Couponing

Yep. I'm back into couponing. I'll admit it. I totally blame the new show on TLC called Extreme Couponing and a fantastic site that I LOVE called Hip2Save. Mostly its Hip2Save's fault... they do all the work and just tell me when there is a killer deal. Not only in grocery stores, but on amazon... or free samples... or survey sites... just everything. I love that site!
I used to coupon a whole lot right after Jason and I got married. I did the whole 'grocery game' thing and we were novices. I bought lots of random and unhealthy food because it was just so cheap! I drifted away from it and revisited it once in a while... but lately I've decided to get back into it, with some rules that we've created ourselves.
You see, most things that you can get coupons for, are processed and junky. Jason and I, more than ever, really feel that we should be eating REAL food and feeding Darby the same way. However. There are some things that we could use coupons for.... paper towels? toilet paper? toothbrushes? laundry detergent? Its all those other necessities that add up! So I started getting our Sunday papers again and even have a plan to buy an extra one or two at the beginning of the month when the coupons are plentiful!
We decided that there are just certain things that we know we will always need and won't expire: toothbrushes, toilet paper, paper towels, shampoo, soap, laundry detergent, tissue, razors... so many things! We also decided that really, we shouldn't be so picky. In general, we actually are not picky about brands, but we find that when in a hurry to buy soap, we drift towards the kind we've used before and pay whatever for it. Does the brand of soap really matter to us? No. Shampoo? No. We're pretty easy to please. And while we'd like to lean towards the all natural products, and we really do whenever we can, we're also practical in what we can afford. The important stuff, like cleansers that I use daily, I use my Shaklee or 7th generation instead of the harsher cheaper cleansers. But I also watch very carefully to get those items on sale and stock up.
We've been doing it for 2 weeks now... on Sunday's I look at some of my favorite sites and see what deals are at LEAST 50% off. I filter it so that I just see those. I look at the Ralphs Deals and the Walgreens, sometimes CVS as well. Then Sunday evening, after Darb is in bed, I hit the stores. I take my cut and sorted coupons and lists and go have some fun!
I have read about a lot of people having big problems with couponing and angry cashiers or stores. But let me tell you... I hit the jackpot when it comes to the BEST walgreens ever. Its so good, I've considered calling the comment line to tell the headquarters how amazing this store is. It just opened this year, and not a lot of people frequent it (i think), so that probably helps. The manager is super helpful and when you walk around you'll notice coupons just taped to products! Can you believe that? I think they take the old sunday papers that don't get purchased, cut the coupons, and when they have free time, tape them onto items throughout the store! Here is a deal they helped me get...
-I was buying 2 toothbrushes. I had one coupon for .75 off. I was going to get $2 in credit (register rewards) for buying 2 toothbrushes. The cashier said "Oh! I have another coupon for that other toothbrush, do you want it?"... Me, "YES!" Thank you walgreens for helping me get 1.50 off and then giving me even more money in the end! It was going to cost $4, I had $1.50 in coupons, and I got $2 in credit that I used on my second transaction, so I spent .50 on those 2 toothbrushes :0) yay!
-I then bought 2 boxes of nice bandaids, 1 tube of sunburn cream, 1 bottle of probiotics... a $25 value... ALL FREE after rebates. That was an awesome feeling.

Later that evening I went to Ralphs. They were having the Mega Sale- buy 10 of the selected items and get $5 off. While I'm usually weary of that sort of thing, I heard something about a deal on pasta so I walked over to that section. They had the healthy harvest whole wheat pasta on sale for .99 a box. Then if i bought 10, I got them for .49 a box. So... $4.90 for 10 boxes of pasta? yes please. They dont expire until 2013 and lets be honest, we eat pasta like 2 times a week. Its all I can cook. It will be gone before you know it!
So for my ralphs trip I got...
-2 cases of water bottles - 24 packs
-3 propel grape waters
-10 boxes of pasta
-3 jars of pasta sauce
-loaf of bread
-toothbrush
-broccoli
-carrots
-turkey lunch meat
-gallon of whole milk
-2 in 1 shampoo for Jason
-and a couple things I can't remember...
All for $30- I was pretty happy with that.

All that to say, I love couponing. My cupboards are full with stockpiles of things. My only complaint about shows like Extreme Couponing, is the fact that people hoard way too much and don't give enough of it away. Jason and I are hoping to get better at the whole process and be able to give more things away. I think it would be neat if more churches started coupon funded ministries! Could you imagine if just a couple ladies in your church got together to coupon and get these deals? Then they could donate all the items to local shelters, food pantries, or even the hurting or unemployed in their own churches. That's what I'd like to see happen. What do you think?