Extreme Couponing, Lisa Style...

I'm a really great deal finder when it comes to things like vacations and children's clothing, but if I'm honest, I sort of stink at coupons.  I just do.  In addition, I am lousy at stockpiling stuff.  We probably would have been among the first to perish if Y2K had panned out the way some people thought it was going to.  We might have had spaghetti in the cupboards... or perhaps some crackers and Cheez Whiz.  Those were the staples for us in our pre-children, one income, college student days.

However, I think it was sometime last week that I sat down and watched a couple of episodes of "Extreme Couponing", and I was seriously blown away.  I don't have the kind of time on my hands that it would take to make couponing a full time job, but I like a good challenge, so today Grace and I set out to see what kinds of deals we could find.

Now let me set one thing straight.  Part of the reason we did this is that Grace wants to sponsor a child.  She gets $30.00 every month for allowance, and after tithe and mandatory savings, she is left with $24.00.  It costs $25.00/month to sponsor a child.  In the end, I'm going to find a way to help her do it, because I think it's really important to foster charity in our children, but I did want to see if there was something we could do to guarantee a few extra dollars of income for her in the months to come.

As you may know, Grace won an iPod touch the other day... true story... and it occurred to me that there are couponing programs that can be activated using this technology.  To make a long story short, we made $24.05 on the following purchases:

 
In case you didn't catch that, I said we made $24.05...  This is different than saving $24.05.  I am talking about real money here.  I walked away feeling sort of impressed...  But, just sort of...

The major glaring issue is that we don't eat this kind of stuff (anymore).  The reactions of the rest of my children ranged from, "Can we really eat this, Mom?" to, "Mom, why did you buy poison?"  Yeah...  I've trained them well.  I'm pretty sure Phil hid the two packages of Little Debbie fudge brownies for later consumption.  Granted, there are a few decent choices among the processed, sugar filled, table full of food shown above.  The yogurt, frozen broccoli (minus the cheese sauce), eggs, flour, almond milk, and 100% juice to name a few...  OK...  OK... to name all of it.  I'm probably going to allow my family to eat this stuff (over time).  I will admit that I ate several Little Debbie snacks... myself... for dinner... and they didn't even taste good (a year ago, they would have been "delicious")!  But there is no way we are going to become a couponing family, because we simply don't want these products in our house on a regular basis.

Now, I legitimately wish I could figure out how to make money on stuff like toilet paper, kleenex, and paper towel, but I guess that's a quest for another day...  or year...

But here's the thing I was most elated about, today.  You see, I have this problem with spaghetti sauce.  Every single time I find a sauce I like, it is discontinued.  But check this out!  I almost never go to Marsh, but sure enough as I was attempting to navigate the unfamiliar aisles today, my favorite Prego Ricotta Parmesan sauce caught my eye!  You'd better believe I cleared the shelf!  Who knows if I'll ever find it again?      

Yes friends, it's true...

Picture of the day: Store Bought Spaghetti Sauce:

And that's it...

L.