Coupon Madness!

Source

I have always liked the ideas of using coupons at the grocery store but I usually forget until I am walking out of the store or I forget to look at them all together. With the impending life changes (grad school, opening a business, and potentially buying a house-YIKES!) that will affect our income, we have been searching for ways to save a few more pennies. Lately, I have been browsing a few sites that makes coupon using easy. If you are interested, check out these sites:

1. www.frugallivingnw.com
2. www.thefrugalgirl.com
3. www.coupons.com

On Frugal Living NW, they refer to accessing your grocery stores online coupon ad. I had no idea this existed. We mainly shop at Fred Meyers, minus the occasional Whole Foods or News Seasons visit for health related items and the farmers market for fresh produce, so I headed to Fred Meyer's website. They ask you to put in your Fred Meyers rewards card number and create a login. Done and done! I then headed to the coupon sections and to my surprise there were so many coupons! We were in dire need of toilet paper so I look for a toilet paper coupon. Found one! The next part was so easy...I clicked the box next to the coupon and then clicked the "upload to my card" button. It immediately uploaded the coupon onto my rewards card so I never had to take a paper copy with me!! Woohoo!!! When I got to the store I checked out the weekly adds and realized that there was another coupon for the same toilet paper. After both coupons, I purchased toilet paper that was originally $8.50 for $3.00!!!!
After today I am definitely going to look for coupons before going to the store. It kinda helps me plan out for meals before going to the store as well, because I tend to be an impulse grocery store shopper.

Does your grocery store have online coupons? Check it out and it may make your life easier! I know that some even have applications for your phone!!!

Conserving that thing we call energy...

We just received our energy bill in the mail and it reported to us that we were using double the energy from last month. Oops! Granted it is cold outside (it snowed today for the first time this winter!!!!!) and so the heater is one a bit more but we could still practice better energy conserving etiquette. For example, Tom is constantly reminding me to turn lights off that are not necessary and I am on a mission to remember to turn the heat off when we go to bed or leave the house. So, I have two ideas that will help you fell better about your energy.

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1. Every time I drive home from Portland, OR to Spokane, WA I look forward to seeing the massive crop of gigantic wind turbines (or as I like to call them, wind mobiles) on the hillsides. They are quite beautiful and somehow peaceful to watch. Well anyways, the Portland General Electric company has a renewable energy program  that allows customers to choose renewable sources of energy instead of those that pollute our environment. We have chosen to pay a little extra on our monthly bill in order to be a part of the Green Source source program. The energy we use and pay for comes from renewable sources such as the new wind (from the peaceful wind mobiles!), low-impact hydro power, new biomass, and new geothermal energy. So at least I can feel a little better about the energy usage, right?

2. I am really excited to share this fun gadget with all of you. I came across this great product the other day and immediately knew I had to test them out. So, I immediately an used an amazon gift card I had to purchase two of these babies and anxiously awaited until they arrived in my mailbox. It is called the Belkin Conserve Socket and runs about $10. The basic idea behind the socket is that it will easily allow you to conserve energy in your home. I am so guilty of plugging items into the outlet and leaving them there for eternity. Okay maybe not eternity but you get the picture. When you use this socket, you can choose how long (1/2 hr, 3 hrs, and 6 hrs) you want it to be on. So, for example I will plug my phone into it and instead of leaving it there overnight, I will set the timer for 3 hours and then the socket will shut off. It is genius! If you are not able to purchase the conserve sockets, think about unplugging items in your house when they are not in use.

I hope this has inspired you to think of some ways you can reduce your energy usage and save some money along the way.

Organizing

I recently did a post about organizing your clutter and somehow my little fingers deleted it..boo! Hopefully I can recreate the magic of the post once again while keeping the mouse away from the "delete" button.

When my humble abode is cluttered, my body feels cluttered. I don't feel inspired to create things or cook a meal. I don't feel like folding laundry only to put it into a cluttered dresser and I tend to hide the clutter behind doors-out os site out of mind. Well I have decided that while attempting to simplify our life, we need to desperately de-clutter our belongings. No one needs 3 spatulas or those hand towels you never use but thought were cute. Really, you don't NEED them. So, one saturday afternoon I made it my mission to de-clutter a few of our cabinets, kitchen drawers, and pantry. Everything that I came had to go through the same application process to earn a spot in our kitchen. Do we use this at least once a month? Is it necessary in our lives? Do we already have a duplicate? And so on. After purging the failed applicants, I slightly organized the areas to be more pleasing to my eye. I would love to have some fancy matching containers, these ones from Ikea to put all our stuff in and make it look like those kitchens in the Ikea catalog but that is unrealistic with our little budget. So I did my best. Because the best blogs have pictures, I have also uploaded some pictures of my progress. Take a look and then start thinking about your drawers, closets, and cabinets that need a little tlc from you this weekend.

After

Before 

Before

After

Natalie Closner

I am really excited about this post. I know that it doesn't have much to do with simplifying your life but sometimes we have to veer off course so deal with it. Maybe we could think of it as a "adding some joy to life" post. Yes, I like that.

So, last night Tom and I had the pleasure of attending a friend's EP release party. I felt fancy just saying I was going to a release party, like I was famous or something. We all know that I am not famous, but this girl I know, Natalie Closner, is going to famous. The party was fabulous and we really enjoyed supporting such a genuinely lovely person. If you have ever enjoyed artists like Ingrid Michaelson or Sara Bareilles I know you will enjoy Natalie's sound. Her new EP is titled Pseudo Love and can be found on iTunes. My favorite song on the album is titled Suspense. I dare you to check it out!

(photo belongs to J. Stockton)