Archive for Frugal Tips
Nicole’s First Couponing Adventure
Posted by: | CommentsMy friend Nicole is trying in her words to go from a “sheepish spender to fabulously frugal.” I thought it would be fun for you to follow along Nicole’s journey as I help her to transform her grocery budget. On today’s journey, she is going to take her first trip to the grocery store using coupons.
Flower Clips For Little (And Big) Girls Hair Tutorial
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I have 3 little girls and we are girly girls around here and we love to do fun things with our hair. We love putting pretty things in our hair, but hair bows are extremely expensive.
Through trial and error a few years ago I figured out how to make these adorable flower clips. They are super easy and dirt cheap to make. I have had a couple of people ask me how to make them so I though I would do a little tutorial for you all.
Here are the supplies you need. A glue gun, mine is super cheap (under $10.00) and I have had it for about 10 years and it works just fine. A pencil. Flowers, I get mine from the dollar store or from after season clearances at JoAnn’s and Michael’s. I never pay more than $1.50 for a bunch of flowers. Clips, see below.
I buy these at Sally Beauty Supply and the box was less than $5.00 for 100 clips.
Turn your flower over and take it completely apart. Take all of the plastic pieces out so that your flower will lay flat. You want to keep the fabric flower parts and the center post and discard the rest.
Put the center post back in and place the first fabric piece back on. Snip the center post so that it is level with the fabric piece.
Glue each fabric piece of the flower back together in the order they came off. You don’t need much glue, just enough to keep them together.
All of my pieces are back together now.
Here is where your pencil comes into play. Hold the clip with your pencil eraser. This is an awesome trick I learned from She Does Hair and it keeps you from burning your fingers when you glue the clip to the flower.
Place a line of glue down the center.
Now just lay your clip right in the glue. The eraser of your pencil will not stick to the glue once it is dry, so don’t worry about glueing your pencil to your clip.
All done! So cute!
Once you have the technique down, you can get a little fancy.
You can take these two flowers apart, and then combine them together to make this:
Or I had some extra buttons laying around from these button flowers, so I put this fancy button in the middle of the flower, and did not use the center post at all.
I love these flowers that I got at the dollar store all by themselves, but I think I love them even more when I put two of them together:
The little sparkly doo-dad came in my bag-o-buttons as well.
And when my hair was longer (and blonde!) I loved to wear them as well. They are perfect for dressing up a plain ponytail.
Each flower costs me $.50 each or less to make and my little girls get compliments on them everywhere we go. They make great gifts as well!
Warehouse Clubs: Budget Help or Budget Buster?
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Image Via David McKelvey
Reader Sarah wrote me recently and wanted to know my thoughts on Warehouse Clubs such as Costco or Sam’s Club. I personally have belonged to one club or another for most of my adult life. It is a good financial decision for our family for a couple of reasons.
First, we have a large family. Buying in bulk makes sense for our family.
Second, I am very selective about the things that I buy at Costco, the club that we happen to belong to currently. Most people can not get out of Costco without spending $150. There are only a few things that I buy at Costco, and I only make a trip once a month or every other month. Here are the staples I usually buy along with recent prices:
Baking Goods
Flour, 25 lbs.: $6.19
I do a lot of baking and I go through 25 lbs. of flour in about 2 months. $.25/lb. is a pretty hard price to beat. I store the excess flour in a food storage bucket.
Sugar, 25 lbs.: $9.49
Again with the baking I go through this pretty fast. I can occasionally beat $.38/lb. with a coupon, but I can’t keep enough on hand buying the little 5 lb. bags.
Yeast, 2 lbs.: $3.89
This lasts me a LONG time, but it stores great in the freezer.
Spices: prices vary
Our Costco doesn’t have a great selection of spices, but the prices are very reasonable.
Tortillas, 30 ct. $2.79
These are the big tortillas. I buy a few packages when I go and throw the extras in the freezer. They freeze just fine.
Snacks
Tortilla Chips, 5 lbs.: $3.95
I am not a huge fan of giving your kids junk for snacks, but these chips are not too bad. They only have 4 grams of fat per serving, they have no trans fat. They also have 2 grams of dietary fiber and 2 grams of protein. Much healthier than crackers. Plus they are very inexpensive. This is a big bag of chips but our family of 6 is able to finish them off before they go stale. I pre-portion them out in sandwich bags for my kids and husband to take in their lunches, then in the morning we can quickly grab them when they are packing up their lunches. And guess what, you can freeze these chips as well, it says so right on the bag! I am not sure if these are a regional thing but check them out next time you are in Costco.
Pretzels, 6 lbs.: $4.89
I use these when I am putting together the kids snack box. Even with coupons it is hard to beat $.05 a serving for snacks!
Cheese/Milk/Eggs
Mozzarela Cheese, 5 lbs.: $8.75
This is about $1.76/lb. I never see cheese this price anywhere else. I buy both the Mozzarela and Cheddar in the shredded 5 lb. bag. I buy a couple of bags when I go and then I divide those bags into 2 freezer bags and you guessed it, put them in the freezer.
Milk: price varies
I know that I can get 2 gallons of milk for about $4.00 at my local grocery store, sometimes Costco beats this price, sometimes not.
Eggs: price varies
Same story as the milk, sometimes Costco can beat everyone’s price, sometimes not.
There are a few other things I buy such as peanut butter and bleach, but this is pretty much it.
There are also several things at Costco that are not good deal at all and I think you should steer clear of. Here are the things I DO NOT buy at Costco:
Meat I can get a better deal buy stocking up when there are sales at my local grocery stores.
Cleaning Supplies & Laundry Detergent With the exception of bleach I can do better at the Drug Stores with coupons.
Canned Foods Most of their prices on canned foods are not too hot.
Most Produce I buy salad and bananas there occasionally, but most of their produce prices are very high.
Trinkets/Toys/Dishes/Cameras/DVD Players/Serving Platters I skip right through the first part of the store with blinders on. Moste of these items are a good buy, but if only if you need them. Do you really need a new matching pitcher and tumbler set? If the answer is no, then don’t stop to look.
So what do you think? Do you agree with my thoughts on warehouse clubs? Do you belong to a warehouse club and do you think it helps or hurts your budget. I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments!
Link Love
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Image via Photos8.com
I came across some posts that I just loved this week and I wanted to share them with all of you:
I already shared this on my Facebook page, but my favorite article of the week came from Trent at The Simple Dollar, The Source of Frugal Misery.
If you have a ton of zucchini coming from your garden (then I am totally jealous because only 3 of the 6 plants I planted made it, and I have only picked 2 zucchinis off of all 3 plants. Boo!) then Amy at The Finer Things in Life has the hook up for you with some fantastic ideas and recipes.
You all know how important coupon ethics are to me, so I loved this post by Mercedes at Common Sense with Money about how to recognize if a pdf coupon is legitimate.
I loved Jessica of Utah Deal Diva’s upbeat positive attitude in her guest post for Money Saving Mom, Lessons Learned From Unemployment. She had some great tips to offer as well.
Even though I am craftastically challenged I think I am going to give Gina at Moneywise Mom’s cute wall art project that she made for about $5.00 a try! I can do it, I can do it! {don’t mind me, just a little chanting to myself!}
Hope you all have a great weekend and happy reading!
Did you read something that you loved this week? Please share your great finds with us in the comments. {No self promoting. Please pay it forward!}
Cinnamon Sugar Muffins
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Last year I shared with you my system for frugal snacks for my kids. But sometimes I just don’t find great deals on snacks to put in our box or I try to make do with items that we already have because I am all out of money in our grocery budget. In these situations I try to make homemade snacks.
These simple, easy to make Cinnamon Sugar Muffins are the perfect solution. They are not loaded with fat like many other muffin recipes. Plus I always have all of these ingredients on hand. And they are delicious!
1 1/2 cups flour
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 egg, slightly beaten
1/4 cup butter, melted
2/3 cup buttermilk (I never have buttermilk, but you can make your own by placing 1 Tbsp. of vinegar in a 1 cup measuring cup and then fill the rest of the way with milk. Let it stand for 5 minutes and you have buttermilk!)
Combine flour, baking powder, salt, sugar and cinnamon. Combine egg, butter and buttermilk. Mix dry ingredients with wet, just until combined. Spray 12 muffin cups with cooking spray and evenly distribute the mix. Sprinkle the tops with a little cinnamon-sugar mixture. Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.
I bake up a double batch of these muffins and then freeze the rest so we have after school snacks for several days. I just pull 4 muffins out after school and microwave them for a few seconds. When I double the batch I get 24 snacks for about $1.50!
Check out Life As Mom for other frugal tips!
Donate Your Expired Coupons and Help Military Families
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EDIT: Effective February 22nd, Tammy is no longer accepting coupons.
When I first started couponing, I kept hearing that you could donate your expired coupons to military families serving overseas. Military families serving overseas can use expired coupons up to 6 months after the expiration date at their local commissary’s. I looked into it and it seemed like a really complicated process that I just could not figure out. A few weeks ago I attended a blogging business meeting on Skype and *met* Tammy of Army Household6.
She writes a fantastic blog all about her life as a military wife. As I was checking out her blog, I noticed that she has simplified this whole expired coupon donation process. You can simply mail your expired coupons to her and she will get them where they need to go. Here are all of the details:
Gather up your expired coupons (no more than 3 months past the expiration date). Your coupons need to be clipped already (you will want to do so to cut down on shipping costs anyhow). They can only accept manufacturer’s coupons from the newspaper or magazines. They can not accept internet printables or store coupons. Send them to Tammy at this address:
Overseas Coupon Program
c/o ArmyHousehold6
5804 Harr Ave Unit D
Colorado Springs, CO 80902
What a great way to be able to support our troops! Please take a little of your time and help a military family out instead of throwing your coupons in the trash.
