My "Realistic" Coupon Adventure

Since moving to Brigham City, my new favorite hobby is couponing! I would say I am pretty obsessed with coupons.  I have actually been using coupons since before I got married, but now, more than ever I have really made an effort to 'coupon.' The first thing I did was start researching on the internet about couponing. There is so much available that makes couponing very easy and convenient. I do not spend hours clipping coupons or searching for deals on the internet. I think one BIG misconception about coupons is that there are only coupons for processed foods and you can always just buy the generic brand cheaper. This is not true at all! It brings me so much JOY every time I can go to the store and spend less than I used to, and be able to not only get my weekly groceries,  but contribute to my food storage.

I am going to tell you about my shopping trip today. I went to three different stores, Smith's, Kent's, and Walmart. I only did this today because my kids were not with me, otherwise, I would have just gone to Smith's. I like the produce better at Kent's so this is why I chose to go there too. The list of groceries I bought is as follows:

• 2 boxes Post Shredded Wheat cereal
• 2 boxes Post Grape Nuts cereal
• 2 boxes Mom's Best Naturals toasty o's
• 1 loaf Great Grains Multi-grain bread
• 2 gallons of milk
• 1 gallon of 100% orange juice
• 3 jars La Victoria salsa
• 9 Balance energy bars
• 1 pack Mission tortillas-10 count
• 2 bags Garden of Eatin' tortilla chips
• 1 box Beech-nut oatmeal baby cereal
• 2 Digiorno frozen pizzas
• 1 box Jose Ole frozen taquitos
• 8 individual Kraft Easy-mac cups
• 2 packs of Pepperidge farm goldfish crackers
• 8 cups Kroger truly awesome kids yogurt
• 1, 4-pack of Yobaby yogurt
• 2 cups Chobani greek yogurt
• 1 lb. Daisy sour cream
• 4 strips of Fleishmann's pizza crust yeast
• 1 pint blueberries
• 1 lb. strawberries
• 5 oranges
• 3 apples
• 2 avocados
• 1 head romaine lettuce
• 5 roma tomatoes
• 5 yellow onions
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 pint grape tomatoes
• 2 packs of Solo paper plates
• 2 packs of Solo plastic cups
• 1, 6-pack Brawny big roll paper towels
• 1, 12-pack Quilted Northern double roll toilet paper
• 1 pack of pantiliners

So, drumroll please, what do you think all of this cost? I would say just going to Walmart and buying all this would probably cost around $160. What do you think though? Anyway, the total came to $69.73! Wahoo, right?! I used roughly $37 in manufacturer coupons and then took advantage of Smith's, buy 10 save $5 sale. I LOVE when they have these sales. They seem to have them quite often too. The coupons I used were mostly coupons I printed off the internet and then I had some from Smartsource (the inserts that come in the sunday paper) and Redplum (the insert that comes in the mail on Tuesdays).

One thing that I have found out about coupons is that there is all sorts of coupons for everything! Even organic and natural foods. And really anything that you like, there will most likely be a coupon for it at some point if you watch for it. Did you know that on coupons.com there is a coupon for $0.75 off any brand, gallon of milk, or $1.00 off any 2 lbs. of cheese? (These particular coupons are for Utah and Idaho only). Or did you know that you can stack a target web coupon with a manufacturer coupon, sometimes being able to get items for free? A lot of companies have coupons on there websites and if you "like" them on facebook. I have printed some really good coupons off facebook!! My favorite coupon websites are:

• coupons.com
• grocerysmarts.com
• couponmom.com
• thekrazycouponlady.com
• dealseekingmom.com
• commonsensewithmoney.com

To really maximize your savings, you need to get Sunday newspaper inserts and print coupons off the internet. You can only print two coupons per computer off sites like coupons.com. I would also suggest subscribing to a daily email sent from a site like krazycouponlady.com or dealseekingmom.com. They give the rundown of the best deals and sometimes there will be HOT coupons that will only be available until the print limit is reached. Sometimes these coupons will be gone within hours. I just look through the daily emails and see if there is anything that applies to me and see if there is a coupon I want to print. If not, I delete them. There are many times where there is nothing I am interested in, but plenty of times where they tell about a really good deal or coupon!

I would like to start teaching coupon classes, so if you are interested in finding out more, in more detail, please let me know! Thanks!

Hello...

I was so excited to get our family pictures taken at Antelope Island during the hot air balloon festival on September 3! I have always loved hot air balloons. I told eric that for our 5 year anniversary I wanted to ride in one, but getting family pictures with them seemed like an even better idea! But, I still want to go up in one sometime! Anyone want to go with me? The biggest highlight of the day was when a ginormous spider was on our photographers back. Apparently Antelope Island has really big spiders you would expect to see in the rainforest. If you have seen the movie "Rio", it was a spider kindof like the one on that show. The spider must have got on her when she was crouching down to take pictures. If you can see the tall brush we were in, you can imagine how freaked out I was after that spider got on her because we still had to walk around. ewwww!

We are getting adjusted to living in Brigham city. Eric loves the work out here and he has been able to meet some good guys he gets along with. That's always a plus! We have been working on our home since before we moved in, just mainly painting. We still don't have very much furniture, but some of our family and fellow ward members have been kind enough to give us some furniture. Ever since we've been married we have only had to furnish little spaces (I think I do better with small spaces) but having more room has been nice. I have had Green River withdrawals, just mainly missing all of our friends and the simple life, I guess. I am glad to be in Brigham, but I definately will always love the time we spent in Green River. I was sad to not be able to go to Melon days (by the way, Melon days=way more fun than peach days!) but Eric "had" to watch BYU vs. Utah with Mike, which happened to be on the same day. That was worth it, haha! Bennett likes it here in Brigham, but he still refers to our green river house as if we still have a house there. We need to go back and visit.

Our little e-bear (Ian) is the chubbiest, happiest baby of all time :) Okay not all the time, but he is a happy boy. The other day we took him to a pediatric urologist at the U of U, that our pediatrition had refered us to, and she came in the room and said "So, is this Ian with one testicle"? I said, "well I hope not!" She checked him and everything is just fine, she said that they maybe couldn't find it earlier because he's so chubby. She was so weird to come in the room and say that and then she asked "Has a doctor ever talked to you about putting him on calorie restriction"? What in the world! She just assumed he was bottle fed and when I told her that I still nursed him only, she said "oh he is just on the chubbier end of breastfed babies that I've seen". Does anyone else think it's super weird she would even say that?

We have awesome neighbors! Everyone here has been so nice and welcoming! In fact, some of our neighbors just brought us German chocolate that really is from Germany. YUMMY! Alot of our neighbors have also been bringing us produce from their gardens, including peaches from a peach tree. The best peaches I've had in a long time!

LOOK at me, I'm THREE!!!

Happy BiRtHdAy BeNnY-- We love you!!!!!!!

Bennett wanted a Toy Story themed party. He actually had two parties, one at my parents, and one at eric's parents. We got bennett a camera for his birthday and he took lots of pictures that i will have to upload, once i learn how!

This is a sad attempt at making a cake. I forgot to bring the toy story figurines, not that that would have helped. haha!

Good thing he didn't care he had an ugly cake, he just loved blowing out the candle! More pictures to come--our camera battery died literally as soon as he went to blow out the candle, so i will have to get the pictures off my parents camera.

Easter Blessing

We blessed Ian on Easter Sunday. It was a beautiful blessing. We love our little Ian! He wore the same blessing outfit as Bennett did, except Ian almost didn't fit in it! We couldn't even do the top button up on the back because he is such a chubber :0) We had a yummy lunch with both our families at the ellsworth's after. Then we had a big easter egg hunt! It was such a good easter sunday. We are so blessed to have two beautiful little boys!

cuteasaurus

Our little Ian is getting so big! We love having him in our family! He is the cutest, most smiley baby! Bennett absolutely loves Ian, it is SO cute!  Benny is the best big brother. Life is pretty hectic with two little ones, especially with the lack of sleep, but I sure do love our little boys! I truly feel so blessed to be their mom. Ian is almost two months now and his look is starting to change a little. I really thinks he looks like eric, but what do you think?

Bennett wanted his picture taken by Ian!

diaper heads

Learning his numbers!

I think he really does love his huggies. This little boy will not potty-train. I hope that changes real soon :0)

One month already?!

Ian is already one month old! I cannot believe how time flies by! We love him so much and are having so much fun with him in our family. Bennett is so cute with him and LOVES to kiss him. We are so lucky to have our two little boys!

peace

peace...again. haha! look at his little fingers!

My favorite...Honey Bee Cookies

Honey Bee Cookies

1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup honey
1 egg
1 1/2 cups wheat flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Heat oven to 375 degrees. Beat butter, honey, and egg until smooth.
Stir in remaining ingredients. Bake 7 to 9 minutes.
Can use 1/2 cup brown sugar and 1/2 cup honey, instead of 1 cup honey.

Bennett mixing all the ingredients and eating them at the same time!

Those are going to be some yummy, BIG cookies, haha!

Waiting patiently for them to cook

loving the cookies