Coupons & Budgets

As my bills start to add up (and go up) each month, I have had to really watch everything that goes out. As I participate in good deals, or what I consider a good deal, I will more than likely write about it because I love talking about good finds :) I do use a website as I've mentioned before...Southernsavers.com. They take all the work out of couponing for those of us who have zero time to figure it all up. This week was a good diaper deal at CVS. CVS has jumbo packs on sale for $9.49, regularly $11.99 (I think). In last Sunday's paper there were two $1.50 coupons for Huggies diapers. If you buy $30 worth of participating items at CVS, you get $10.00 back. I bought 3 jumbo packs of diapers and 1 toothbrush. I had (3) $1.50 coupons for the diapers and a .40 coupon for the toothbrush, which made it $2.59. My total after coupons was $29 and some change. I qualified for the $10 back, so it's like I paid $19. I saved $13.30...talk about jackpot! I am in need of some more foundation because some silly person left the top off of hers and it's kinda gross now lol. I'm going to take that $10 and use it for my foundation and get $3 back. You only have to spend $10 on L'oreal cosmetics, so if I didn't need foundation I could just get $10 worth, which is maybe two eye shadows and make $3 profit. I think foundation is around $15 so I pay $5 up front, but get $3 back so I am buying foundation for $2. Is it starting to hurt your head a little? I think I need some pictures with this post, but my camera is out of batteries and I don't have anymore and my phone...well, it's running out of room.

One thing that has stuck with me since I have been couponing, is the diaper deals. I used to just buy the big box of diapers at Babies R Us for $41.99 and be done with it. I thought it was the best deal. I think it is if you need a lot of diapers and none are on sale. I've learned that those big box of diapers actually cost more per diaper than the small packs. In the jumbo pack at CVS there are 27.  Those diapers cost roughly .17 a diaper, whereas the big box would have cost me around .29 a diaper. My math is probably wrong somewhere, but you get the idea :)

On top of getting a good deal on diapers, I am also going to try out a method of budgeting I've read about before...can't remember who, but I think it may be Larry Burkette. The idea is to figure out what your budget for everything is and put the amount of money you have budgeted for a particular item in envelopes and once you are out of money for that item then you are done until next payday. For example if your grocery budget for the week was $100, then you would put $100 in an envelope to take with you. I would suggest making a list before going to the store and calculating costs, so you have no chances of going over. I'm hoping this will help me stay on target in my budget. I tend to see all these cute things for Maddy and want to buy them all, but I kinda need to stop lol. I did use my personalized tote I talked about here and it was a huge help. I was able to carry all my extra coupons in case I found something I wanted/needed and I was able to leave my purse in the car. Maddy thought it was a great idea to put all the candy at the checkout lane in our bag while I was paying. She has the hang of shopping....grab everything you want and stick it in a bag and somehow it's magically paid for lol...if it's in the basket...it's ours to keep ;)

One more work day and we are done for two!!! We also have Labor Day coming up so woohoo!!!