Supply Run!

So I am taking a sort of break from hands on projects today.  I went to Jo-Ann Fabrics to seek out some supplies for future projects.  It's one of those things where I have 90% of what I need and am missing that 1 item that's preventing me from starting it.  I was armed with a sales flyer and a stack of 50% off coupons.  Seriously, if you aren't on their mailing list (email OR paper mail) you need to take advantage of it.  One - you get to make your own sales.  Two - you can use more than one coupon at the register.  Today I used 4 of my 50% off coupons (it's coupon commotion) and combined with sales, I saved 45% off my entire bill which was a hefty chunk.  Honestly, it's the only way these projects are affordable.

So I did pick up another bag of Poly-Fill to have until the next ice age probably.  I will need some amount to finish the pillow and then I have another project lined up which should hopefully even out the bag and I won't need any more.  *fingers crossed*  I might be in an infinite loop.

I also picked up piping material ($0.59/yd) which will allow me to work on some experiments I have in mind.  Eventually I am going to reupholster the chairs in the living room (haha, I have had these for 3 years telling myself this), so might as well learn how to make piping now on the smaller stuff.

I am most excited about my colored copper wire purchase today.  I will be making a can tab purse as one of these upcoming projects.  There were numerous ways people have done these in how the fasten them to each other.  A lot of people used nylon cord or crocheted them together, but there was one post that explained how to do it with wire.  At first I thought that was obnoxious, but I realized it allows for some vibrant colors to be worked in too.  I am probably going to contribute blood to that fiasco, but hopefully it'll look cool in the end. To start, I cleaned a load of tabs and am letting them dry.

I have no idea how many I need, but I figure, might as well start with a bunch and see how far I get.  

Using Coupons at Target

In the past week I went to Target twice (imagine that) and had two completely different experiences involving the use of coupons.  Enough so I wanted to share them here.  And more so to say that in both instances I was right but each time the cashier was "wrong".  Also an important fact, my husband worked for Target for about 9 months and knows their policies.  Here is my tale.

I preface this first tale with this; I am not what I would consider an "extreme couponer", but I will push it right up to the nose of where I know the line to be.  I don't try to scam stores into taking more than what I can logically account for with items and number of coupons.  When I see a coupon for buy one get one free,  I immediately search my book to see if I have a coupon for the "buy one" part.  I had found a coupon for buy one get one free on mascara (Cover Girl if you care) and I did in fact have a coupon for $1 off Cover Girl products.  I also wanted to pick up another eye liner which I was also going to buy in a Cover Girl brand because I had another $1 off coupon for any beauty product.  So are you with me so far?  I have three Cover Girl items and three coupons.  Two mascaras (one free, and one will get the $1 off) and the eye liner (also $1 off).  I have done this quite a few times before and NEVER had a problem at the check out.  I should have known there was going to be an issue when the girl stopped to read IN DETAIL the cat food coupon I had which read off a number of combinations of canned food you could buy to save $1.  So when she got to the buy one get one coupon, it should have been no surprise that she had to call over a manager and have a discussion about what I had and why it wasn't going through.  And at this point I was like, what's the problem?  She was like, well, it looks like you are trying to use too many coupons, we only accept one per item (now I am mad because I have 3 items and 3 coupons - I am NOT stupid).  I actually bought exactly what was pictured and the manager added, well you didn't buy the item, to which point I might have had an outburst.  FYI - If you are a manager you better double check before accusing your customer of something that's not true.  It does wonders for customer service.  Also, at this point, another customer loaded their items back in their cart to find another line (I didn't blame them).  I had pulled out the items and was showing them exactly what I had bought and what coupons I was using and how.  She was not listening at all.  In the end, she "gave me the deal" but as I walked away I heard her explain to the employee, "we only accept one coupon per item" to which my head imploded.  I had to get home otherwise I would have gone back and had them explain what I was "getting away with". Sigh...

The second tale is with another cashier a few days later.  I was trying to buy a handful of items and didn't have any coupons on hand to offset the cost at all.  Mostly because they were medicine/treatment for Colin's eczema and therefore not something in the usual kit of mine.  I bought a giant tub of Aquafor (or as we call it in this house - grease) which had one of those "instant" coupons on the top of the jar, but it was for their sunblock, so I was like oh well and just set it on the belt.  The cashier rings up my stuff and notices said instant coupon and says, "Oh you have a coupon here" and I told him "Oh that's for the sunblock version of this stuff".  He proceeded to take it off anyway and said, "Well, let's try it".  What do you know, it went through.  He was pretty pleased with himself and I wasn't going to argue.  My conscious was clear since I explained why I did not intend to use that coupon.  But hey, what a nice bonus.

So do the two tales cancel each other out?  Sort of, but I really have to wonder about the training at that store.  We have had a few other incidents with a couple of cashiers just not being smart enough to know how to ring things out.  One instance I recall was trying to get the Coke Zero free because we had bought the required amount (4 cases).  The dude was so confused, he tried to give us a $5 gift card and we were like no no, the Coke should just be free.  I guess if we were smart we would have just taken the $5 card since it was worth more, but again, we aren't trying to scam people.  The real lesson learned here is that I now have a favorite cashier to go to if he is working.  :)

Crock Pot Wisdom

When I first moved out on my own and got my "real" job, my parents had told me what the value of a crock pot was.  You can set it up in the morning and come back to a hot meal with very little prep time.  Sounds good to me!  I bought one at random back in 2004 (read cheap) and I have been using it every since loving the set it and forget it feature which cooks food for as long as you tell it to and then goes to warm to keep it happy while you get around to eating. 

I made a crock pot meal for my sister and brother-in-law when they were here helping paint the nursery in January.  I had never made the meal before, but the directions had mentioned that I would have liquid left over in the pot when I was done and this was not the case for me.  In fact everything looked like it had been overdone a bit.  My sister had liked the recipe enough she tried it when she got home and confirmed some suspicions I had been starting to have about my crock pot.  She told me hers turned out different and had liquid leftover and that she suspect my crock pot was running hot.  This wasn't the first time I had thought this, but I kind of figured crock pots never "went bad".  There were a few other meals I had made that had what looked like hot spots in the pot when the meal was done, but I just thought, "oh it's being quirky". 

I have finally conceded that my crock pot was broken and decided to replace it.  The beauty of crock pots is that they are relatively cheap for a kitchen appliance, so for me, it's a matter of admitting mine is junk and throwing it out.  I wouldn't want anyone else using this piece of junk which is really too bad.  But it doesn't cook things properly, so who on earth would want that?  Here, have my broken stuff! 

Being the spend thrift that I am, I started my search on Amazon, which in my experience usually has some of the better prices for almost everything.  Not to mention a healthy mix of reviews for whatever you are looking for.  So I plugged in "crock pot" and started to read.  What surprised me was reading about the crock pot I owned.

It was rated 2 stars and had 185 reviews.  Most of the ones I read mentioned cooking food too hot.  Amazing what other people had also found with this stupid crock pot. 

Anywho, I moved on in my research and ended up with a Hamilton Beach one that has a programmable feature and has generally been rated very well.  After finding it on Amazon, I checked good old Bed Bath and Beyond to see what they had for a price.  It was the same as Amazon, but I could use a 20% off coupon, so we made the trip on Monday to pick it up.  Saved myself $10 doing it that way and got it instantly.  Tonight, I made the same crock pot meal to test it out and see how it did.  I'll be damned if it didn't turn out like it was supposed to according to the recipe.  I am really happy with it and am glad we bought it!

Recipe from tonight's meal if you are interested.

Slow Cooker Chicken
6 bone-in chicken thighs skin removed (about 2 1/4 pounds)
1 large onion diced
2 medium carrots chopped
3/4 cup unsweetened apple huice
1 garlic glove
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 cup dried apricots chopped
Couscous

Spray the crock pot with non-stick cooking spray.  Place the onions and carrots in the bottom on the crock pot and then place the chicken on top of them.  In a small bowl, combine the apple juice, garlic, salt, pepper, and cinnamon.  Pour over the chicken and vegetables.  Cook on low for 6-8 hours.  Remove chicken from crock pot, shred chicken with two forks and remove bones.  Add apricots and chicken back to the crock pot to warm.  Make couscous and serve over the couscous. 

It's tasty and easy to make!

You Saved $$$ Today

I love a good deal. I have in fact blogged about good deals I have gotten in the past because they are usually awesome and I want to share. I am convinced that nothing is actually worth the full price it's usually labeled with. There might be rare exceptions, but I think they are so far and few between, we will pretend like they don't exist.

Yesterday Rob and I had a big day running errands. We went to Micheal's, Target, and Wegmans. It's kind of a risky move for a Saturday following a snow storm, but we braved the crowds anyway armed with a shopping list and fist fulls of coupons. At Micheal's we had to get two frames; one for a frame that broke a while ago and one for a collage photo our friends gave us for Christmas. Micheal's had a sale going for 40% off frames and then an additional 25% on top of that. So we bought two frames and some ribbon for the wedding for what one frame would have originally cost us. Not bad!

We moved onto Target where we were only going to pick up some healthy and beauty items because they are usually cheaper here than at Wegmans. (I love my Wegmans, but it's basically true for all grocery stores.) While strolling the aisles at Target, we found they had a lot of things on sale and even found a few target brand coupons hidden in the items (like an Easter egg hunt!) which is great because we can use them in conjunction with manufacturer's coupons. I think on one set of items we bought we actually made money on. Combine the coupons with Rob's discount and we saved over $20 which was almost half our original total. Wohoo!

Wegman's also proved to be pretty rewarding with our coupons and discounts and bottle returns. Not as much as the last two, but I think we did pretty good. What I wish Wegmans was able to do was display the amount saved by buying their brand item instead of the name brand stuff. Most of the time even if I have a coupon, it's cheaper to get the Wegmans brand item, which was almost never the case in GA so it's taken some getting used to.

In total we saved almost $50 on our trip out getting the things we needed. I just can't imagine going out without coupons and hunting for good deals. Then again, I also know there are people who are much better at this game than I am, but so far I think I am doing ok. Here are some sites that I find really helpful when trying to find a bigger discount on something (especially retail stores).

For the crafty types, signing up for AC Moore and Micheal's online will get you coupons in addition to what's in the paper. My sister passed on a 60% off coupon to me from Micheal's that I printed out about 10 of and used them to buy wedding supplies. Huge savings.

Retail Me Not - Great for buying from retailers online, plug in the name of the company and see if there are any deals active
Coupon Mom - Printable coupons for groceries
Coupon Album - Similar to Retail Me Not
A Full Cup - Signed up for this recently, but haven't figured out how to really work it. I guess you can trade coupons you have. I think you can also search, but I haven't had time to go back.
Target - As I was explaining to Rob what I was blogging about, he informed me of this site. Better late than never. :P Also, if he goes with you, he is worth 10% off. :)

So go forth and save!