Thoughts for Friday

Here are a few quotes for today ;)

They who are of the opinion that Money will do everything, may very well be suspected to do everything for Money.

              ~George Savile, Complete Works, 1912

It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocketbook often groans more loudly than an empty stomach.

                         ~Franklin Delano Roosevelt

It's good to have money and the things that money can buy, but it's good, too, to check up once in a while and make sure that you haven't lost the things that money can't buy.

                          ~George Horace Lorimer






Have a Great day!!!

Homemade Frugal Tomato Soup

I was looking for a recipe for tomato soup, and couldn't find one I liked with ingredients I had on hand. SO I took a recipe I found and modified it to what I did have and its GOOD!!

1Tsp Olive Oil
1 Med onion chopped
1 tsp minced garlic
1/2 cup diced carrots
1 small can tomato paste
1 1/2 cups beef broth
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce ( I used BBQ sauce)
1Tbsp Sugar
1Tbsp dried basil
Salt and pepper to taste.

In a large sauce pan, saute oil, onions and garlic for 5 minutes. Add carrots and saute again for another 5 minutes or until veggies are soft.
Add tomato paste, broth, Worcestershire sauce, sugar and basil. Bring to a boil, then reduce to med to simmer for 20 minutes. Add Salt and pepper to taste.

You can mix with an immersion blender or blend in a blender to puree, I left is as is. Add a quarter cup of cream, and top with shredded cheddar cheese.

I prepared this with common ingredients, and for less than $2. I'll serve with Grilled Cheese for a nice frugal dinner for this hot evening. Enjoy!!

Have a great night!!

Join Swagbucks, get CASH!

I'll admit, I've been hearing about Swagbucks now for quite some time and I just thought, no way can this be legit. Once I heard of a fairly skeptic friend join up and doing well, I thought I'd give it a shot. I am amazed at how easy this is to do, and there are NO strings attached! Its simple! I joined up in May, and since them I've earned $5 in cash, and $45 in Amazon Gift Cards. Now if *I* can do this and earn, then you can too! Click this link to get started.

Now let me tell you more about how this works. All you have to do is go to the Swagbucks home page once or twice a day and do a search. Do your regular searches, or just make up a crazy one like, "Whats for dinner"?? You will be rewarded with Swagbucks, which are 'digital dollars' that you can use to 'buy' prizes. Swagbucks accumulate quickly, if you do several searches a day, or find codes. SwagCodes are like a virtual Treasure Hunt. Go to the SwagStore and you will see what prizes you can earn. There are gift cards, video game stuff, kids toys, whatever you need. Most people opt for the Amazon Gift cards, since its one of the easiest and cheapest ways to shop on the net. But I elected once to take the $5 in paypal cash, and it was deposited in my paypal acct in about a week. Love it! I plan on saving up my Amazon cards to use them for my Christmas shopping. I do a lot of shopping on Amazon, I buy stuff for my kids for next to nothing prices, then spend my $25 to get the free shipping. Right now, I'm almost up to 2 FREE Amazon orders! How can you beat that?

Now, should you take MY word for this? No, you don't have to, but you can check out the site for yourself, or you can read the swagbucks facebook page to see how people are using their swagbucks and enjoying it. If you aren't doing Swagbucks right now, you are missing out!! I promise you, you will not regret this, sign up now and start earning Swagbucks!

Have a GREAT day!

Free chips and salsa from Chilis

Make sure you sign up at Chili's to get a coupon for a FREE chip and salsa with the purchase of an entree. You will only get that coupon once, but you can get other great deals if you are on their email list.

Do it now!

Have a great day!

Instant Bargains

One of the best things that ever happened to me was when Kim Danger wrote a book called Instant Bargains, 600 ways to shrink your Grocery Budget. I love how she includes ways to use your coupons and how to match coupons to your store savings, but also other ways to strengthen your stock pile, and even make popular items from scratch. There is also a quote from yours truly included, one of my best tips for catching the best deal. LOL If you don't own this book, you should consider putting it in your library, some of the information is invaluable. Who said you can't teach new tricks?? I always thought I was a good coupon clipper, but then I read Kim's book and learned NEW tricks. Pretty nifty!!

Do you read books that teach you how to catch a deal? What was the best book you read?

Coupons 101

In my opinion, the best and easiest way to be frugal is to be a coupon clipper. In this day and economy, not clipping coupons is wasted money. Its the easiest way to get products for FREE, or ALMOST FREE. I know some people will complain that coupons are a waste of time, or they never remember to bring them, but for me, that's a waste of time. I do such a good job saving that most of my mommy circle of friends would like for me to give a basic step by step tutorial of my best money saving grocery shopping tips. Consider this your first lesson. :)

I will be the first to admit that clipping coupons might be tedious, and might take up more time than you want to spend, but nothing free ever came easy. Is it worth it? YES. The basis of a frugal lifestyle comes from coupon clipping, there is no way around that. What I do when I get my coupons in on Sunday, I clip almost all of them. There are some so ridiculous that I know I will never use, like joint pain relief, or weight gain supplement, I let those go, but I clip all the others. You never know when an item will go on sale, whether its 'your brand' or not, clip it. Remember that if you get items for free, or you have a chance to pick items you'll never use for free, you can always donate to the local food pantry. Toiletries can be donated to the local woman's shelter, they always welcome items.

I organize my coupons in a 'coupon binder'. I went to Walmart and bought a binder for around $3. Then at the front of the store, you'll see one register where all the baseball card stuff is, I picked up some of the clear baseball card holders. Basically, all my coupons go into the clear slots of the baseball card holders. This is the best way to see all your coupons, so you know which ones you have, but you also can see the expiration date. I have no real organization to my binder, but I do try to keep like items together.

Now, you have coupons, they are fairly organized, what you want to do is check your circulars. My favorite store is Shoprite, I've gotten the best deals in that store. Lets say, Wacky Mac is on sale for .99 this week. You look through your coupon binder and find you have a .50 off 1 coupon for wacky mac that is not expired yet. Bring it to your store, MOST grocery stores around here will double it. SO your .50 coupon, now becomes $1. If your Wacky Mac is only .99 and you have a doubled coupon, your Wacky Mac is now FREE! If you have 3 Wacky Mac coupons, get 3 bags of Wacky Mac. Why not, they are FREE after all! You just saved $3 off your grocery bill. It all adds up. Its that simple.

There are some ground rules, remember that using a coupon does NOT always make the best deal. If you have a coupon for a brand name, but the generic or Store brand is STILL cheaper after the coupon is applied, then its not a deal. And if you are wasting money on stuff you will never ever use just because you had the coupon for it, then that's not a deal either. Not every store doubles. If a coupon says 'Do Not Double', the cashier is not supposed to double it. Sometimes they do, depends on your cashier.

Here is a great video to help give you some more inspiration.

So tell me, do you use coupons?? Do you get alot of stuff for free? If you don't, are you going to start? Did this 'tutorial' help you at all?

Have a Great day!

Free Nintendo DS games from Kelloggs

Usually, I don't bother with 'contests' sponsored by the cereals and yogurt companies, rarely do people win. To me its just a gimmick to buy their product, and it always works. LOL

Last week, Shoprite had all their Kellogg's cereals marked down to 1.99. I used my $1/2 coupons and bought 4 boxes of cereal for 1.49 each. I refuse to pay more than 1.50 for a box of cereal. The promotion they were running was that if you purchased 3 boxes of Kellogg's cereal, you got a FREE gallon of Milk, any kind. That was my main motivation for buying! SO I got a box of Apple Jacks, 2 boxes of Raisin Bran, and 1 box of Frosted Flakes. My oldest daughter opened up the box of Apple Jacks and said, "Mom, there is a sticker inside this box, it says 'You won!'? I still didn't take it seriously, assuming it was still something ridiculous, or cheap. Then my husband pointed out to her, 'sure, you probably won points for a DSi, which you don't have'. We all laughed and assumed it was just a gimmick.

On a whim, he decided to check it out. He went to the website that was listed on the box to claim the prize. We were all surprised to realize, they actually won a GAME for their Nintendo DS! They chose Zelda, and it is to be delivered in 4 to 6 weeks.

How is that for being Frugal!! I got a FREE gallon of milk AND a free DS game, for my $6 cereal purchase.
Have you entered any contests or won anything like this?

Have a great day!