Cheap Old Navy

From now until Feb. 2nd Shop at OldNavy shop the clearance deals and add the promo code HALFOFF at the check out and get 50% off. If anyone knows of a good shipping code let me know!

Jessica Simpson is Fat???

I have a not-so-deep-dark-secret... I love celebrity gossip. I check People and Tmz with more frequency than I like to admit. So when all the gossip sites blew up with the buzz that Jessica Simpson was fat, in morbid curiosity I looked here at OK mag., expecting to see a lard butt(see my pics), and she is a stinking a size 8. That's fat?? Come on aren't there more pressing things in the world? Not to mention tons a little girls seeing a star ripped to shreds over actually eating! Just had to speak my piece on this. I know I probably don't help the cause actually reading this crap, but really? This is important, in a time when people are worried about having enough to feed their children?

CVS...slow week

I am getting really behind with coupon clipping! Two weeks into the semester and I am drowning in a sea of homework, ugh.
Dh was happy CVS had his shampoo on sale!
I got:
5 Gillette Shampoos sale $4.99 each
used 2 $2/2 qs
earned 3 ecbs on each
1 One touch monitor $19.99
used $20/1 q
2 Revlon Mineral Eye Shadow Trios sale $8.99 bogo
used 2 $1/1qs and $2/1 CVSq
Used $10/50q and 16 ecbs
Earned 15 ecbs
Total oop .33!

I had to get yet another One touch monitor to fill up to $50 because my CVS was out of Johnson's buddies soaps and I didn't read the fine print on the Fusion gamer razors. The sale started on Sunday but they wont have the razors in store until the 30th.. Bummer.
Does anyone need a monitor?? Really! I have a ton of them!

Just Another Monday

Well my day started up full of hope, I was finally getting my oven fixed (after 5 stinking weeks without one), alas my dreams of baking cookies, were squashed. They ordered the wrong damn part and it will take 2-3 weeks more!! I could cry.

My sister and I got our hair cut and mine looks pretty cute! Kinda healed the oven pain.

I arrived home to a freaking garbage can in the middle of my driveway. My dh put his foot down and is calling to complain.

Wanna hear the coolest part of my day? I met someone who reads my blog! Someone who I didn't beg to read it! lol
She is actually in my History class and recognized me! Holy cow how cool is that? People actually read this thing!

Open Note to My Garbage Guys

WHY do you hate me? We have lived here 3 years and everything in garbage land was cool. Then last year, I noticed my can wasn't quite making back to the curb, kinda (a lot) in the road. I was mildly annoyed, but hey, its your can and if it gets smashed it is not my fault. Then I backed out one day without checking and WHAM smacked my garbage can. Where was my can? It was in the MIDDLE of my damn driveway. Every Monday and Thursday my garbage can is in the middle of driveway. Now maybe I am the dumb butt, cuz I forgot to check, but yesterday I smacked the damn thing again and broke my side mirror. Dh is not happy.
So back to my original thought, why do you hate us? We don't even have diapers in there anymore! Did I break some thrash can code? I checked and no one else in our neighborhood gets cans in their driveway.
Thanks for letting me rant ya'll.

A Day I Never Imagined I Would See

I sit here, in awe, watching our 44th president accept his new position. My boys are excited, because we have been supporting Obama from day one, but they don't see the big deal about him being elected. As a mom of bi-racial children, I cry because this means when I tell them that they can be anything when they grow up, it is true. I cry because he has a way with words, that inspires hope and faith in his ability to lead us. I cry because I know this man will bring much needed change to a nation where the American dream has been lost.

A Look Back...Year at Disney

Note that I tured the pics into polaroids, I am soo hooked on it.


Have I mentioned we like Disney a bit? Maybe a few (hundred) times?? Yesterday was a beautiful day here in Florida, high of 72 and perfect clear skies. We spent the day wandering around Epcot and enjoying the day. I bet some of you may wonder why we would blow a lot of money on Disney passes, when we don't have much money to start with (I am guessing those thinking this are also wondering why we keep having kids too) but let me tell you it was worth every penny!
To be honest having a child with autism is no picnic and most out of the house activities are really rough, but last year a friend got us into the park for free and WOW! Noah loved it, as did all of us, but rather than screaming like he normally did when confronted with crowds, he was happy! That sold us..
It been a whole year and we have gone around 45-50 times, can you imagine that would have cost around $16,000? lol The passes are less than 10% of that cost.
Noah still loves it and his ability to deal with crowds has continued to get better, though he does still FREAK if someone touches him.
Please consider this and open apology to anyone he has called a jacka$$ in the last year, its his word of choice and we are still working on it.
We are really hoping to renew our passes and continue to go.

****Note to tourists, if you see someone running around a building SCREAMING a name, they are probibly looking for a lost child, GET OUT of the WAY!!
This happened to us yesterday and I guess this group of tourist thought I wanted there spot in line for soda (G*d forbid) and refused to move. UGH

Check This Out

My friend Erin got me all excited about this new program! It can turn your pics into old school polariods! Go check it out on her blog.

I Had the Best Publix Trip

For someone who used to shop at Walmart, excellent customer service seemed like something that vanished with pay phones. Since I started this whole frugal/couponing life and began shopping at Publix, I have discovered that you can get customer service and great deals!
This week I had an exceptionally great cashier. I inwardly groaned when the only open cashier was a young man, flashing my handfuls of coupons, I thought this is not going to be fun. And my worries seemed right as he laid EVERY coupon on the counter, luckily I already had them divided into products! Then he shocked me by getting excited for me! As he rang up my groceries, he was marveling at how I had coupons for everything, lol. He even told me and the bagger not to tell him my total saved until the end! My total was pretty darn good too!!
I was able to get:

8 Quaker High Fiber Oatmeal sale bogo $3.89
used 8 $1/1qs
2 Quaker Oatmeal sale bogo $3.89
used 2 .70/1qs
2 Mueller pasta sale bogo $1.39
used .55/2q
4 Green Giant frozen veggies sale $1
used 2 .50/1qs and 1 .50/2q
6 Yoplait Gogurts sale bogo $2.99
used 3 .75/2qs
2 Motts Tots Juice sale bogo $3.05 (this stuff is yummy!)
used 2 $1/1qs
2 Kellogs Frosted Flakes sale bogo $4.29
used 2 $1/1 qs
2 Smuckers jam sale bogo $3.19
used 2 .30/1qs
2 family bags Tostitos Chips bogo $4.99 and
2 Jars Tostitos Salsa bogo $3.19
used $2/1 salsa when you buy 2 bags chips
1 Smuckers Uncrustables sale $2
used .35/1 q
4 Lysol Cleaners bogo $2.69
used 4 $1/1qs
2 Eggo waffles bogo $2.39
used 2 .75/1qs
Yeast packs $1.49
used .40/1
non coupon items
5lbs sugar $1.99
rack ribs $7.54
angel soft tp $2.93
steak $6.93
rice $1.19
vit water $1.25 (i was dying of thirst)
2 packs blackberries sale $1.29
bag salad .99
also used $5/30q
Grand total $56.30 and SAVED $99.79!!!!!

In a Weird Place...

We are TTC our 4Th, or is it our 5Th? Its always confusing, should I count Kai or not? I will just say we are TTC our 4Th LIVING child. After 4 losses this is a daunting task. I am working on my health and hoping it helps us have another baby.
In the meantime I have three big boys!
I signed Isaiah up for VPK (in Florida we have 4 yo preschool the is paid by the state). This means in the fall, for 4 hours a day, I will be alone! I will miss the little monkey terribly, he is really awesome company (as are all they boys...for the most part lol).
Its been a longtime since I have washed a bottle, changed a diaper, used a stroller, or snuggled a tiny baby.
I miss all those things something fierce.
I wont say its all bad though, we are enjoying where we are for the time being. There is no prep time to leave the house, we just up and leave. We can go to the movies or out to eat (well depending on Noah's mood). We go to the beach with a bottle of sun screen and a towel!
They are all hilarious little men and actually FUN to hang out with.
Yet, we still feel like we are in limbo, like someone is missing from our crew.

Sunset on the Holiday Season

As I have mentioned, I love the holiday season. We had a wonderful Christmas, loaded with family and wayyy too many gifts. As much as I love it, the minute we rang in the New Year, I was ready to pack up the decorations and reclaim our living room!

We ain't exactly fancy round these parts, almost all of our decorations are plastic. Plastic makes for easy clean up, can you say garbage bags? Yep, we throw everything in big black garbage bags and chuck it in the closet. We did have a little problem with the 9 foot inflatable carousel,someone...me? may have thrown the box away. It is in a pile in the garage awaiting a giant container.
We had another issue, my boys were given enough toys to fill a toy store x 3 and already had too much. Each boy got a large tubberware box with their name on it to store their new toys and favorite old ones, the rest went??? You guessed it, big black garbage bags im another closet.
Like I said, we ain't fancy, lol.
It was an amazing Chirstmas, but I think I will need the next 344 days to recover.

This post was written for a contest sponsored by the new SC Johnson website Right@Home on the Parent Bloggers Network

Dealt Another Blow

Last year dh's company was bought out by a larger one. They swore nothing would change, but I felt uneasy. Lo and behold a few weeks later dh hears whispers his department is going to be eliminated, being the smart man he is, he changes departments even though it was almost like being demoted. His old department does vanish and the entire store loses all the overtime they have always had. Flash forward a few months overtime is back and dh has moved back into a leadership roll. We are feeling ok, then last month overtime goes away again. And it got worse this wee, when they sent everyone home 6 hours early. Panic set in, but once again they insisted it was a one time thing. Here we are another week later and the entire store has lost hours. A lot of them.
I am not sure how we will get through the next month. Dh is searching for another job, but there aren't jobs to be found.
I thank God everyday I started clipping coupons and stockpiling this year. We have enough to get by for now. I know we are better off than some. Dh still has a job, we have food, my kids have clothes and shoes and we have a roof over our heads. Dh is amazing he keeps getting knocked around, but still manages to take care of all of us. And I will keep praying things get better but over all we are blessed.

Resale Children's Items

Almost every board I belong to has been up in arms over a new law that goes into effect Feb. 10th, that seemed to prohibit the sale of all used children's items. Thankfully this does not appear to be the case. Go here to read the clarifying of this new law.

Great Sales are BACK!

And so are COUPONS!!! The holidays left the papers lacking coupons in a major way, but this week they are backkkkk! This Sunday's paper was FULL of coupons, good ones too! Can you tell I am excited? lol
CVS has some great deals this week, also be sure to check the Christmas aisle as they are 75% off and there are some items to match qs with.
I also went to Walgreens to snag some free hair products.

CVS Transaction #1
1 Garnier cond. sale $2.99
used $1/1 q
Earn 2 ecbs
2 mens speed stick sale 2/$6
used bogo q
earn 3 ecbs
4 Childrens Motrin sale 2/$11
used 2 $2.50/2 q and $2/10 pain relief CVS q
earn 10 ecbs
1 Excedrin 124ct sale $8.99
used $2/1q
earn 3 ecbs
2 Palmolive Dish soap sale .97
used 2 .25/1 qs
1 One touch glucose moniter sale $29.99
used $30/1q
2 Gold emblem candy sale bogo 50% $1.49
used $1/1 CVSq
Also used $10/50 CVS q
17.98 in ECBS
total after qs .92 on Gift card!!!!!
saved 138.65

CVS Transaction #2
2 Pantene 75%off $1.37ea
2 Pantene 75%off $1.55ea
used 2 $3/2 qs
4 Celestial seasonings holiday tea 75% off .87ea
used 4 .55/1qs
total $1.82 on Gift card
saved $42

Walgreens
17 Garnier Hair Products sale $2.99
use 17 Easy saver qs $2/1 AND 17 $1/1 manu qs
Total oop $3.40
Did I miss any great deals? Please share your great trips!

Publix Deals

I decided to jump on the Publix bandwagon again. The sale this week was pretty good.
The oldest and I headed out this morning and snagged:
4 Savorings on sale bogo $3.99
used 2 $1/1 ip and 2 .75/1q
4 40ct Totinos sale bogo $3.99
used 4 $1/1 Target ip and 2 $1/2 ip
4 Pop Tart sale bogo $2.19
used 4 .55/1
2 Ben & Jerry Pints $3.79
used 2 $3/1 ip
2 Taco Bell Dinner kits sale bogo $2.69
Loaf white bread sale .89
Also used $5/30 Winn Dixie q
3 Candy bars (oldest wanted to get brothers surprise) .89 ea
spent $11.77
saved $45.43!