Third Frugal Week of February

Monday and Tuesday were Winter Break from school, so we had those days free this week. I was able to work Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, so I am grateful for that.

Sunday afternoon I had a radiator hose in my car to start leaking on me. My Dad fixed it for me, but said I needed to get a new hose to replace the worn out one. I was able to get that fixed on Tuesday as well as have the oil changed in my car. $171 plus change for the car repair. 

On Saturday I went shopping to pick up a few deals.

First stop was Publix where the Keebler Club crackers were on sale for buy one get one free. This was a great time to cash in some of my Kellogg's Family Rewards points. I was able to use my points to print off four coupons for $1.50 off one box. I ended up paying 40¢ for each box. It really pays to enter these codes into the website for money saving coupons. 

Next, I combined a manufacturer coupon with a Publix store coupon and scored two loaves of bread for 50¢ each. 

Next, I was able to get 4 containers of Tropicana Orange Juice for free. It was a buy one get one free sale and I had two coupons for buy one get one free, which I printed online. 

My daughter did a deal on Sundown vitamins and ended up earning money that went towards our other purchases. 

Other items at Publix included 4 boxes of Krave cereal for $1.00 each and 2 boxes of the new Mueller's Hidden Veggie spaghetti for 24¢ each after a buy one get one free sale and a manufacture coupon, 6 cans of Progresso soup for 25¢ after sale and coupon, one free Snickers candy bar with a free coupon won on Facebook, and free alcohol, baby cereal (donating to a friend), cocoa butter, and hand sanitizer.

The Iams canned cat food you see in the photo came from Target. There are $2.00 off 3 cans coupons online and I printed two of them. The cat food was 57¢, so the overage went towards my other purchases. 

I went to Target to pick up a deal on Grands biscuits. They were on sale for $1.25 each, and there were manufacturers coupons for $1.00 off a purchase of three. Target also has a coupon online for $2.00 off three, so I combined those and paid 25¢ each for 6 cans. 

My daughter went to the Dollar Tree with makeup coupons. She came out with these two items and only had to pay 10¢ each for the sales tax. 

I went to Food Lion because they have the 4 roll packages of Angel Soft and I had a buy one 12 pack, get a free 4 pack coupon. The 12 pack was $5.99 and I had a $2.00 off coupon for that, which they let us combine. (We asked beforehand). So, I paid $3.99 plus tax for 16 rolls, which is 25¢ a roll. These were for double rolls too. 

I went to Bi-Lo to pick up English muffins. They were on sale buy one get one free and I had 55¢ coupons that doubled, so I paid 98¢ each for 4 packs of English muffins. While I was there I stumbled across a display for Scotch brand scissors. They were $1.69 and there were $1.00 off coupons located beside them, so I picked up a pair for 69¢ plus tax. 

All breakfasts, lunches, and dinners came from home this week as usual. 

Our Dinners this week were: 

Monday: Baked Potatoes, Steamed Broccoli
Tuesday: Baked Spaghetti, Broccoli
Wednesday:Salisbury Steak, Pan Fried Baked Potatoes, Peas & Carrots
Thursday: Fish, Oven Fried Potatoes, Brussel Sprouts
Friday: Meatballs & Gravy, Mashed Potatoes, Broccoli 
Saturday: Grilled Chicken Salads
Sunday: Baked Chicken, Broccoli, Teriyaki Rice, Cole Slaw

We rented Bad Grandpa from Redbox using a free rental code. There were a couple of funny parts, but I would not recommend the movie to anyone. How can they take such a cute idea and make it dirty? Just like the movie Step Brothers. They had a good idea, but they have to make it dirty, which just ruins the film for me and my family felt the same way. 

How has your week been? Frugal or not, we would love to read about it in the comment section. :)

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Affordable Hair Cuts

I currently have in my possession, three five dollar gift cards from Great Clips. They were given to me when I took my Mom, daughter and myself to get haircuts a couple of months ago. 

They were having a grand opening sale and haircuts were priced at $4.99. I paid for three haircuts and received three gift cards, therefore it was like receiving those haircuts for free. 

I also have a postcard they sent in the mail for a haircut for $6.99. The postcard expired on January 26th, but with all the bad weather I just haven't been able to get out for a haircut. 

Today my daughter and I went and finally got our overdue haircuts and used a couple of these rewards.

I asked the cashier if we could still use the postcard and she said yes. Yay! She also let us use one of the $5.00 gift cards.

Haircuts at Great Clips have went up to $12.oo each now. 

Haircut #1 was $12.00 minus the $5.00 card, $7.00. 

Haircut #2 was $6.99.

Total for both haircuts was $13.99 plus tip. 

Make sure to sign up for the mailing list on the Great Clips website and like them on Facebook to get in on these good deals. Right now they are selling future haircuts for $9.00 each. They usually do this every February. You can buy as many haircuts as you want and they put them all on a card and you keep the card all year long and use as needed. 

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Second Frugal Week of February

What a week we had here! School was called off for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday due to the winter mix of weather here. We were/are on Winter Break Friday, Monday and Tuesday, so no school here for over a week. I missed out on several days of working as a result. 

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday were no spending any money days.

Thursday was bill paying day and all bills were paid online to save on postage. 

Friday was spent in town doing our big monthly stock up at the grocery stores. I spent a total of $202.77, used 82 coupons, which saved me $116.40 and does not even include the $50.00 savings at Food Lion for the sale on Powerades.  

Here is a breakdown of items we bought:

Family Dollar

Suave Shampoo - Same deal as last week. I had a $1.00 of coupon, so I only had to pay the 10¢ sales tax. 

Cooke's

Cheese, frozen dinners, cat treats, and 40 pounds of potatoes ($7.98 or 20¢ a pound). I found 14 bags of cat treats in the Crash & Burn cart for 90¢ each, and I had coupons for them, so I paid 40¢ each for them. 

Save a Lot

Eggs are/were on sale this week for 99¢ a dozen, so we stocked up and bought 8 cartons. We also used a $1.00 off coupon to score a free bag of salad. 

Aldi

5 bags of onions

Food Lion

I went on Friday to score the deal on Powerades. And then on Saturday I found some coupons to use, so after my daughter's volunteer hours were done, we went back to get more. In the end I bought 75 Powerades for my pantry for 20¢ each. This definitely beats her wanting to stop at the gas station on the way to school in the morning for a drink for $1.89. There are only 68 school days left this year, so she is all set. 

I also scored 16 FREE cans of Campbell's chicken noodle soup. As I mentioned in this post the kiosk was printing out coupons for $1.00 off 2 Campbell's soup and they had them on sale for 50¢ each. Customers are only allowed to print one coupon sheet per day, but people tend to abandon these coupon sheets in their cart, so we picked up several that way. We also bought cereal, soup, diced tomatoes, and honey mustard here. 

Bi-Lo

Bi-Lo had their awesome cereal deal again this week. You buy 6 boxes of cereal and get a free gallon of orange juice. We had numerous coupons for the cereal and at least one of them was buy one get one free. We bought two of these deals and combined with the cereal deal at Food Lion, we ended up with 22 boxes of cereal. My family has gone through a lot of cereal this winter for some reason, so I was very glad to be able to purchase all of these.  

I also bought sugar, bagels, shampoo, and yogurt here. 

Publix

Some of my greatest deals came from Publix on this shopping trip. I used to shop at Walmart so much, but in the last two years I've realized that I can find better prices at the grocery stores and when I combine them with sales and the double coupons that Publix offers, I buy very little from Walmart now. 

Items here included cream cheese, oranges, fish, tea bags, Knorr rice packages, Kotex, Stayfree, ham, olives, beans, sour cream, salt, rice, butter, yogurt, tartar sauce, Alleve, peas and carrots, and chocolate milk (had coupons!).

I bought 18 bags of the Knorr rice for 14¢ each after sale and coupons.

Four boxes of Lipton tea bags were $1.12 each after sale and coupons. 

Four boxes of 40 count Alleve were 49¢ each after sale and coupons. 

Walmart sells my brand of Stayfree for $4.97, which I buy regularly. Publix sells the same package for $4.09, but with coupons I was able to get two bags for $4.09, which blows Walmart's price out of the water! 

It was a terrific shopping day and these are the things we got that were completely free: 

In the end I bought $369.17 worth of groceries for $202.77 and now the bulk of my grocery shopping is done for the month. All I will need to buy is milk and bread and some fresh produce. 

Other things we did this week to save money include:

Tuesday I entered My Coke Rewards points into my computer. A chore I dislike a great deal, but I do it for the free diet coke 12 packs for my Mother who is on a limited budget.

On Saturday we both had our hair cut and used a coupon for that as well. 

We rented a movie, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, with a free rental code from Redbox. CouponDad.net regularly has free rental codes on his blog. 

Breakfasts this week consisted of oatmeal, leftovers, scrambled eggs and toast, toast with butter and jelly, cream cheese with bagels, and peanut butter & jelly sandwiches.

Dinners were:

Monday: Baked Potatoes stuffed with Vegetable Chili
Tuesday: Hot Dogs & Tator Tots
Wednesday: Salisbury Steak, Beefy Mushroom Barley, Corn
Thursday: Macaroni & Cheese, Broccoli
Friday: Homemade Pizza
Saturday: Grilled Chicken, Mexican Rice, Steamed Carrots
Sunday: Pinto Beans, Collard Greens, Cornbread

That's our our week went, how was your week?

How did you save money in your home this week?

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Good Deal Alert: Onions

Aldi has onions on sale this week in the 3 pound bag for 99¢. 

The last time I stocked up on this sale was back on October 22, 2013. 

You can read my post about it here. 

I have one onion left from that sale, so the timing for this sale is perfect for me. 

I bought 5 pounds this time hoping to make it to the next sale on onions. 

In my last post, reader Mama P asked me the following question,

"Does putting them in those pantyhose knots really extend the life of the onion? I'm so tired of my onions going bad so quickly."

At that time, I told her this was the first time I was trying this storage solution and that I would have to get back to her and let her know. 

Out of all 28 onions, I did have one with a bad spot inside of it, but I cut around it and used the onion anyway. 

I think having the onions exposed to the air around them helped to preserve each one until I was able to use it. In the past I've had an onion go bad and then the ones next to it go bad as well because they were right next to it. I did not experience that with this batch of onions, so I will definitely be storing my onions this way in the future. 

While I was shopping it seemed like everyone had onions in their shopping cart, lol. This is a great deal and hopefully you'll be able to get in on this one. :)

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Good Deal Alert ~ Food Lion Powerade Sale

Food Lion has a great deal on Powerade this week. 

No coupon required. 

Food Lion is running their "MVP Gold Medal Savings" promotion right now. When you buy 10 participating products, you receive $5.00 off instantly, or when you buy 15 participating products, you receive $10.00 off instantly. 

The 32 ounce Powerades are on sale for 89¢.

When you buy 15, they take $10.00 off the price, so each one is 22¢. 

What a sweet deal! 

We did the deal twice and now have 30 in our pantry. 

The Powerade website does have this coupon for 50¢ off too. We didn't have the coupon to use it in time. 

One thing to do when you go into Food Lion is swipe your MVP card in the kiosk when you enter the store and you can print out a page of coupons. 

One of the coupons we received today was $1.00 off two cans of Campbell's soup. While I was shopping I found a section of chicken noodle and tomato soup for 50¢ each, so I was able to get two cans of soup for free with my coupon. 

My daughter also has a Food Lion card, so she swiped hers and was able to get the free soup as well. You can see all four cans here, which we were able to get free. In fact, everything in the photo was free today with coupons. 

We spent most of the day Friday in town grocery shopping and getting some good deals. I'll be posting them as time permits in the next few days. :)

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Winter Storm February 2014

We woke up to 7 inches of snow on the ground this morning. 

We lost power for about 4 and 1/2 hours, so not bad at all. 

Here are a few pictures...

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Winter Storm Warning

We are all geared up here as we prepare for another major winter storm here in Tennessee. We have filled every vessel we could find in the house with water including the bathtub and kitchen sink just in case we lose power. We are on a well here and if we lose power we also lose the ability to pump water into the house. We also have water storage containers on the back porch filled with water. 

Law enforcement and other emergency officials are asking people to stay off the roadways if at all possible. They are advising people to: 

• Make sure your cell phone is fully charged, keep it and the charger with you 
• Check your car's battery to make sure it is properly charged
• Fill your fuel tank before the winter storm arrives
• Check your tire pressure, make sure tires are properly inflated
• Check your car's spare tire and make sure it is in the trunk and in good condition
• Dress warm and keep additional blankets, food, and water in your vehicle. Consider adding an ice scraper, extra blanket, sand for traction and jumper cables.

If you do find yourself stranded here are some tips to try and prolong the life of your cell phone battery.

• Turn the phone off; only turn it on when you are expecting or making a call
• If in an area with no reception, turn off the phone to prevent it from constantly searching for service (even with automatic power save features, it can take up to 30 minutes and it is depleting your battery)
• Limit use of the vibrate function on your phone; use a ring tone as it uses less of the battery's power
• Don't use extra features such as the Internet, WIFI, GPS, camera phone, and hands-free device; additionally limit use of the back light or turn it off to prolong the battery

Before heading out you can check the road conditions by calling the following numbers.

• AL  888-588-2848  WWW.DOT.STATE.AL.US
• GA  888-635-8287  OR 511 IF IN GEORGIA
• NC 877-511-4662
• TN 877-244-0065 OR 511 IF IN TENNESSEE

For those of you staying home during this winter storm you should make sure you have the following items available should the power go out.

• Flashlights
• Radio
• Blankets
• If you lose power do not use alternate power and heating sources in the home or garage that may produce carbon monoxide. 

Keep an eye on your neighbors especially the elderly.

Please keep in mind that during weather events like the one we are expecting will delay response times to emergency calls. In order to reach some locations EMS will rely on other response agencies for assistance with response and manpower.

Again emergency officials ask that you not venture out unless absolutely necessary.  

Please be safe out there! 

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Mock Tuna Salad

Mock Tuna Salad is a recipe that I first tried out last fall after I started on a plant based diet last year. This recipe is very simple, affordable, easy to make, and tastes great. 

What I did was to take a one pound bag of garbanzo beans and let them soak overnight. You can used canned garbanzo beans, but they will cost more money and you will not have the advantage of being able to soak them overnight as they are already cooked. 

In the morning, I placed the beans in the crock pot and covered them with water and set the crock pot on high to cook until lunchtime. After they were done cooking, I drained them and ran cold water over them to cool them off some. 

After that I put them into my food processor and using the pulse button, I chopped them up just a little bit. I wanted them to remain chunky somewhat and not be the consistency of hummus. 

After that I add whatever items I like in my tuna salad, which may be different for you. I like sweet pickle relish and mayonnaise in my tuna salad, although I have made it without the mayonnaise as well. You can add whatever you like to yours. I would add celery if I had any on hand. 

I've eaten this as a sandwich on toasted and untoasted bread, as well as crackers, or just by itself. It would also be a good topping for a salad. 

I am able to purchase a one pound bag of garbanzo beans for under $1.50, so this makes a very affordable option for lunch. Once the beans are cooked and the other ingredients added, I had an ordinary mixing bowl full of "tuna" salad. Enough to last us for a week of lunches, which is much more affordable than tuna and healthier as well. 

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

First Frugal Week of February

Thankfully the ice and snowy weather has moved out of our area this week and I was able to work every day this week. I'm very thankful for that. 

All drinks, snacks, breakfasts, lunches, and dinners came from home this week, so no money spent on any food out of the house. 

My daughter took stove popped popcorn with her to school one day this week as a snack. She also took a bag for one of her friends, a 16 year old girl. Her friend loved the popcorn and had never had popcorn popped on the stove and had no idea you could buy popcorn or make it on the stove this way. Can you imagine that?

Dinners this week included:

Monday: Pork Stew (Leftovers from Sunday's Pork Roast)
Tuesday:  Vegetable Stir Fry & Rice
Wednesday: Spaghetti & Garlic Bread
Thursday: Vegetable Soup & Cornbread
Friday: Soup Beans & Cornbread
Saturday: Homemade Soup
Sunday: Vegetable Chili

On Saturday, after my daughter's weekly volunteer duties, we ran a couple of errands. 

First errand was to the Dollar Tree for another loaf of bread for 54¢ using the last of our 55¢ off coupons. 

Next errand was to Walgreen's for their buy one get one free Lady Speed Stick Sale. We had buy one get one free coupons, so we were able to pick up 8 Lady Speed Sticks after tax for 17¢ each. 

We also stopped at the Family Dollar store for a bottle of Suave Shampoo, on sale for $1.00 with a $1.00 off coupon, and only paying the 10¢ sales tax. 

I also spent $25 on gas this week, but other than these few things we spent no money otherwise, so a very frugal week here. 

How were things in your home this week?

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

My Frugal Week

I went to IGA on Monday morning to take advantage of a meat sale. I bought 10 pounds of ground beef, which was on sale for $1.99 a pound. This was not the ground chuck that I used to purchase. This was ground beef at 73/27 mixture. I made sure I drained this meat well after cooking. 

I don't know if we will ever be able to purchase ground chuck at a decent price again unless I find it on markdown, which does happen from time to time. 

I also bought a package of 3 sirloin pork roasts, which were also on sale for $1.99 a pound. There were three nice sized roasts in the package and I cut each one of them in half, which is plenty for the three of us for one meal. I put 4 of them in the freezer, saved one to cook for dinner, and gave one to my Dad. 

On Tuesday we woke up to snow in the forecast, but school was still open, which turned out to be a mistake. I dropped my daughter off at school only to turn around 2 hours later and pick her up and had a rough drive there and back. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday turned out to be snow days and unfortunately, I missed two days of working as a result. 


All breakfasts, lunches, and dinners were eaten at or came from home this week. 

Dinners this week included:

Monday: Tacos with all the fixings
Tuesday: Spaghetti & Garlic Bread
Wednesday: Meatloaf, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans & Onions
Thursday: Chili
Friday: Chili Tacos
Saturday: LaChoy Beef Chow Mein, Rice, Corn
Sunday: Pork Roast, Oven Roasted Potatoes & Carrots

Other things done to save money include:

1. Read a book for free on my tablet Kindle.
2. Paid bills online to save on postage costs.
3. Entered codes at Kellogg's Family Rewards
4. Entered codes at My Perks for Purina Cat Chow
5. Entered codes at My Coke Rewards
6. Watched Port Charles for free on You Tube during free Internet time. 
7. Stayed home four days this week and spent no money. 

Things we do every week to save money:

1. Haul our own garbage for free to the county dumpsters. 
2. Paid bills online to save on postage. 
3. Used cloth napkins at meal time instead of paper napkins. 
4. Combined all my errands into one trip this week to save on gas. 
5. Log onto MyPerksCatChow.com daily to earn free cat food. 
6. Clip coupons from the Sunday Paper.
7. Check grocery store sale ads for good deals on food. 
8. Combine store coupons & manufacture coupons with sales to get the best price on food. 
9. Use paper in the printer twice by reusing to print on 2nd side. 
10. Make use of residual heat on my electric stove. 

January always brings with it extra expenses for the renewal of my car registration, auto insurance, and auto membership, which is a yearly fee. All expenses have been paid for and I even have a little surplus left at the end of the month, which is a good thing. 

How did your week shape up this time?

Belinda
CFO ~ Chief Frugal Officer
© Belinda & Frugal Workshop, 2011-2014.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”