm still happy with how things turned out. We spent $608 on groceries for the month of October and while in Cali, we only spent $133 on eating out. It was unavoidable at the zoo, sea world, etc. Plus you HAVE to eat a pizza as big as a stove at least once in your life. Hopefully, twice!

I never calculated eating out in the original $935 average as we rarely eat out, maybe once a month. With that being said, I won't count it in this months total, and we saved $327 on groceries.

I'm getting pretty good at stacking sales and coupons and which web sites to visit to find where the deals are and where online coupons are. I'm still learning though. And I think this month may be my best yet. I stocked up on tons of canned goods, pasta and other items at the store yesterday. I spent $43 (which included the Toy Story 3 DVD..I had a coupon) and saved $89 in coupons and bonus buys, etc. I love that.

The biggest lesson I learned is that tons of things are free. And when I say free, I mean free. The item is $1 and you have a coupon that can be double/tripled to $1, so it's free. Or you can get online coupons for free items that cost way more than a dollar. Here is a picture of just some of the items that I got for free last month.

After I took the picture, I realized I forgot the men's body wash, 2 rolls of paper towels, gum...

If you coupon, you never have to buy another toothbrush, toothpaste, dish soap, soap, dental floss... I'm kicking myself that I didn't do this years ago.

My biggest problem now is realizing that I might need to join coupon anonymous. Seriously, it's become an addiction. I guess it's a healthy one, but now that I'm getting better at it I don't think I will need to spend as much time researching everything. Hey, my husband has his new car show. I have my coupons. We're even.

Last night when I showed David more free toothpaste, he told me he was cutting me off. I'm not allowed to buy toothpaste anymore. We have a 3 year supply now. I told him I would continue to buy it if it's free and I'll donate it to a local charity.

But only after I build our stock pile a little more...

Around Our House

Noah is getting into everything. I can't get anything done unless he is undoing something else. If I want to put on make up and brush my teeth in the morning, my bathroom will inevitably look like this.

And when I'm doing dishes, he'll get into something else.

It would be very frustrating if he wasn't so cute.
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Ben watched one of the Spiderman movies the other night with Toby McGuire. We had shown him some of the action parts before, but he wasn't interested in anything else. Now he will watch the entire movie, and he did just that three times yesterday. I know the movies are PG-13, but it's really just for violence and his animated cartoons are just as violent (if not more) as this movie.

I picked him up from school today and we had a conversation that went like this:
Me: You're the best Ben.
Ben: Not everyone thinks I'm cool.
Me: Who doesn't think you're cool?
Ben: That guy at school.
Me: Which guy at school.
Ben: The one on the glider.
Me: (Did he say glider?) You mean the one on the slide?
Ben: No, the one on the glider...outside the window.
Me: There was a guy on a glider outside the window at preschool?
Ben: Yes and he said he was going to hurt me.
Me: What did this guy look like?
Ben: He was green.
Me: (I'm still confused) He's green and he's on a glider?
Ben: (very frustrated that I'm not following along) Yes and he throws pumpkin bombs.
Me: Are you talking about the Green Goblin?
Ben: Yes
Me: You know he is not real, right? That what you watch on TV is pretend?
Ben: No.

And I now understand that the PG13 rating has nothing to do with violence and everything to do with not being old enough to differentiate fact from fiction.
I guess I don't need to wonder what he daydreams about while he is supposed to be learning about the letter B.

And today we will be watching Sesame Street.
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David has never been much of a guys guy. He doesn't drink beer and I had to explain what first and 10 meant during the Super Bowl. He can tell you what channel Food Network is on, but he's never turned on ESPN. Now, he likes the occasional Diamondback game and he gets into playoffs for baseball and hockey, but that's about it.

Out of no where, he sets up the DVR to record some car show, Top Gear, on the BBC. What? What? What? He's watching it every night and laughing while I play scrabble on the laptop. We used to watch Dancing With The Stars together. Who is this guy and what has he done with my husband?

I'm going to overlook the car show, but if he brings home a case of Bud Light that isn't for making chili or marinating brats, I'm going to have to find out what happened to my husband.

She Makes Us Proud

I had my first parent teacher conference last week. We had one in Kindergarten, but David went to it. So there I was sitting in a chair three times too small listening to Emily's teacher say some pretty wonderful things about my daughter. I was so proud of her. She is such a good student and tries her best.

Her report card was pretty darn impressive. I don't think I ever got grades this high and I doubt David did either. I usually got O's and S's, but never 21 O's and 1 S+.

Then the teacher showed me her reading stats. She's already reading 47 words per minute. At this time of year, they want less than 20. By the end of the year, 60.


And all this hard work earned her Student of the Month for August! August! That's awesome!

So, we all went to the assembly yesterday and watched her get recognized for Student of the Month.

And she also got Perfect Attendance for the first quarter. Last year, she was sick at least one day out of every quarter. So far, so good this year.

They called all the names of the kids who had perfect attendance and they stood up. Out of the entire K, 1, 2 and 3 grades, maybe 40 kids stood up.

She is doing so well in school and we are so proud of her.
Great job Em!

Another Halloween

The kids, especially Ben, were more into Halloween this year. And it's always more fun when your kids are super excited. Sunday afternoon we went to an event at our sports arena, lots of candy from local merchants. The kids dressed up as Spiderman, The Last Samurai Baby (or a Teppanyaki cook) and a pirate.




It was nice to do something during the daylight hours as I felt we were all just waiting around so we could go out trick or treating.

Darkness finally came and the kids dressed in their third costume for the weekend. The kids are fans of all the Charlie Brown movies, so they wanted to be ghosts. Since I was anti spending $50 for costumes. I thought this was a perfect solution. I spent $2 for face make up and $2.58 for sheets at the thrift store. Actually, Emily's was a shower cutain so there was lace at the bottom which is perfect for a girl ghost. I even broke out my sewing machine to try to make them fit better (like a big robe) so they wouldn't move around so much. It worked out perfectly.

Noah went as Batbaby again, but I made him a tiny ghost out of scraps. I knew he wouldn't keep it on, but it was fun for a picture.

We had a great time trick or treating with friends around the neighborhood.

When we were finally on our way back home Ben sighed and said, "Another Halloween come and gone."

It was our best Halloween ever....until next year.