First Day of School

Well, Aaron came back from Asia last month and I forgot to get these pictures off the camera. The video camera cable is still missing, so I don't have Aidan's first day of school for you to see yet.

Tristin is sporting his new bolaro. He got away with it for a few days before he was told he couldn't wear it in the hallways at school. But, there was a hat day, and he has worn it to some parties, so his purchase hasn't been for naught.

The boys are all doing very well in school so far. Tristin is enjoying being around more mature students, and even has math classes with mostly sophomores and juniors. Show choir practices twice per week, and I think he enjoys it. Aaron and I went to watch him for the last half-hour of dance camp on Saturday (it went from 9-6), and he is keeping up really well!

Brandon had his first show choir activity last night. He is one of 20 boys in the choir, which consists of all of the boys who auditioned, plus all of the 8th grade girls. The 7th grade girls are making up a new show choir this year. There were 112 kids who auditioned in all, so they created a new choir for them.

William is enjoying middle school. Band started last week, so he is working on consistently getting the right sound out of the flute. He is also participating in the play with me. We're working on getting him through his chores. He is not one who likes doing the same thing every day. He'd rather do a big project that has an end than sweep and vacuum the same floors each day.

Ben is becoming more responsible. He has come home to an empty house with Dallin and Aidan a couple of times now, and has done exactly as he's been instructed, making sure Aidan comes right in and doesn't go out to roam the neighborhood. It is only about 20 minutes before the older boys get home, but he has been handling that 20 minutes very well.

Dallin is also doing very well. He has some harder chore responsibilities this year, and is doing well at them.

Clearance + Coupons = SCORE!

I had a fun time shopping at Target today.  I had two of the big bottles of Tide on my list.  I recently purchased some in the smaller bottle, because of a sale and some coupons that made it a better price per ounce, only to find that it drips all over the place when the cap is put back on (weren't those supposed to have a no-drip design?).  I figured I could set it aside and use the big one until there was room enough to dump the rest of the smaller bottle in.  Since I use both Tide Coldwater and regular Tide in my machine, depending on the type of load I am doing, I needed two.  I had one $1/2 coupon, which wasn't particularly great.

I visited the clearance aisle at the end of my trip.  They had marked down filler paper and notebooks quite a bit. I had seen them right after school started, but their idea of clearance then was double their sale prices from before school.  This time, however, they were one cent less.  I wasn't completely sold on buying them yet, but one of the brands of wide-ruled notebooks had a sticker on the front that said "$5 in Target Coupons Inside," so I flipped one open.  There was a coupon for $1/1 Tide inside!  There were also coupons for Tropicana, Quaker Oatmeal Squares, Life Cereal, Chewy Granola Bars and Instant Oatmeal, Danimals, Nature Valley, Energizer, Kellogg's and Frito-Lay.  Not all coupons were the same in each, but if you are buying for a big family for next school year, you are sure to get more than you need.  They all expire 10/31/10.

I didn't think much of anything other than the Tide.  But, when I got home, I was putting away some tortilla chips (Mission brand were $2/bag), and I found an empty Quaker Instant Oatmeal box in the cupboard.  I thought to myself, "hmm...any coupons inside? that could stack with the Quaker coupons I just got..." and sure enough, there were five coupons in the box, four of which would stack with the coupons I had just received.  I already had two printable Life coupons for $1/2, so now all I need is a great sale, and cereal will be extremely cheap next month.

The one other unbeatable deal at Target that I found this week was Playtex Sport 36 count for $7.14.  Buy two, get a $5 gift card.  If you've been getting the paper for a while, and/or have signed up for Playtex samples in the mail, you probably have at least $1/1 coupon in your binder.  That makes it a great deal!

Excuses, excuses!

So, I haven't been updating this weekly.  After vacation, I got into the school mode, and I haven't been remembering to buy newspapers on Saturdays, so I haven't had coupons to make great deals match up.  I'm really sorry!  I will try harder this Saturday to remember.

Walgreens Sneak Peak for August 15--21

Fine, if I actually have readers, I'd better have something for them to read. :-)

The Walgreens Sneak Peak is out for next week, and I've already found some deals!

Lindsay Olives, $.99/can with coupon from add

But, print off the $1/2 coupon from http://offers.lindsayolives.com/clublindsay/

Final price 2/$1! 

Do you still have Twizzlers coupons from a June SS?

Sale price 3/$4

Coupon $1/3

Final price $3/3

Have you ever tried using a B1G1 manufacturer's coupon with a B1G1 sale at Walgreens?  I haven't yet, but the Right Guard and Dry Idea is B1G1, and there was that coupon in the SS a few weeks ago, so... let me know if it works.  I don't know that I'll get there on Monday morning before I leave on vacation.  If it doesn't work, there are the printable $1 off coupons printable through www.couponmom.com.  I wouldn't go for the latter deal, myself, unless I were out of deodorant and brand-specific.  I don't pay for deodorant.  It is too easy to get free.

Way to Go, Me.

I haven't been posting for a while, as I haven't been getting any viewers.  I haven't been advertising my site because I'm waiting for my husband to miraculously have some free time to help me with my design before I do that.

Unfortunately, today one little bit of advertising showed up before I was ready for it.  I'm not sure yet if it produced any leads, but an article I wrote on saving on school supplies that I submitted as a guest post showed up today on a blog.  Of course, I only wrote "Saving with Seven" on it, and not my actual blog address, so it may be that nobody ever finds me anyway.  Oh, well.

Just so anybody who comes here will know what's going on with this blog, I am planning on starting up again once I feel like I might actually be writing for an audience.  And that will hopefully be in September, after the kids are back in school.  Maybe I'll get creative and try to make my own graphics.  Who knows?

Busy Week!

Sorry this post is later than normal.  I've been extremely busy so far this week. I don't know if anyone is reading this, anyway, so unless I start getting some comments, or start seeing some click-throughs on AdSense, I'm not going to worry about it too much ! :-)

Walgreens has some specials this week that you don't want to miss.  My list was longer than normal.
First, I'll list the items with coupons from their circular:

Palmolive $.99, plus another $.25 off after printable coupon, making it $.75
Campbell's Chunky Soup 2/$3, plus use the coupons.com $1 off two coupon - limit 4, so you can get 4/$4
W Facial Tissue, 200 count, $.99 (great for that box of tissue for school)
Penway 2 Pocket Folders with Prongs 8/$1 (make sure you get the paper kind - if you get the plastic ones with the same name, they don't count those - I know from experience)
Corner Office Index Cards $.39
Crayola Posterboard 22"x28" 3/$1, limit 6

Items on sale this week without in store coupons were:

Duracell Batteries $10 for 20 AA or AAA, 8 pack C or D, 4 pack 9 Volt, Rechargeable 4 pack AA or AAA or Mini Charger - if you were at Walgreens a week or two ago, you may have gotten a checkout coupon for $4 off Duracell Batteries.  I used mine, and this was a great deal with the sale!
Select General Mills Cereal or Nature Valley Bars, 2/$4 - use some of the coupons you got recently, and this deal brings the price down to 2/$3 or even 2/$2.50.
Pepperidge Farm Goldfish, 6.6oz - $.99, but go to their website to print off a coupon for $.50 off, for a total of $.49 (click on the bottom left corner of the web page)
Expo Dry Erase Markers $1.99 - I thought this was a good enough stand-alone deal.
Crayola Markers 10 pack $.99
Penway Pencils 24 pack $.79

I'm so close to done with my school shopping already.  This is so great!

Mackenthun's Cereal Deal

Gear up for shopping July 11-17th!  Mackenthun's has a great deal on cereal that you won't want to miss, especially if you still have the General Mills coupons from two and three weeks ago.  Both the Sunday paper and  the printable coupon sites had a plethera of GM coupons, so if you've been up to speed, you should have a ton. Here's how to capitalize on this deal:

Four for $10 sale price, plus a $4 instant savings when you purchase four.  Only certain GM cereals qualify, so look carefully.  Some of the cereals on sale are in the 8-11 oz. sizes, and these aren't really the best deal.  But, if you like Fiber One, you are in luck!  They are the 14.25-17.25 oz boxes, and the coupons happen to be the $.75 variety.  So, if you have four coupons, that will knock $3 off the price, giving you four boxes of cereal for $3.  That's $.75 per box!!

I'm struggling for any other fabulous deals this week at Mackenthun's.  If you see anything amazing, let me know!