The End of The Month

I hopped over (ok...I waddled over) to King Soopers this morning to do my weekly grocery shopping. We are pretty stocked up on things, and there isn't too much that's exciting me in the weekly ad (except some blueberries, YUM!), so my shopping list was short. However since it is the last day of the month, I still had a stack of coupons in my hand.

One of the ways that I keep myself organized is by pulling all the coupons that will be expiring that week out of my binder before I go to the store. That way they don't sit in my binder when they aren't good anymore, plus it gives me the chance to take one last glance to see if there are any unadvertised deals that will go with my expiring coupons. If the deal isn't top notch then I make the decision to toss the coupon, or leave it on the shelf for another customer (I usually do the latter).

Today I found a few deals and picked up these goodies...

Everything above cost me $3.11. Here's how...

Ban deoderant - on sale BOGO free (reg. $2.69). I used four $1 off coupons (yes, at King Soopers you can use 2 coupons on a BOGO deal as long as the coupons do not cause an overage) so they ended up being .34 each!

Banquet fruit pies - On sale for .79 each and I had a .40/2 coupon that doubled making them .39 each. A nice little treat...with some ice cream...yum!

Yakisoba noodles - On sale for $1.09 - used three $1 off coupons so they were .09 each.

Reach Floss - not on sale but the regular price is $1.05. I had four $1 off coupons so they were .05 each. These went straight into a bag to be donated to the food pantry at my parent's church. :)

The Kool-Aid sale continued this week. They are on sale 10/$1. The current coupon (not expiring until the end of June) is Buy 10 Get 5 Free. Now, .06 a package is good in and of itself but the cashiers have had trouble entering in this coupon both times I've used it (I picked some up last week too). Today she had to key in a generic grocery coupon for .50 (5 packages free at .10 each) but the computer doubled it so it gave me $1 off! That made the Kool-Aid .03 a package. Yay for kool-aid in the summer time!

So there you have it. That along with a few other items we needed, and a few markdowns I found, I only spent around $35 today, with a 48% savings.

This is awesome considering I went a little over budget last week with the Memorial Day sales. I do have 2 more stores to stop at this week but the items will be minimal. $1 eggs at Albertsons (we are nearly out!) and $1.99 for a 10 lb. bag of potatoes at the Byers General Store....so I think it will be a successful week all in all.

Love and unadvertised goodies!

Stephanie

Memorial Day Sales

I know I usually let you know what I picked up after I do my shopping (and I probably still will) but this time I thought I'd give you a heads up as to what I'm planning to do a little stocking up on.

You can check out the full list of deals over at Bargain Blessings and make sure to check the comments since there are a few deals that were missed (we're all human, right?).

At King Soopers I'm looking to pick up...

Ball Park franks for $1 each (not the best price, but for the brand it's a good deal for now)
Kool Aid for .07 each!
Land O Lakes butter for .66 each
All Detergent for $1.99 each (that's my go-to price for laundry detergent and fabric softener)
Snuggle fabric softener for $1.99 each
Jett Puff Marshmellows for .50 each (I stocked up on Rice Krispies a while back so I'm ready to make some treats!)
Popsicles for .50 a box (find the online coupon for that here)


I haven't finalized the deals at Albertsons but just scanning through the ad I see..

Petite Sirloin Steak B1G2 free
93% ground beef for $2.99/lb (hard to find a good price on lean ground beef anymore)
Coke products 4/$10 plus get a free bag of Snyders pretzels with the in-ad coupon
Drumsticks (I swear I printed out a coupon for those recently so I have to check that out)


Let me know what fabulous deals you are snagging this time around. I love to hear your success stories!

OH, and just a note - this Sunday's newpaper will not have coupons in it since it's a holiday weekend. I'm putting my subscription on "hold" for Sunday so I don't have to worry about getting a paper I don't need. :)

Love and Memorial Day weekend,

Stephanie

Finding the Goods

Yesterday I skipped my original plans and went out to some garage sales. I had been driving around the day before and saw a bunch of signs for community sales so I couldn't deny myself.

The quick and dirty of it is here...

I found 15 items of clothing (including those adorable red cowboy boots for the new baby),  10 books, 4 toys, some clothes hangers (originally I was buying the kids hangers and he threw the "leftover" adult ones in for free), a boppy pillow (which forgot to make it's way into the picture) and 8 other misc. household items.

My grand total for the day was $33.50 and that included this...

A "big girl" bike for Nora! She doesn't know about it yet, which is why it's still in the trunk of my van. I also picked up that bike helmet for .25! It's not the best but for a quarter it will get us started. The woman I bought the bike from couldn't find one of the training wheels so that is the one thing I need to buy for it before we give it to Nora. She will be so excited because she has wanted one for so long.
I'm wondering if I overpaid since it doesn't have training wheels with it, but I think $10 isn't too bad.


Have you been out to some garage sales yet? If so, what gems have you found??


Love and a "new" bike,

Stephanie

Look and See What Was Free!

Today I did my weekly shopping at King Soopers and here are all the goodies I got for FREE!

Yes, even the flowers were free! I received a catalina (from a DiGorno promotion a few weeks ago) for $5 off my next floral purchase. I found this nice $5 bouquet and voila! Free flowers!
The Acqua Panna was also free from a catalina I received.
The Crave cat treats were on closeout for .95 and with my $1 off coupon they were free (I think I actually made .05 on each of them because I noticed the coupon didn't adjust down)!
The Friskies cat treats were actually not free, but I found this one variety on closeout for $1.19 so with my $1 off coupon they were only .19 each.
The Good and Natural bars were free because of using the free coupon in last Sunday's paper (I bought 3 but one made it's way into my belly before I could take the picture)
The Blue Bunny ice cream was free with a coupon I received from being chosen as a HouseParty host.

So nothing toooo mind blowing...just some good luck with some catalinas and a couple closeouts. I did save 60% at the store this week so that made me very happy!

Before grocery shopping, I stopped at Walmart to pick up a couple things. One of the things on my hit list were these candles.

They were FREE after coupon (actually a .03 money maker) so you can hop over to Hip2Save and find out where to print out the coupons for these.

Not too shabby of a day all in all. Tomorrow I'm hitting some garage sales and can't wait to see what kind of deals I can score.


Love and taking home the free stuff,

Stephanie

Update on King Soopers "Incident"

My previous post was about an interaction I had with one of the cashiers at my local King Soopers. I meant to update you on this earlier but better late than never, right?

I did send a "comment" to King Soopers via their website, later that afternoon, and waited for a response.

I didn't have to wait that long because the next day the store manager called me to ask about it. He wanted to find out who the cashier was who handled me and wanted to make sure I was taken care of. He told me that he was going to have a talk with her about it and I made sure he knew that she wasn't rude to me, just that she made the comment regarding the coupon and that she did go ahead and ring them in. I also, kindly, stressed how I just wanted to make sure she (and other cashiers) were knowledgable regarding the print on a coupon.

I did receive an email back, regarding my comment, from a customer service rep. but it was very generic and didn't really address my concern. It didn't matter though. I was blown away that the store manager called me to talk to me about it. It made me feel better about walking into the store last week to do my shopping.

It's nice to know that even a big company like King Soopers does care about their customers.


Love and continuing to be a King Soopers shopper,

Stephanie

Understanding the fine print

While at the grocery store today, I was thinking all about the blog post I was going to write - about the great deals going on right now and some of the freebies I picked up. My focus shifted after I went through the checkout line and had a small incident with my cashier. For the record, it wasn't really an "incident" because I didn't want to continue to disagree with her. I'm not a confrontational person in the first place, plus there was a lady in line behind me and I didn't want to hold her up. But here's what happened...

I was redeeming my FREE Starbucks Refreshers coupons that came in last Sunday's paper. I had 4 of them and they were on the top of my coupon pile, along with my other "free" coupons (I always try and do that to help out the cashier). As she was entering them in she commented that the computer was beeping because the coupon says "One coupon per purchase." My response, "Yes, one coupon per item purchased." She disagreed with me saying that that phrase meant one coupon per purchase, as in transaction. I decided at that point to let it go because that's when I didn't want to start an arguement. She did go ahead and ring the coupons through for me and it was left at that.

I was riled up on the way home (and a couple hours afterwards), frustrated that the cashier (who was a "head cashier" according to her nametag) was not knowledgable about the wordage on a coupon. Even more so, I was upset because I don't like the feeling that someone thinks I'm someone trying to take advantage of the system, like I'm doing something wrong.

Since I have become an avid couponer, I try and be very careful to follow coupon wordage and follow a store's coupon policy. I don't try and get away with things that I shouldn't because I know it will just come back to bite me in the rear (and all the other couponers out there).

I'm still trying to decide if I want to call (or go back into) King Soopers and explain the situation to them. I just don't want to be marked as a trouble maker because I know I'm not. I think, for now, I will just send a general comment to King Soopers, via email (is that passive aggressive enough?) lol

So for those of you who aren't familiar with the fine print on a coupon, and what it actually means, I found a blog that explains it all. I was going to do it myself, but she has it laid out really well. So hop over to the Krazy Coupon Lady and make sure you know what it all means. Maybe I should just print this out and take it into the store with me next time I go. lol

In the meantime, check out the deals at King Soopers and Safeway this week so you can grab your freebies and steals. I saved 62% off my order today thanks to Bargain Blessings. :)

Love and reading the fine print,

Stephanie