My cereal box overfloweth

because I went to CVS and bought out most of their cereal that was on sale! 16 boxes in all.. I printed out the IP coupons and didn't look at what they were all for and they took them all.. so I got 16 boxes! Nice! check it!

16 boxes (yes count them) cereal 2/$4 used $1 IP kelloggs coupon for each
6 Extra gum used 3 BOGO coupons $1.29 each
1 Johnson buddy used $1 coupon no clue how much it was $1.19 maybe?

tried to buy 2 Well Patches however it was the wrong ones so I had to return them.

used $10/$50 coupon
a few hundred ECBS some were almost about to expire which is why I went
I spent $3 OOP then got nooooo ECBS back so I returned the Well Patches and they put the $13 back on my debit card! I would have liked to have a CVS card instead. OH well!

now after this trip check out my stockpile!! I have meant to take pics but haven't. This is just my garage stockpile. this does not include my cabinets in my kitchen that are packed, my freezer that is packed (I'm actually looking into getting a 2nd frige for my garage), and my bedroom walkin closet that I currently can not walk into due to stockpilage!

I know this isn't the definition of photobombing, however, I think it's funny my animals make appearances as often as they possibly can especially when it comes to bringing bags and bags of stuff into the house. they could care less what is being brought in, they just love the bags and the excitment, and bugging mommy of course. Well here we are in the garage, it's an extra room of the house that they never get to hang out in, so it's like a treat for them to come out while I'm organizing.

this is my new CEREAL BOX. I still have probably 8 bags of that $1 cereal left from last week's 10/$10 sale over at my local grocery store.
this was my original "cereal box" it is now cereal, animal crackers, pretzels (my husband is a pretzel hound so I bought him 10 bags at the same 10/$10 sale last week at my local grocery store. WOW our garage floor is really nasty.. I really want to paint the floor like all of our neighbors have.. huge big job we should have done over the summer.. *sigh*
my cats food cabinet. of course she has to go in to inspect. I have 9 of those little bags of food and two of the bigger bags. This on top of the two stuffed to the brim containers inside the house.
ahhh yes, I haven't shown anyone my coupon bin in awhile.. I got this at the dollar store for $1 and at first I had to stuff things behind the envelopes so they would stand up.. now it's so jammed I couldn't get another coupon in there if I tried.. I have about 10 inches of uncut inserts *sigh*. a girls work is never done! lol!

do you have one of these???

for ALL OF THIS???

I know other people have actually gotten wayyy more for 10 cents.. but I was happy.. here is how it all went down... (of course with me there is a story to everything.. I'm sure you are all learning this if you've read my blog before)

I was looking for the Aleve Sinus and realized you had to get it at the pharmacy.. ok no biggie.. well at some stores (not CVS) you can go to the pharmacy and they take all your information but you can pay for it at the front with the rest of your order.. of course CVS wouldn't let me do that.. okay.. fine.. so I finished my shopping and came back to check out.

I put everything up on the counter, she started scanning and the Aleve stopped her. But what she didn't realize is that it asks her first for the drivers license to be scanned.. so it was popping up with 1.20 (the grams of Pseudoephdrine that is in that product) so she thought it was giving her a price of $1.20 and I was like heyyll give me the whole shelf!! Of course, that wasn't what it was asking and she was all confused. Finally the manager came over to key in the amount of the product and then gave me $3 off because he knew I wouldn't get my ECB's. He leaves and she starts putting in all my coupons. She gets to the $2/$10 which I told her to use first but it wouldn't scan so she put it aside.. so now of course my total is $7 something and it won't work.. so finally she gets it work and it takes off my total so now I'm at a negative $1 something because she also finally remembered to scan my CVS card so the price of the Excederin came off. Okay she knew that was totally wrong, cancelled my whole order and started over.

Now this time I had watched that she had to scan in my DL first for the Aleve so when she got to the Aleve I shoved my DL at her and said "try this first this time" and of course it worked. So this time I see the price popped up with no issues so I'm thinking "okay cool I'll get my ECB" and she keys in CVS -$3... what? so I had no clue what she was doing but thought maybe she had to do it that way?? no clue.

She scans in the rest of my coupons and I'm standing there looking at my total and it's $4.48 so I throw up the 99 cent baby lotion. It goes over $5, I go to hand her the ECB and she tries to scan it and it won't work.. so she asks for my CVS card (which she never scanned this transaction either) and it takes my balance lower because my sale priced items had scanned full price.. so I'm standing there trying to get my balance over $5 to use my $5 ECB that is expiring next week. (I try to play it safe) so I wound up with the three bags of Reeses. If I had known that was how it was going to work I would have grabbed something for $5 instead of the two hand wipes which I had used as a filler so I could use the $2/$10 coupon.
Okay so here is my final break down

♥Aleve Sinus $3.99 75 cent coupon (the IP coupon link said I already printed it which I know I never did grrr)
♥excederin tension headache $2.99 used $2 IP coupon
♥2 CVS hand sanitziers 99 cents each used $2/$10
♥10 2 pack shick razors 99 cents each used 5 $2 off schick coupons one she had to lower to $1.90(yes I know I could get a better deal buying the 10 packs at Wal-Mart but they are always out)
♥travel sized Johnsons baby lotion 99 cents
♥3 Reeses 50 cents each

she gave me that $3 CVS coupon and I used the $5 ECB I mentioned.. My total was 10 cents.. one thin dime. I got back $6.99 in ECBS so I was really happy because I had lost some ECBS over the past few weeks not working my deals before going to CVS. It was nice to walk out with $1.99 more in ECBS than I had walked in with.

**side note**YTD Savings $818.25 Summer 2008 spending $111.76

BzzAgent gave me this gaming system!

Welllllll I had to pay $50 but I got the games free or did I buy the games and get the gaming system free.. either way.. It was a good deal. and with my 4 guys hanging around here (my husband 31, my son 14, my oldest nephew 16, and my youngest nephew 10) we have every gaming system known to man.. including specific gaming computers, both the older kids have their own laptops. So the run down is XBOX, XBOX360, Playstation 1,2,3, Wii, Atari (the old school one), 3 PSPS, gameboy (2-3 of those floating around), we never had gamecube and we actually just got rid of our old Nintendo. They also play computer games on-line and against each other.. So this was more for me and to break up the "finding the Pimp Cup" hours with Grand Theft Auto. I figured it would be a way for all of us to play together (I'll have to get the extra 2 controllers) and exercise our minds.

Okay so it comes with the gaming system, 1 game and 4 remotes (WITH BATTERIES). Then I got 6 extra games along with it. We'll see what the hubbie says when he sees it.. I never told him.. he might want to give it to someone for Christmas gift, so who knows.

Anyway.. I'm loving BzzAgent. I finally took some time to navigate around their site a little more and finally moved up to a level 2 bzzagent. So I'm finally getting in on a few things. like this month I had mentioned some free taco bell, I got the scrubbing bubbles shower scrubber for free, and I have another campaign that I haven't recieved yet. It's all really great stuff.. I can't wait to get this game running and see how it works.

I had to take several pictures to get the final one I used because I kept getting photobombed by who other than my animals.. as usual.. check it out.

now *I KNOW* what "shop til you drop" means...

This is why I'm all hounded out... or in a rut, or exhausted from shopping.. because it takes ALL WEEK for me to figure out which deals I wanna do and then I finally go out and once I get to the store I wind up figuring out new deals and reworking and working.. and then this store is out of the one thing I really needed to make this deal work.. ahh but then another store has the product and makes up for it with a better deal (somehow) and then I over buy making sure I got every deal.. confused? I know I am too!

FIRST STOP CVS

again I got photobombed.. the animals get all excited when I come home from shopping.. they must think I'm the best hunter ever! lol!

transaction 1

2 choc covered raisins 88 cents each

24 case water bottles $3.99
1 schick quattro $7.99

1 cvs moist wipes $2.19

coupons

$1 off 2 gold emblem candy

$2 off CVS skincare

$2 off CVS water bottles

$3/$15

$5 ECB

Total $3.03 with tax got back a $5 ECB from the Schick razor

2nd transaction

2 gold emblem candy 88 cents each (hey these rung up as $1.50 each)

4 glade air spray 88 cents each

2 gas-x thin strips clearance for $2.85 each

1 CVS feminine wash $3.29

1 CVS sport lip balm $1.99

Coupons
$5 CVS coupon for gas-x (printed with receipt)
2 BOGO glade coupons
2 $1 gas-x manufacturer coupons
$1 CVS suncare from scanner
$1/2 Gold Emblem candy from scanner
$2/$10
$2 CVS skincare
$2 not sure what this is from but it balances the candy being rung up wrong and now I see only 3 $1 coupons rung up.. hmm. oh well
Total $1.89 OOP no ECB's used, none given

***just a little note**** just wanted to post my CVS totals from when I started hounding to now. Not even sure of the date! I guess I could look up my first transaction. It was sometime in June. But as of 8/11 (what my receipt is saying from today) my YTD savings is $584.26 and my SUMMER 2008 spending is $86.58. I guess that's not bad. wonder where other people are at?





WALGREENS

Okay, don't ask me who was pulling this deal together because really.. I walked in there with my $5/$20 coupon not having a clue other than I needed some school supplies and that flex folder thing. Other than that.. it was a total blurr. things got messed up at the register so I had to get the CSM to fix it for me so I'll just list each item.

Kelloggs Cereal 3/$10 used one $1/2 and received 5 RR
5 Star Flex Binder #42 in Easy Saver Catalog so I'll get $5 back $7.99
2 Mead 5 class notebooks BOGO 50% off $7.99 each but they had them in the wrong spot so I thought they were $4.49 each so I showed the CSM and refunded me $6.47 and I got to keep the nice big notebooks.
3 sharpies 39 cents each
3 papermate 10 pack of pens 39 cents each
Quattro razor $2 easy saver coupon and $4 manufacturer coupon

$5/$20 and a $4 RR from earlier this week. OOP $20.xx (plus of course I got the $5 RR and a $5 easy saver so I see it as spending $10 OOP)

MEIJER

Okay.. another strange trip. I thought I better ask first if I needed to buy 4 boxes of the 100 cal packs. They were BOGO so before their sale 4 packs was over $12 and in order to get $10 off the Fruit of the Loom deal (socks) I had to spend $10 in Nabisco products. I wasn't sure if that was before or after the sale prices. So I asked.. of course CS had no idea but said "go get all your products and come back and we'll figure it out". Okay.. of course I get everything, get to the register and the CS guy was at lunch by then. So another CS person came up and finally I said "let's just ring it up and see what happens" and of course I had to buy 8 to get the deal. Oh well.. so here is my break down. again.. I'll just list product/deal instead of coupons at the bottom. still with me??

3 4pks of joint juice $1.63 each $1/1 coupons on each

(why do some fonts skip two lines and other just go down to the next line?)

9 Powerades 69 cents each 3 $1/3 coupons

1 meow mix 75 cents FREEBIE

4 cat litter sale for $1.61 4 $1 coupons

4/$5 pop tarts used 1 $1/2 coupons PLUS 2 Nutrigrain bars $1.80 each (5/$9 sale) used 1 $1/2 coupon PLUS 2 eggo waffles $1.15 each used 1 $1/2 coupon to get backpack $11.99 on sale $10 off equals $1.99 total

8 nabisco 100 cal pack (bogo) total $12.78 to get $10 off Fruit of the Loom products. Socks $3.99 got all three for $1.97 plus used $1/2 coupon.

Total OOP $31.98.. did I miss anything? so for the day I spent $57 give or take! not bad for all that loot.. now to eat.. geez I gotta stop with the breakfast stuff! lol!

This is going to take forever... maybe longer..

first stop jewel

Okay.. sooooo I wanted to go to Jewel first because it's the farthest, I had nothing cold to get there and because they had a super give away at this particular one JUST TODAY! It was a reuseable grocery bag filled with free organic goodies (including pet products) and tons of coupons. If I had time like a day and half I'd actually list out each coupon.. all I know is that they are all for organic products.

I tried to take this picture twice but my chihuahua Blue just had to be in the pic.. I guess he's my photobomb for the day.. ha ha

Inside Jewel I wanted to get the $1.77 cereal deal (limit 4) and it just so happened that I had two $1 off coupons and a free chex mix product (up to $4) from GM for calling in and telling them about a bag of chex mix 100 cal pack I got that was slit up the back. Totally weird. It was like a box cutter had cut right up the back of the bag but there was no box cut mark in the box that the bag came from.

anyway so I got all this for $11.xx but I'm taking the soup back because even with the $1 off 2 coupon they were $5!! I had no clue they were $2.99 each. I thought they were $1.99 each. I did finally get to use my MUIR coupon but just for that little can of tomato sauce. I only had one.

STOP TWO WAGS

I had read WAGS was doing a demonstration type deal today something to do with Clean and Clear complete with coupons/samples so I went in to check it out. Basically it was both the Clean and Clear blackhead eraser and the Advantage Acne Cpontrol Kit were both $19.99. All Clean & Clear products were buy 1 get 1 50% off this week plus buy $30 and get $10 in RR. So because I was a few cents short she run up one of my C&C items as $20.10, gave me 2 $1 off C&C coupons, 50% one of them, plus a $5 Internet coupon she had sitting there. I had a $5 RR plus somehow she worked in 2 packs of Starbucks candy for free (she had the coupons for those too.. I wanted to ask for some coupons for myself but didn't). so my total came out to $19.xx and then I got the $10 ECB!!



so basically, I got all this for $9.xx not bad!!

exhausting unorganized stop CVS!!

Okay, so I'm driving to CVS and realize I'm really not all that prepared. I have a few coupons for deals that are ending today. I have a my CVS $2/$10's printed, $2 skincares printed.. that's about it.. no lists breaking up my deals, figuring out rough totals nothing.. okay.. wing it.. My total for all three transactions were OOP $2.80 and one $10 ECB which I got back.

Transaction 1

2 Crest toothpastes $2.49 each with $1.50 ECB plus 2 75 cent coupons

2 oral b toothbrushes $2.49 with $1.50 ECB plus 1 $1 off 2 coupon

2 colgate toothpastes $2.99 each with $2 ECB plus 2 $1 coupons

1 cvs sunscreen $2.19 with $2 off all CVS sunscreens PLUS $1 CVS sunscreen coupon from scanner

2 CVS hand sanitizers $1.19 each b1g1 50% off with $2 off CVS skincare coupon

total came out to $8 something and I had planned on using a $10 ECB so I threw another CVS antibacterial $1.49 and a nail clipper $1.19 up on the counter. My OOP was 19 cents!! I got a $6 ECB for Crest/Oral B and a $4 ECB for colgate.

Transaction 2

1 cvs sunscreen $2.19 with $2 off all CVS sunscreens PLUS $1 CVS sunscreen coupon from scanner

2 CG lashblast $8.49 b1g1 50% (I thought this was B1G1 free?? hmm, oh well) plus 1 B1g1 free coupon

2 CVS foaming soap $1.99 each b1g1 50% off with $2 CVS skincare coupon.

My total came to $2.18 OOP which should have been negative now that I see what I did wrong.. oh well I wanted to try that mascara anyway! lol!

Transaction 3

1 cvs sunscreen $2.19 with $2 off all CVS sunscreens PLUS $1 CVS sunscreen coupon from scanner

2 CG loose powder $7.99 each B1G1 sale with B1G1 free coupon

2 CVS aloe hand soap $1.69 b1g1 50% off with $2 CVS skincare coupon

again my total was negative so I threw another CVS antibacterial $1.49 and a nail clipper $1.19 up on the counter. My total OOP was 43 cents! Woot!

Last stop, Butera

Okay I went simply for the $1.99 milk.. but you have to spend $20 to get that good milk price. It's limit one so I went twice this week. Ok. So I wanted to make sure I got only things we would use so I wound up with lettuce, cantalope, hot dog buns, water bottles, 2 liters of pop, 4 cans of full throttle, milk, and some marked down doughnuts. My total with coupons was $21.95.. not bad.

TOTALS for the day

Okay, roughly OOP I spent $55.53

minus $10 CVS ECB

minus $10 WAGS RR

minus $5 soup return later today

I spent around $30

Plus I got a $4.79 Rebate today from Excederin. Not sure if I mentioned it but I also got one for $6.49 yesterday from 3M for the stove top cleaner I bought a few weeks ago.

In the mail today I got Glad force flex trash bag sample, and a Freeze It sample with a $1 off coupon. At WAGS I got a sample of Eucerin Redness Relief face wash and face moisturizer along with coupons for those products.

Okay so the way I'm looking at it, I spent $30 on the Clean and Clear products at WAGS and everything else you see was free! not bad for a few hours!

this GAME is sooo frusterating!

OKay.. so this was my idea for the day. I had TWO $5 RR from the WAGS KELLOGGS DEAL from Sunday. So I figured this.

1st transaction
8 speed stick deoderants 4 womens 4 mens $1.99 each
use 5 coupons 2 $1/1 3 $1/2
use 2 $5 RR
pay $2.15 (roughly)(giftcard)
get $10 RR from Speedsticks

2nd transaction
2 biofusion products $5.99 each
use $10 RR from Speedsticks
pay $3.xx OOP (gift card)

Earn $11.98 toward Easy Saver.

and that is basically what I did HOWEVER.. of course my coupons wouldn't work, the cashier told me I COULD NOT use two RR together in one transaction.. even though it does not state it anywhere and I haven't heard not one person say that ever on here.. ughh

So of course I walk up and there is not one person in the store.. just me and employees, nobody at the register and little old lady Judy starts my order and as soon as she sees the RR's "ooh I can't take both of these the last time I tried this it messed me up" so she tries *shaking her head the whole time* then she calls half the other employees asking them telling them what the register says (she can't just ask one of them to come up) I've tried that/this/whatever. Now there is 5 people in line and she has tried the first $5 RR like 27 times and it beeps and says something like it was more coupons than products which is totally wrong.. okay whatever.

So finally mr manager comes up front as she whispers "ohhh he's in a terrible mood" great as I turn and roll my eyes. Finally she calls for Mary to open a 2nd register and sends a majority of the line back to her. mr manager voids my entire transaction, rerings, throws my $5 RR through FIRST, then my coupons and my total is $7.15 they refuse to take my 2nd $5 RR he said they aren't allowed to.. okay whatever.

So then the 2nd transaction I messed up by grabbing one of those Jane make-ups IN THE WRONG SIZE, so it rings up $6.99 even though what I grabbed had a tag that said $4.99. She checks the size (of course with everybody sighing and coughing behind me) and says "oh you have the 1.4 oz not the .xx oz" or whatever. ok.... great.. so it's right there next to the register to I grab the correct one as she is taking off the other one and she rings up my total $8.29, I put $5.64 the remaining balance of my gift card and paid $2.65 on my debit card which I had more than $2 cash but I was so nervous with everybody mad behind me I just threw it on my debit card.

After that I strolled over to Dollar General to see what coupons I could steal or which ones of mine I could use NOTHING! great huh? So I went next door to Butera (the store I had a big problem with over the 75 cent Krakus coupons) and got a few things. they had $1.99 milk (with a $20 transaction) so I got two packages of Scott towels for $4.99 each and used my $1 coupons and then some fruits/veggies, kraft cheese for free with 3 kraft products (kool aid), and sour cream. I had never had this cashier before but woahh what a nastyyyy girl.. at first I thought maybe someone had seen me in the store and told her to be careful with my coupons (because she asked me about each of them including the Butera milk coupon) but then I heard her talking to the lady behind me and this girl was just a nasty arrogant miserable person. Nice huh?

Got some great samples yesterday/today. Eukenuba Naturally Wild dog food which both my cat and dog love!! That came with a $5 off any size dog food coupon. Gillette shampoo with $1 coupon, Carress body wash with $1 coupon, and another Stayfree sample with $1 coupon.

Okay so in the end I still have my $5 RR and am out $10 OOP which makes me mad.. but whatever. I think from now on I'll go to the cosmetics or camera register myself to avoid the whole situation! lol!

great freebies, samples, and deals today OH YEAH!! and proof why I still don't need to buy the cow...

Okay so today I was pretty busy.. I had enough time to squeeze in a good 2 hour visit with my friends son/daughter/mom/brother and help out a bit with the kids. I brought my coupons thinking I might have time to stop at Walgreens, Wal-Mart, Ulta, and CVS... ughh not so much. I was meeting my sister and mom for the $4 matinee of MaMa Mia and possibly a late lunch so I knew it was going to be tight.. I didn't wind up getting out of the house until almost 11.. so time was tight.

I had a great idea to go print coupons that don't print on my computer at my sisters and of course most of the ones I wanted didn't work at her house either!! ughh. so I printed out what I could and found out that I was VERY GLAD I didn't stop at WAGS today because a $5/$20 coupon came out for TOMORROW ONLY!! woot! Tomorrow I'm going back to my friends house to help with the kids again (I promised her 2 year old son some play time at the park)so either on my way there or home I can hit WAGS. I also have to take my nephew to the dentist.. so I can possibly hit Ulta and a few other places.

Not sure if I had mentioned it here but it's pretty much a fact now that my mail lady hates me. Every Tues/Wed/Sat we get flyers/coupons in our mail. For some reason I mysteriously stopped getting them about 4 weeks ago. At first I thought they stopped sending them out. Then I realized that other neighbors were still getting theirs after I watched my neighbor get her mail and then asked her if I could have hers when she was done... so for the last 4 weeks I've had to ask her every week. She doesn't mind but it's insane.. so I write a little note to the postlady asking "what's up" she writes back that she isn't sure, she'll look into it and MAGICALLY ads my Tuesday coupons/flyers with my address plainly typed on the front in my mail box yesterday.. then today the day that the all the grocery ads come out.. BAM nothing again.. grrr.. I'm calling the post office tomorrow.. ughh along with about 4 other phone calls I have.

Okay.. I also realized today that I didn't have a FREEBIE part of my blog.. how could I miss that??? I get really great freebies from time to time and normally there is a good story behind how I got them.



don't mind my photobombing son!! eh eh eh.. I learned that from another hounding blog.. and of course I can't find it right now and links never work in my blog anyway! ughh..

so here goes.

sample
Ponds facial towellette

freebies
~two packages of dog poop bags ($10 credit from Amazon prime shipping trial membership I signed up and then so did my husband so we got two for free)
~two 12oz bags of cereal. $1 at Wal-Mart and there were $1 coupons for the 15oz or larger but another site linked the coupons as the ones to use to get them free. I figured it wasn't a bad deal so even though I only had 2 coupons I think I bought 5 bags.
~one Uncle Bens rice (I didn't think this one would ever come, another I think my postlady hates me.. my samples come days after everybody else)
~Smart Start Cereal.. it wasn't free. I have to send in for the MIR. I have had the MIR for awhile and meant to buy it and for some reason this box jumped off the shelf at into my cart today.

I spent a total of $18 at Super Wal-Mart today. I pulled into the parking lot and had NO CLUE what I needed to get there.. so I sat in the car thinking for a long time and decided to only get what I knew I needed.

Rebatetracker.com is still down! ughhh what a pain! I really liked that site! It keeped everything all organized for me! lol!

So now with my $5/$20 coupon for tomorrow I must strategically plan my outing. I need milk so 2/$5 is sort of expensive.. but hey.. I got a $7 RR as well.. so I'll get milk for free.. I'm STILL NOT BUYING THE COW! lol! I honestly can not remember what other deals I wanted to pull along with the milk! lol!

get-tow (ghetto) CVS

soooooo we don't have many CVS stores in the area but today I figured I would go to a CVS in a different town because the driving distance is the same and I didn't have other errands to run that would involve needing to go towards my normal CVS.. yes.. so this one is in a nearby town that just has a really bad rep for just being plain scummy. So I walk in and my MAIN reason for going, I need hair dye really bad and there was a good deal going on.. well of course they have not one type of blonde in the brand/type that I have coupons for and is on special.. upon inspecting the shelving tags I see they don't even stock blonde!! insane huh? Anyway.. so after getting gas for $4.23 then having to drive over a half hour to get to my nice quiet clean blonde hair dye stocking store I get my steals.. errr I mean deals and drive home.. passing a gas station that has gas for $4.18 KILL ME!



Okay
4 100% hair dye $7.99 B1G1 free
used 4 $3 coupons
2 Sally Hansen nail polish 99 cents each
used $3/2 coupon but it rang up as $1.28 and that's all she would give me
1 Stridex $3.99
used one $1 coupon
recieved $1.50 ECB
1 15ct towelettes $2.99 each
used $2 CVS coupon
recieved $1 ECB

Cashed in $2 ECB
Total $4.81 including tax

Not bad considering normally I would have spent $4 for hair dye and not gotten anything else!!

I now have $14 in ECBS which is nice. I should start checking out next weeks deals to see what I can get.

I just went on CVS and located a couple more CVS's I can hit, one of which has several other stores I can stop at for other things such as Target.