Monday, May 7, 2018

Frugal Friday: Money Saving Weekly Recap


Okay, I know it's Monday and the whole "Friday" thing doesn't really work this late, but I was just not up to blogging between a migraine and busy kids, so Friday was delayed till Monday.  At least tonight my head doesn't feel like it's going to explode at any moment, so that's a good step in the right direction :).

So, let's get down to the nitty gritty, since I really want to finish this up and hit the hay. 

1.  Shopping was pretty much non-existent this week due to the whole "not having money" thing, so I ended up spending a whopping 10.00 at Fred Meyer on soda for the son for last week and this week and ran to Carrs to get a few minor things (more boy food) and that was it for shopping trips, or what passes for shopping anyway.

The above were the freebies I got that day.  At Fred Meyer I got the free Miracle Gro single pour thingie that I will happily use on some flowers or whatever else I grow this year and the taco seasoning.  I had a couple of other freebies loaded onto my card, but Fred Meyer didn't have any of them (one of the big problems I have with Fred Meyer and freebie coupons).  I then went to Carrs to get the other items that were on sale there and redeemed my freebie coupons I had for a free bagel and a couple of coupons for free cans of tomato sauce.  Those freebies can be seen up top there.

The cashier handed me a big pile of Monopoly tickets since the game is going to be ending soon and I got a couple of more freebies.  When I had to run into town to get the son more Diet Coke (he protested the store generic soda this last week, surprisingly) I grabbed a small can of tomato sauce and a couple of free bagels (which the daughter was thrilled to eat for breakfast and the husband made one into a sandwich for lunch).  While checking out, again, I was handed a HUGE pile of tickets (which surprised me since I only spent like 7.00) and I got some more freebies to redeem tomorrow when I go in to get milk.

2.  I ended up rescheduling the cat's vet visit after having a chat with the vet's office about how long the cat's shots are good for (and because I had to since I had a kid home sick the same day I was supposed to go in for the vet's visit) and I am glad I did as I got the Value Pack (or however you spell it their special way) of coupons in the mail and there was a 20.00 off any medical treatment coupon to our vet.  Which makes the vaccination visit even cheaper :).

3.  Instead of making YET another trip into town to get gas in my truck, since we didn't have any gas rewards waiting for me there, I took a gamble on a gas station that is really close to our house instead.  And I ended up saving .10 per gallon of gas by going that day, so it was totally worth it AND I saved the gas going to and from town to get gas, so double win!

4.  I traded freebies with a friend.  She offered me her Doritos freebie from freebie Friday and I offered her my measuring spoons (as I do not need any, at all).  I felt good being able to offer something in exchange for someone offering me something for a change :).

5.  My husband picked up some extra work on his days off last week, which will help a bit financially. 

6.  I totally spaced my son's speech evaluation last week due to me screwing up and putting the right day on the calendar but putting the wrong day into my phone.  When I switched the calendar over a few days into May I realized that I had missed the appointment by an hour and a half.  I ended up calling for two days, basically stalking the speech therapist, as I apologized in every single way I could think of for doing that.  That is only the second appointment in my adult life I've spaced.  Not a proud moment. 

I finally got a hold of the speech therapist and rescheduled the appointment (on a day this time where my husband can go with to the evaluation, which I think is a good thing as he always feels like he should be more involved with my son's therapies and things) and while talking to her found out that the federal government expanded medicaid so regular disability medicaid (TEFRA) will now be covering ABA therapy and up to like 40 hours a week!  Since this new speech therapy place offers ABA, come July, this could be a real God send for us with trying to keep Alvah moving forward during the summertime and things.  I'm praying so hard he hits it off with the speech therapist, makes good progress there and is able to start making communication strides.  That would be priceless to me.

7.  I received my product testing kit from Kroger/My Magazine Sharing Network this week to try out a new brand of cat food.  I fed the cats the Meow Mix wet food for their wet food portion for today and they did actually like it (surprising with those two, really).  I'm praying my local store has the dry food the coupon is good for as the coupons they sent me expire next month, so I don't have a lot of time to locate these things.

Double bonus was the cool amount of tissue paper that came in the box.  I put it aside to reuse it for wrapping paper later on.

8.  I bought a crock at a yard sale a while back for like 5.00.  It actually has another family name on the back of it (Johnson) with the family's old street address on it, but I loved the crock anyway, so I bought it, brought it home, and simply turned it around.  I had my bias tape and some other sewing notions in it in my sewing area, but my son kept getting into it, so I wasn't sure what to do with the crock after that. 

Well, I found a good use for it.  The #10 (big) cans I had been using for utensil holders in my kitchen started to rust and look not great this week and I didn't really want to replace them with more empty cans for fear the new cans would rust quickly as well.  So, I emptied out the crock, cleaned it really well and now it's sitting by my stove with all of my kitchen utensils in it.  It works great!  It's BIG, but it works great :).  And my husband agreed that it looks cool, so hey double bonus there.

9.  I cleaned a bunch this week since it didn't cost me anything other than time and I worked hard on reorganizing some more stuff (I'll get more into that in the monthly goals post tomorrow).

And there you are folks.  Some of my frugal adventures this week.  How did you do? 

2 comments:

  1. How wonderful about the therapist and Medicaid! I hope it works out better than you think!
    Love the crock since I have one, too! Yours looks bigger then mine, though. When I wash out baggies or cereal bags, I hang them over the utensils to dry. It looks weird but it works!
    I hope this week is calmer for you. Migraines are the worst!

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  2. I love how that crock looks! It is such a cool place to store your utensils.

    I am also happy to hear about the extra services you are going to be able to access. I know that when some of my special needs kids were young, there were no services at all that were available. There are so many more now for my niece and nephew. Those services benefit them so much.

    I gave my measuring spoons to my 22 year=old daughter, as she will move out eventually, probably in the next few months. I don't need any more, either, for myself, but am delighted to be able to give her a nice item. I still haven't been able to get my fertilizer. They are still out.

    The cashiers have been extremely generous around here with those Monopoly tickets, as well, but the whole game is over now. There are a couple of lonely tickets in my purse to redeem. Yesterday, when my niece went to grab a couple of things, they told her they were out...I guess their plan to use up the tickets worked. I was amazed at the pile of things I won during this past week, though, from the ones I got. I just am stockpiling the extras (several tomato sauces, I froze the bagels I got, lots of gravy mixes, and so forth), and the girls happily ate the donuts yesterday that I had tickets for.

    This game bought me an entire hour of no fighting between my daughter and nephew Saturday night as they opened tickets, she arranged and sorted them, and so on, and that was the best gift Safeway gave me so far:). The kids do well together, usually, but it was a LONG weekend, and tempers were fraying by that point.

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