Anyway, onto this week's money saving endeavors!
1. I ended up going shopping today because we were still really tight on money this week due to my husband's doctor visit (and a subsequent follow up visit yesterday as his cough is still bad...he's now on another type of inhaler, an oral steroid to help control cough and a cough medicine. At least his lungs are clear now, so that was an upper...it's his asthma that is giving him fits now), bills coming due and just general stuff.
Highlights of today's shopping trip were awesome (sorry for lack of pictures, but my kitchen table is terrible right now and I didn't have time to clean it off before jetting out the door again). I got some coupons in the mail from a friend and went to the store armed with them in the hopes of getting some things cheap. First I went to Fred Meyer and got the free cat treats from today (fail in a way as the new Sheba meat stick things my cats don't like, but at least it was free to try). I managed to get cheap Children's Zyrtec by finding 24 caplets reduced down to 9.69. I had a 3.00/1 coupon from the mailed fliers, so I grabbed 24 caplets for 6.69!!! Since my daughter is once again having to take Zyrtec everyday to avoid eczema with the trees in full force and mold and everything, these will definitely come in handy, especially for that price. I also found two half gallons of 2% milk on reduced for a little over a dollar a piece, so I got a gallon of milk for about 2.00. And I got some more marked down apples for 1.00 (I just got enough to pad out apple crisp for dessert tomorrow night :). Fred Meyer also has some cereal marked down to 3 for 5.00 this week as part of their anniversary sale and I remembered that the cocoa crispies (or equivalent anyway) were pretty good (the cereal is an all natural brand, so it gets KIND of iffy on taste sometimes with those), so I bought three boxes, which will come in handy for a treat for breakfast in the coming weeks. I also bought one box of their Cinnamon Toast Crunch equivalent to try and see how it tastes. If it tastes good we'll probably just eat it dry for a snack instead of popcorn one night during movie time.
I then went to Carrs and stocked up on cat litter (it was on sale for 5.00 today as part of 5.00 Fridays). My husband convinced me a while back to just buy four when it goes on sale as that'll get me through to the next time it is on sale for cheap and it has really saved me a lot of money in the long run doing it that way, so I went and did that again. I was also able to get Eckrich smoked sausages cheap. Carrs has them marked down to 2.00 a piece and I had a buy one get one free coupon, so I managed to get them for 1.00 a piece! Now that is cheap meat :). I spent a total of 62.00 on groceries this week, which I thought was pretty good since 20.00 of that was the cat litter.
2. My husband and I took the kids to the Fall Festival Event today at our local U-Pick farm. Today is actually the day before the "big" event (which is always jammed packed full of people), but today was free for special needs children and their families compared to 25.00 to get in tomorrow. It was a LOT less crowded, very laid back, the volunteers were awesome and the kids had a great time. My son especially loved climbing all over the farm equipment, suckering the farm hands into giving him multiple hay rides with the tractor and just generally running around like a maniac. He also REALLY liked the leaf pool (him playing in it seen up top there). He kind of buried himself in the leaves and found zen. It was really cute.
My daughter went and charmed her way through all of the games and managed to weasel a prize from each of the volunteers at the booths as she did the games. Cracked me up really as she'd also always ask if she could have an extra prize for her brother as he wasn't too interested in working the games himself. She's such a good big sister :).
In short, I'm really glad my husband dragged himself there even though he wasn't feeling that great still to do that with us as with my bum arm I wasn't sure if I could handle the kids without him.
3. I finished another Christmas gift and have another one in the works (more on that later) using materials I had around the house.
4. I spent most of the week trying to get the housework somewhat caught up after being down with my arm for so long. I finally have gotten to a point where "use it or lose it" with my arm. Doing 100% everything the doctor told me to was actually making my arm hurt worse and I was losing mobility every day with it, so I got fed up and figured my arm wasn't going to snap off if I started to work it. I'm up to lifting things with the arm again...or was...until my son made me sleep upstairs again and he hit me with his bottle at 2am, making me sit bolt upright and my arm did something it shouldn't have so now it's doing spasms again. Ugh. At least I know I can get it where it works if I just do a little bit at a time and keep pushing a LITTLE bit by little bit.
5. I managed to start finding the fall decorations and putting away the summer ones. I've used the same fall decorations for years and if we feel a need to add something my daughter and I make it out of materials we have around the house (or try to). It's fun to do it that way and doesn't cost anything to do :).
6. Kind of a frugal fail, but after night before last where my son was up all night long and me reaming my arm during the night, yesterday I was utterly miserable. My arm out and out hurt, I was exhausted and I had a migraine from both of the above things effecting me adversely. So, I actually asked my husband if we could just go and get dinner at McDonalds, keep the kids happy and call it good. Not the most frugal thing to do, but it gave me a very necessary break and I did compromise with myself a bit and ate my husband's leftovers from lunch for dinner myself, so I saved us the cost of one meal at McDonalds.
7. I filled up two big boxes with donations for the used store. I have been trying to get rid of things that while I might think they are neat looking and all if they get in the way, or worse if I haven't used them at all in two years, they are on the chopping block to go or at least have me consider sending them to find a new owner. I feel good when I do this. My dad was a hoarder of everything you can imagine, so I really make a conscious effort to not go down that road (she says as she stacks food in her den *laugh*). I also make a point to donate my plastic shopping bags to them as well as they can use them for checking people out (of course) and I figure this is the best possible way to recycle as it saves the bags from having to go to a plant before going back into circulation :).
8. I clipped the cat's claws and cleaned their teeth good this week. I've been doing chores like that for years and it has always paid off compared to having someone do it for me. Once my arm recovers it'll definitely be time to give them a bath too as they are shedding to grow in their winter coats.
And yeah...I'm sure there is more that I'm missing, but those are the major things I can remember from this week. How did you do?
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