Saving Money through Everyday Activities

Recently, my husband and I have been looking for ways to save money by changing some of our daily habits. With a bit of thought, we've found ways to save money every month by changing a few of habits, as well as eliminating some unnecessary luxuries in our lives. Here's a list of the changes we have made- and once I find out  how much it has saved us, I'll let you know!

Don't turn on the dishwasher unless it is completely full. 
Okay, this may seem obvious, but we never did this! We always turned the dishwasher on whenever we were running low on bottles or sippy cups, but now that baby is out of bottles and has more sippy cups, we can stop. We've gone from running the dishwasher at least twice a day to running it once every other day!
Similarly, we've made sure to move the laundry to the dryer in a timely manner. There is no sense in having to wash the same load of clothes 3 times because you never got around to moving it to the dryer. Wasting money!

Limit showers to 15 minutes or less.

I don't know about your husband, but mine tends to take showers of at least 30 minutes. That, to me, is absurd. Just wash your hair, bathe, and get out!!! When you just stand there and relax in the shower it is wasting money! - At least, that's what I want to tell him. Anyway, we've decided to limit showers to 15 minutes or less. If I can get husband to stick to this rule, we can save (15x7=105) 105 minutes of running water each week! That's 420 minutes of water a month!

Find a temperature that you can live with, and agree not to set your thermostat below it.

We tend to keep the thermostat set at 69. We are crazy. We know. We live in Louisiana where it is a humid 104 on a normal summer day. Sooooo... we decided that we could live with agreeing not to set the thermostat under 72. (I didn't actually think we would be able to stick to this rule- but we have!! Yay!) Sometimes I get all crazy and turn it all the way up to 75! Look at me, living the wild life! (Hardy har har.) In the winter, we agreed to not set the thermostat above 69. (Normally we probably would have set it at 73- maybe up to 75.) 

Evaluate subscriptions and decide what you use and what can be eliminated.

In our home, we had 2 movie service subscriptions, and frequently rented movies on our PS3 (at $3.99 a movie!! Geez!!). We cancelled one subscription, and reduced the other one. We've agreed not to rent anymore movies off of the PS3 (or at least not 2 or 3 a week like we were before.
We also had a home phone subscription which I had INSISTED upon getting when we moved into this house. "I don't want to be a pregnant woman whose cell phone won't work when she goes into labor or has an emergency!"  Well, I got over it and decided to cancel our home phone. Haha. I decided, we have 2 cell phones and live within an hour of nearly all of our loved ones. We will be fine. 

I'm still looking for more ways to cut costs. What do you do to make ends meet each month? Please, let me know!

Couponing- again! :)

I've had a couple people approaching me telling me that they are having trouble finding deals or understanding how to make the most of their couponing. I thought I'd share with y'all what I've shared with them. :)


http://www.southernsavers.com/learn      This is where I learned to coupon. it was the easiest explanation for me to understand.

http://thefrugalfind.com/online-coupon-class/introduction/
If you learn better by seeing someone and hearing them explain it, here is a video series. :)

One of the best tips I can give you is not to cut out every single coupon you get. Save the newspaper inserts and mark the date on the front of them so that when you are looking for a certain coupon you can find it more quickly. I check websites for coupon matchups before going to the store to find out what the deals are. If I don't see anything I really need/want that week that is a great deal, I usually don't go shopping. The websites I check every week for my coupon matchups are www.frugalday.com , www.thefrugalgirls.com, southernsavers.com, and thecouponposse.com .

If I didn't answer any questions, PLEASE let me know! Thanks!!

Saving Money Through Couponing

I always knew I wanted to be a stay at home mom, and I always knew I would have to make some sacrifices in order to afford that. What I didn't know was that I could save significant amounts of money through couponing and smart shopping. I'll let you know how I did it, and also give you some links to the websites I go to for tips! First, here are some of my deals.

Roughly $9

Also included and not pictured are two cans of Ragu. Spent $16.40

Cost $25.21

$4.19 (Value: $23.44)

Some Basic Couponing Rules:

• Look for items that are on sale. You are going to get your best deals on items that are already marked down, because you can apply coupons to those and get an even better deal.
• You can apply one manufacturer coupon and one store coupon to each item. So if I am buying 5 boxes of cereal, and I have 5 coupons for $0.50 off from the manufacturer and 5 coupons for $0.50 off from the store, I can use all of these coupons. One manufacturer and one store coupon for each box of cereal. This is called stacking coupons.
• You can coupon on items that are having a B1G1 (Buy one, get one) sale. If the soap bars I want B1G1 free, I can use a manufacturer and store coupon on the soap bar I pay for, in addition to using a manufacturer and store coupon on the soap bar I get for free!

There are many places to get coupons. I usually check the Sunday Coupon Preview before I buy a paper to see what coupons will be in the paper. Each Sunday I buy at -least- one Sunday paper, but I usually buy 2. This is where a majority of your coupons will most likely come from.

I also frequently visit online coupon sites such as coupons.com, smartsource.com, and redplum.com. Here you can browse printable coupons. Even if I don't need a coupon right away, I still print it for items that I am likely to purchase in the future. 

Many manufacturer's will allow you to sign up to recieve coupons in the mail. I receive Pampers, Huggies, Similac, and Gerber coupons in the mail. Proctor and Gamble gives out a lot of coupons- How do you think I can afford all of that Tide detergent? :D

It's also a good idea to find a coupon buddy. For example, I have a friend who uses Huggies diapers, while I use Pampers. I give her my Huggies coupons, and she gives me her Pampers coupons. Now we have twice as many coupons for the items we will buy, and we don't throw away valuable coupons someone else needed!

-If you do NOTHING else in your effort to coupon, DO THIS

I visit frugal deal sites everyday. You don't have to visit every day, but you are more likely to find good deals if you do. 

These are my favorites:

Frugal Day

Southern Savers

The Coupon Clipping, Money Pinching Mom - This one has deals specially for baby items. 

You may be tired of reading- but we're almost done! Just one more thing!

Please have couponing courtesy! When you go to buy an item, DON'T clear the shelf! Leave some for the rest of us. If you want to buy (for example) 400 bottles of Fuze, you can place a special order with the store for no additional charge. They will still honor your coupons when the items arrive, and you will still get all you want and leave some for everyone else!

I recommend Southern Saver's online couponing class. That's the one that I took, and I learned a lot. If you have any questions, post them in the comments and I will be happy to answer them!