Coupon Starter Kit

So.. I've started to coupon! I know, I'm kinda late of the craze, but we're just now getting back out into the "real world" so we are depending on me to be frugal with our money. There are tons of great sites and blogs that I've read lately to help me start out.

Here's Fake It Frugal and that's pretty nice - it shows all these "faked" items for cheaper! I just saw fake Windex...!

Coupon Mom has a database that allows you to search for your zip code and then the store you shop at and it hooks you up with the sales that go with the coupons in certain inserts you get in the mail. Simplifying your work. - I use this now because I'm just starting out, but I'm sure I'll continue it!

This website is helpful, Coupon Lingo can be confusing, but with this you can figure it out!

There are SOOO many I can share - I have a lot ;) - Here is the last one, for now. Kansas City Mamas have tricks of the trade and they also share the hot coupons available.

So the purpose of this post is to share my starter kit for couponing!

This is what I started with. I bought a clear box with a lid, a 1 in. binder, sleeve protectors, & tab dividers. All at Walmart. I would have waited until school started because most everything you will need will be on sale up to 75% off within a month of school starting, but I needed it sooner.

My wonderful husband collects sports memorabilia and these are sport card holders we already had so I didn't buy any new. You can get different or more Pocket Pages there. <-- that website also offers binders and starter kits you can buy from them instead of making your own!

I put the sleeve protectors in the front - I'll put print outs here. Like the downloadable ones from Money Saving Mom. They have shopping lists & menu planning. Also, most anywhere online they have e-books and printable coupon 101 pages that you can add in here so you'll have it with you. You can also stash the ads of the stores you shop in so you'll have that too.

Then I spaced out the tab dividers throughout the binder. You can section it into coupon categories like - "baby, food, snack, laundry..." 

 Wonder what the box is for? I put my coupon inserts in there and keep them for awhile since couponmom.com has the database and it will tell you the date the insert is in and which one so you can maximize your savings!

I mark the date with a sharpie in the corner so I know what date this insert came out on. (I got all these tips from couponmom.com & other great websites I shared up there ^).

I was given some extra coupons and I wasn't sure which date these inserts were from... so I clipped out what I think our family will use and put into my coupon pocket pages. If I won't use them I can always give them away.

I haven't mastered this, yet and I'm sure I'll come up with things that work better for us later. This is just a starter kit I've put together and wanted to share! Maybe you can coupon too! You're always welcome to share your great ideas with me. Go make your coupon binder & start saving money!

Oh My!

It's been so long since I posted. Well, It's mostly my fault. I've gotten distracted and started my summer class so I ignored this! =( Bummer. But I'm back. Really.

It's been a little over a year and a half since we've been married and lived off our seemingly small income. I look back now and see that we were just bad with money. We had credit cards that we would have been paying off for the rest of our lives if Grant didn't lose his job. It's amazing how the one thing you would think would ruin us - saved us.

A year ago this month, August 6th actually, will be 1 year since Grant said bye-bye to his first job. I remember it so well. It was a friday & I was 7 months pregnant washing the HUGE piles of clothes at my grandma's house because we did own a washer & dryer & I was NOT going to the basement of our our apartment to wash. Grant called me earlier than usual. He wasn't supposed to be out of work for at least 2 more hours. I was excited because I was washing Aubrey's clothes we got from the baby shower so we could get everything ready for her. It seems like a month long nightmare now... Grant called angry and I was confused. He said he got fired & I actually thought he was kidding. Nope. Not kidding Sam. I told him that's okay, sweetie, we don't need that job. We'll find a way through this.

Well, before this.. 12 hours before, around 2 am, I started my unpaid maternity leave because I was unable to preform the job due to pregnancy related illness. Get the picture? We had no income. Bills to pay & a baby on the way. My 7 month pregnant hormones went wild. I laid first on the floor and cried (sounds dramatic, but I was already sitting on the floor folding clothes), then moved to my grandma's bed. I didn't want Grant to see how scared I was. My grandma kept saying I need to calm down or I'm going to go into labor. Pshhh. I didn't & when I was 9 months pregnant & 1 day - I wish I had gone into labor. =)

We decided that since we needed 1 stable job to pay all our bills & we didn't have that so we broke our lease with the apartment September 1st & moved into the back room at my grandparents. I didn't go into labor at all through the whole crazy period. Luckily - since we weren't ready for her. Most of our wedding gifts we didn't get to use, yet are packed away in a shed my grandparents bought for everything so we could move in. We have our dressers, bed, Aubrey's crib, a TV and furniture so we can feel like it's just a studio apartment.

Let me tell you. It's not ideal, but I like it. I like being this close to  my grandparents and did I tell you my mom & dad live right next door? Yep. My little brother moved back from his junior college this summer so we had everyone together! I got the much needed help with having a new baby & then I started school in January & had babysitters. I have sitters anytime I need or want. I'm spoiled, really.

So after 1 year of living with my grandparents we've finally got on our feet and are moving out. The end of August actually.. which will almost be exactly a year from when we moved in. I will miss this like crazy, but we have to do what we have to do. Our society isn't meant for multiple generations to live together anymore. This will be good for my husband and me! I hate to take away Aubrey from such loving family, but she will see them everyday - they still are my babysitters even if we live in another town, not too far, but farther than I expected. 

The Lord knows what we need & will always provide for what He sees fit. I have come to the conclusion this past year is that He will provide. No matter how deep you are drowning in something, debt, hate, sickness... He will never leave you nor forsake you [Deuteronomy 31:8]. 

Swag Bucks

Yes, I've been gone awhile. I know. We had puppies (8 of em) 6 weeks ago and they are monsters! Cute little monsters, though. They chewed the cable for the internet and so we were without. Then I've been sick and unable to really focus for so long because of pain, but I'm able to lay down and function just fine.

Check out this Swag Bucks! You can get FREE gift cards for just searching online. Psh. I can do that. I research things all the time. You get more points for more searches and if you get people to follow up through you, you get more points faster.

I Just Won 7 Swag Bucks on www.swagbucks.com

**Update: I sent our creditor dispute letters out today. We had 11 letters to mail. 3 to CSRs & 1 to a debt collector for a dispute then the rest were to creditors for a "goodwill" write off. I sent the 3 CSRs, 1 debt dispute, & 1 goodwill letter certified mail, then I just mailed the other 6. It cost me a little less than $31! I'll let you know what happens next. Check out those swag bucks & if you missed my blog about the creditor letters you can check this out.

Hope you had a great weekend and everyone was safe!

Newsday Tuesday!

Good morning Tuesday! I dub this day as Newsday Tuesday. Tell me a good News story you found today. I found one on TMZ. 


""Mob Wives" star Renee Graziano plans to kick off next season with a LOT more booty -- telling TMZ, she went under the knife yesterday ... for a $30,000 full-body surgery, including a massive [booty] LIFT.


Renee says she was a little nervous about the 5-hour procedure -- but gave it a lot of thought, and ultimately decided to take the plunge. According to Renee, the "full-body lift" also includes a tummy tuck.

The mafiosa tells us, she's not getting the surgery because she's self-conscious -- she's getting it because she gained a lot of weight since Season One ... and she's always wanted junk in her trunk.

According to Renee, the show had nothing to do with the procedure -- "Mob Wives" didn't pressure her to get the work done ... and they didn't pay for it either.


The recovery time for such major surgery takes about 10 days -- but once she's in the clear, Renee tells us, she can't wait to get naked."

Alright Renee, you go for it. $30,000... lots of money. 
Top 5 things to do:

1. Total debt completely paid off. Including those stinking student loans.
2. I'd like a new car. I like the Hyundai Santa Fe, but Grant would probably decide something else.=)
3. New clothes are ALWAYS fun.
4. Big shopping spree at Sephora.
5. Finally, I'd save the rest!

What's your News story? What things would you want to do with $30,000?

Yesterday, we meant to do a lot of things.. one of those being buying diapers & wipes. So this is the time I'm seriously thinking of reusable things. We have a washing machine. I can do this. So I found this GREAT "formula" for DIY baby wipes.

Homemade Reusable Baby Wipes

• 2-3 receiving blanket or flannel
• 2 cups of water
• 1/2 cup of baby oil
• 1/2 cup of baby wash

Take the receiving blankets and cut them it into squares. Fold and put neatly in a baby wipe tub (or another airtight tub).

Mix together the water, baby oil and baby wash. Pour over the baby wipes.

I found this through Money Saving Mom newsletters. She originally found it at Rattles And Redheads. 

Do you have Pinterest yet? I'm new... so I don't understand everything right now, but it so much fun! I have a picture up there on the reusable diapers I've been toying with using (for the next child.. I'm not dedicated enough to change 9 months into this). I got the picture & idea from Money Saving Mom, who got it somewhere else.. I forgot though. You can go to Pinterest & see where I got the link from!

Have a great night!

A New Start

First off. Today June 25th is my mom & dad's 23rd wedding anniversary! Happy Anniversary! I love you both. 


A new start? Yes, please! Who doesn't need, or want, a new start in something! We learn from our mistakes, isn't that what they say? Whose they, anyway?! Parents and anyone who has any knowledge about anything I guess.... 


As I mentioned before I started to blog because of my daughter and to catalogue her days and the things we do. I got this idea mainly from this BLOG. I love reading her blog. It breaks my heart, but makes me glad that this helps her try and start a new. If you have time read her blog, fair warning though. It will hurt to read how much hurt she has and how much she misses her baby princess. I feel like I know her personally, even though we've never met. I've learned SO much from her - she is an inspiration. Even if she doesn't know me. 


Another new start working is.... repairing our credit! We recently went to a meeting to hopefully get a loan to get a house. It's a really cool program and they build the house for us and it's low mortgage and nice neighborhoods! I found out my credit score was 600. at best! ughh... 600.


Hubby was sitting nice and straight after we found out our scores.. his is higher! Well. WHY!? I pay his bills too. (Yes, its our money, but I actually click the "pay here button" to pay them!). Well shoot. So I started googling. =)


This website is for Credit Repair. It has information you may or may not know. I'm young and don't really know a lot yet, so I had A LOT to learn. Learn I did. I read and read. If you've wondering where I've been the last few days.. this is it. Repairing our credit. 


A great thing on her is that is shows what's the most risky that shows on your report. Bankruptcy is up there, but it can be helped!! I have medical collections and it's on the lower scale and easier to take care of. It also has Letters you can copy and paste and then conform them to your situation and send to the CRA's or actual debt holders. It tells you some things you should NEVER do. Like:

1. Failing to disputing with the credit bureaus FIRST - sometimes they will initially be dropped off! So then you can fight in different ways on tougher stuff. Plus, you may need to take legal action and without a dispute FIRST, you don't have anything. =(
2. Failing to document your efforts - I'm keeping a folder of EVERYTHING, just in case.
3. Disputing items online. - don't do this!!
4. Being unrealistic. - it may take awhile to fix if it's in real bad shape.
5. Giving up. - don't give up, though!

*** All information was taken from the site cited above. The tab for the "5 mistakes" is in there. 

Hope that helps somebody out there! Have a great weekend.

Amish Friendship Bread

A few days ago, on the 11th actually, my friend gave me this zip lock baggy at church. First off this friend is a nursing mother that just bought a huge deep freeze for all the breast milk she has. So i put my hand out and you can tell on my face that I'm confused and a little troubled. I thought it was breast milk! What can you say to that? Thanks. Thanks is what I said. She started to laugh and explained that it was Amish Friendship Bread and she'll email me the directions later. Goody! I've never done this and was excited to smoosh the bag throughout Pastor's sermon. Well, it takes a total of 10 days to "cook". You just leave it in the baggy and smoosh everyday and on the 10th day. Viola! You bake bread. You add more to it and then scoop out 4 baggies from yours and you can give all of them away or keep 1 for yourself. I will be keeping one since it makes 2 large loafs and 1 is already gone! Monsters I live with. =) It's very good and I encourage you to try.

If you want to try you can google it. There's tons of ways to make it. You do need a "starter bag" since its a special deal... it takes 10 days!

In other news Aubrey's still fussy. Still teething! I didn't get a picture of the actual tooth. Since it's just poking out and she's not real happy with my hands in her mouth with my camera down her throat and all. There is a picture of her from yesterday. Don't let it fool you - she is fussy! She knows to smile at cameras... my goals have been complete. Miss America here we come!

Another momentous occasion was that we finally lowered Aubrey's bed! I wake up in the morning and I see her on her hands & knees, in her crib, rocking back and forth.. then sits up! She hasn't done this before! So, then she sees the top of her crib bars. I'm just starring from my bed trying to figure out if this is a dream. Nope, she pulls right on up and gets to her knees before me, mother of the year that I am, finally gets out of bed to stop this! Needless to say when Grant got home I put him to work lowering her bed down. You might ask why did I wait so long, she is almost 9 months old! Well. You see. I'm 5'4 and  I can hardly reach her in her crib on the top level let alone on the bottom. So if Aubrey chooses to just lay there I will never be able to get her out! We'll see. Speaking of sleeping.. when is it okay for babies to sleep on their tummies? Aubrey is and is okay (i've been at work for 6 hours...) so I think it's okay. She flips herself over. Motherhood worries...

Father's Day & Aubrey's 1st tooth!

Today was a fun day! A few weeks ago I was appointed to be the Nursery Director at our church and I love it! We went to church and as usual I was running around and making sure everything was right on track. Well... let me tell you, the AC in this church isn't the best, but in the nursery. WHOOA. Heat. It was at least 86 degrees and was NOT cooling off. Of course we have children that are newborn to 3 years in there and they, sweet children they are, were fine. The workers were fine. We only had one family a little too hot and they decided to leave early, but overall it was ok. I'm getting Grant and Tyler, the Pastor's son and our good friend, to look at it this week and see if it's an easy deal to fix. Pray that it is!

That's really all we did today for Father's day. Grant went out to the Zoo with his dad to see a car show. whoop whoop. I was going to go and take Aubrey, but really?! It had to be near 100 degrees. Not. Happening. So we stayed home and took a 2 hour nap!! Gotta love that. For our Dads I printed off these pictures:

In order is, Grant's Dad and Aubrey, My Daddy & Aubrey, and Grant & Aubrey!
We put them in nice 5X7 black frames with little cards from us all. I like this idea. It's simple and grandparents LOVE it.

Good news! Aubrey has her FIRST TOOTH!! I found it only because I was putting teething gel on her gums before bedtime and it's just poking out. :) I'll try to take a picture of the actually tooth tomorrow, but I'll get a picture of the happy teething baby tomorrow! 


Tomorrow I'm working on her birthday party invites and going to get more diapers. Goodness that child goes through those. I've been thinking about cloth diapers lately. I saw on coupon mom or money saving mom a great way to make your own with a diaper cover... I'll find it tomorrow and post it. I just may do that... for the next one? Aubrey's just too big now. When can we potty train?! :)

Baby gate is here!

Finally! Aubrey's been crawling around and slithering all over. We ordered this gate from Walmart online and it came today! It's pretty big, but we love it! She loves it!

Overall it wasn't an exciting day. We went to a beautiful outdoor bridal shower and Aubrey had a great time! Now my hubby & I are watching Hall Pass... very different kinda movie! Lol.

Night!

First Post!

I decided to start a blog a while after I saw so many moms blogging about their kids. I see a lot of craft ones that I'll eventually follow and I hope to have some of my craft creations up here soon so I can "show off" what I learned from so many other people!

Background story.. my adoring husband and I met in 4th grade and have just about been together since then. We married January 9, 2010 in a big Cinderella Fairytale Winter Wonderland wedding and went to Las Vegas for a weeks honeymoon. I came home feeling weak from the travel and on vacations you just can't lay around! Soon enough we found out that we were expecting a baby in the end of September 2010! We did want to know the sex, we're lame like that, it was a girl! Grant, my husband, received the honor of picking out the first name if I got to choose the middle name. We choose Aubrey Elaine. Pretty, huh!? She's our princess... So now you understand the "Sweetheart Stories" and "Cinderella Mommy hood". =)

Aubrey is almost 9 months old. The other day, the 14th, she started scoot crawling!! It's the cutest thing. (she's obviously our first child). Today, well I guess it's yesterday now, she got on all fours, hands and knees, and started to actually crawl. It's adorable. She started to pull up onto her knees from sitting up awhile ago... bad mom for not documenting that, but I'm taking the chance to do it now! I have taken a picture every month on her "birthday". I'll post those later. She pulled herself all the way up to standing today too!! I'm impressed, but a little broken hearted that my baby is getting so big.

I started planning her birthday party months and months ago and you'll see more about that, our buying a house trials, marriage, and our church and how involved we are in that. I will try to entertain myself! I'll post the crafts I'm so excited about then I'll move onto a new thing. haha. Can't help it! I hope you enjoy the crazy posts of this Cinderella Mommy.