How to save money and the planet!

A post on Mrs January's Facebook page made me think of this post.

She asked what people did to save money. Well, for me, it's not to waste.

So here are things that I do for us to save money on things that would otherwise be thrown in the garbage.

1- Use cloth diapers

There are SO many kinds of cloth diapers these days that I'm convinced that there's a kind for everyone! For my first born, we used prefolds. The come in 2 sizes and have 3 rows, with 4 layers of cotton (or bamboo if you choose) on either side and 6-8 layers in the middle. You just put one end on the change under the bum, then fold on top and fasten with a diaper pin or Snappi. You then add a waterproof diaper cover and voilà!

Here's what a prefold diaper looks like:



And a prefold with a snappi (instead of pins - super quick and safe to use!)



Here are the cute covers you put on top:






This worked well, but my second son has extremely sensitive skin prone to eczema, so prefolds didn't work. We had to use a all-in-one. And since we were dishing out money for all-in-ones, we figured it was best to get a one-size-fits-all all-in-one diaper!

Here's what we got:






The prefolds cost about 150$ in total for everything (including all sizes and covers). This was for 36 diapers and 6+8 covers. I sold them for 75$. So it cost me 75$ to diaper a child for 2 years.

The one-size all-in-one cost quite a bit more, but worth it! It cost about 500$ for 25 diapers. They will have lasted 2 months shy of 3 years. I will change the velcro and they will look as good as new! And they work perfectly! I can then sell them for about half of what I paid. So it will have cost me 250$ to diaper a child for 3 years. GREAT in my opinion! I also use cloth wipes (just plain baby wash clothes - we got tons at my baby shower, so that was free). I just add a few drops of Tea Tree oil or Lavender oil and wet the wipes and they're good to go and disinfect! I also use 2 cloth wet bags for dirty diapers (one for home, one for the diaper bag). That's about it!

While I was saving money and the planet with the kids, I decided to do the same for us. We compost and recycle for the earth, but I also grow a garden for fruits and vegetables in the summer. We don't use paper towels. We just use a cloth and wash everything once a week. For cleaners, we use natural products like vinegar.

On a feminine note, I have found a great product! It's a cup that holds all the flow and you can use it for about a year or even sometimes more. It's not dangerous like a tampon (because it doesn't soak up natural fluids) and it's super easy to know when to change it (you feel it).

Here it is:




We also try to use as many reusable containers as we can.

So that's about it for now! I might think of more ways to save money, so I will let you know if I find more!

Today was hard...

I know I haven't had a chance to post about Patrick's birthday yet. I will get to it soon! This week has been a busy week! We have been running around trying to find all the school supplies before they run out and my youngest Anthony has decided that he doesn't want to wear diapers anymore. So let's just say it's been "busy"!

But today was the summit of hard. The boys have been OFF for about a week now. Oldest is stressed about school, is jealous of the little one potty training (and us making a big fuss every pee & poo), is regressing, being clingy, etc. Youngest is better, but he's hard-headed and has an attitude.

So this mixed it to everything else plus the boys making mess on top of mess on top of mess and not taking care of their toys was driving me CRAZY!!!

SO, after the boys almost completely destroyed a super nice and expensive Playmobil set that I spent 2hrs assembly that Patrick got for his birthday, I shipped them both outside and I put ALL their toys away. Now my first floor is bare. There's nothing left except a few books. I can't stand it anymore!

And of course they come in and don't care. Ugh... Hopefully they'll care soon enough! But I think I will only bring 2-3 things in at a time and see how they act with it.

Thankfully they were cute at lunch and we talked and then Anthony went to bed like an angel. And when he wakes up we're heading out to pick up Robert (husband) and then we're going swimming with my future sister-in-law & my nephew and then the boys are going to have supper at their grandparents while WE shop - ALONE!!! That will very nice! I NEED that break!!! Poor little things of mine. I love them to pieces, but they can certainly get to me sometimes!

It's been a while!

With my oldest's son birthday party yesterday, I have been busy with preparations! We were over 30 people and there was 12 kids aged 1-6. It was SUPER fun and my son loved it! I'm happy.

During that party, my couponing came up a few times and even though some people are pretty impressed, a lot of people had negative things to say about it. So I will take this opportunity to make a few things clear.

First, if I happen to find a good deal and it's for things I don't need a lot of, I will donate the stuff to everyone I know and if no one takes it, then I will donate to shelters.

Also, I don't spend TONS of time couponing. It takes more grocery shopping planning, but I used to do that anyways, so it only takes a few more minutes to iron out all the details. It's that simple!

Anyways, that's all I have to say for now!

I will be back with details of yesterday's party!

My biggest little man...

Today, I woke up happy. Yes, I was tired from waking up 3 times during the night because of the kids, but happy. At 4am, my oldest, Patrick, woke up. He walked to our door and knocked. He wanted to be put back to bed - by ME. This hardly ever happens! Because of his condition, he has a hard time showing emotions towards people. That combined with the fact that he's a 5 year old boy wanting his independence makes me feel not very loves sometimes! I know he loves me, but when you have to pin him down just to get a hug or to give him a kiss on the cheek, it's hard! I'm not his #1 anymore (like when he was a baby), now I'm #2. Which is fine, but it makes me sad.

So this early morning, when he woke up and asked for me, I was happy. I laid down next to him and he turned around, gave me a hung, touched my arm and fell asleep. It was the cutest thing! I stayed there a few long seconds just enjoying the feeling... He woke up again half an hour later, so I realized something must be wrong (since he wouldn't talk) and I realized he had eaten a few bites of a sausage at 6pm and hadn't eaten a thing since 2pm. He hardly ate all day because he was too anxious about his birthday and starting school. So I brought him a big glass of milk to fill his empty tummy 'till morning and he fell asleep and is still asleep now - at 9am! Poor little thing.

So for now, we're going to lay off with the school and his birthday. We're trying to get him excited for it (because we are!), but he's just getting more and more anxious. When a going-to-be 5 year old refuses to go to a party store to buy stuff for his birthday, there's definitely something wrong!

Here's my cute biggest little man:

My "extreme savings" of yesterday!

As you saw on Saturday, we saved a lot. But the Walmart in Orléans didn't have everything we wanted.

So, we decided to go look at the Walmart in Hull since I was babysitting my little nephew for the first time yesterday since his parents and my mother were painting their new house all day.

At this Walmart, they had everything we wanted and more! I didn't even have enough coupons!

So we bought:

24 cans of Campbells soups (all kinds)

4 Listerine Zero bottles

6 boxes of extra strength Aspirin

2 Meow Mix cups

1 La Coupe mousse

Total: 12,15!!!

I also scored myself 18 free Smart Sources from the dépanneur in the town next to where we live (3 min. away from here). They've accepted to give us all the old Sunday newspapers on Monday morning! YAY! We will buy 5 just in case they have none (the owner said that it does happen sometimes). So I now have 23 Smart Sources to clip! I know what my evening will look like!

Me, myself & I

This is something I struggle with daily... ME! I *want* to take care of myself and do things I like, but I just don't know how!

I see a lot of people going to the gym, taking classes, going out once a week, scrapbooking with friends, etc. I have done all this, but after having 2 kids, it just kind of went downhill. Before kids, obviously it was easy. I had myself to take care of and eventually my boyfriend who then became my husband. Even after our first child, I used to find it pretty easy. When I was a teenager, I used to play hockey and I used to run. In my last year of high school, I played for the basket ball team and started downhill skiing. I had practised cross country skiing for years with my family, so I had a good base (I used to like finding the highest hills to go down!) After I got married, I started going to the gym. I used to get up before 6am and get there for opening (6am) and would work out for about 45 min. and then shower and leave for work. I really liked it! I did this 'till my baby bump got in the way of most of my work out! I put my membership on hold (they let me keep my contract with no penalty) and after I felt good enough after birth, I went back. I continued this for a while, but it got really hard when I started back at work. In my first teaching job, I started at 9am. But after I had the baby, I wanted to find a school that was closer to home, that started earlier (so that I could finish earlier and not be stuck in major traffic) and I also wanted a better grade. So I changed to a school that started an hour earlier. Not that bad, but I had to now leave around 6:25am instead of 7am-7:30am to get there on time. BIG difference when a gym only opens at 6am! I know I might be making up excuses, but that's what I told myself.

A short while later, I got pregnant with number and started to have health issues pretty soon on, so no big exercise routine then neither! After I gave birth, I walked a lot, and still do, but it's not the same.

I see most of my friends and colleagues doing a bunch of fun things and seriously, I don't know how they do it! I really admire them! I kept telling myself that when the kids got older and into a routine, they would sleep well and I would have all evenings to myself (something I rarely got with 2 kids, 2 and under). And it became true! Since November, the kids started going to daycare on the days I worked and had to get up before 6am, so we had to put them to bed by 6:30pm is we wanted them to function the next day. So I usually had from 6:30pm to 9:30pm to do WHATEVER I wanted! And my husband wasn't keeping me home, I just didn't want to do anything! After the kids were put to bed, there was dishes to do, a bit of laundry to fold, lunches to pack, clothes to prepare for the next day, sometimes a bit of work and some sewing and I was just finished. I just had no more energy left! All I could do is plop on the couch and stare at nothing, the TV or computer. Even talking on the phone was hard on the brain! Am I just weird, I don't know?! But something NEEDS to be done!

Even this summer, I'm home all day and all night. I don't like going out, I have a super nice elliptical machine I got for my birthday, I had nice walking paths, but somehow, I stay plopped. I always find something that NEEDS to be done! Dishes, food, sewing, couponing, laundry, activities, etc!

I wonder if I'm the only one like this?

I know I can do it.

I know I can start relaxing for real.

I know I can take care of myself.

I know I can loose weight.

I know I can feel good again.

Now I must change all the cans for wills...

Our big shopping trip!

Our oldest son's fifth birthday party is next Saturday (he will turn 5 years old on the 15th), so I had to plan food for about 25 people. It's not that much since usually we're closer to 40! But I still had to plan!

So we decided to make hot dogs and hamburger on the BBQ plus broccoli salad, broccoli slaw, macaroni salad, Cesar salad plus a cheese & cracker platter, a vegetable platter and of course, a nice cake!

Thankfully, I'm making most of the food homemade (taste great plus it saves money!), but it still requires a lot of "specials-hunting"!

So here's what I bought:

5lbs lean ground beef
1 pack of Spalding bacon
2 frozen Ristorante pizzas
3 dozen eggs
3 pints blueberries
2 containers mushrooms
4 romaine lettuce heads
24 corn on the cob
6 large green peppers
2 lbs organic carrots
2 celery
2 Kool-Aid jammers (10 packs each)
4 boxes Christie crackers
2 boxes Dale cookies
4 boxes of Chewy granola bars
4 pounds Lactancia butter
2 4L 2% milk
10 cans "cream of" Campbell soups

4 Black Diamond cheese bars (big 500g ones)

3 Pepsi 6X710ml Pepsi

1 bag Lay's chip

1 Philly dip

* Last 2 purchases for Robert!

Pillsbury crescent rolls

Puff cereal

Onion dip

Fresh-baked Italian bread

5 big family sized boxes cereal (including Frosted Flakes, Corn Pops, Mini Wheats, etc.)

2 Meow Mix special cups

Baking powder

Salad dressing

153 piece heavy duty clear cutlery pack

Aluminum foil

Parchment paper

Ribbon

2 extra strength Aspirin boxes (50 counts)

Topsy Turvy upside-down strawberry plan holder (since bugs keep eating my nice strawberries!)

I still have a few things to buy for the party (like buns and icing sugar at Costco and some (minimal) decorations plus some poly-beads at Micheals for the party favors, but everything is quite cheap and for Micheals, I have a 40% off coupon that I will be using.

So, how much do you think all of this cost?

Here's the breakdown with prices (per item)

*PM = Price Match

5lbs lean ground beef - 0,80$/lb (cashier made a mistake that I only noticed way later, should have been 1,97$/lb) PM
1 pack of Spalding bacon - 2,47$
2 frozen Ristorante pizzas - 2,25$ (after 1,50$ coupon) & PM
3 dozen eggs - 1,66$ PM
3 pints blueberries - 1,66$ PM
2 containers mushrooms - 1,75$ PM
4 romaine lettuce heads - 0,44$ PM
24 corn on the cob - 0,25$ PM
6 large green peppers - 0,88$/lb PM
2 lbs organic carrots - 1,97$ (for whole bag)
2 celery - 0,97$
2 Kool-Aid jammers (10 packs each) - 1,44$ PM
4 boxes Christie crackers - 1,44$ PM
2 boxes Dale cookies - 1,44$ PM
4 boxes of Chewy granola bars - 1,44$ PM
4 pounds Lactancia butter - 1,34$ PM
2 4L 2% milk - 4,47$
10 cans "cream of" Campbell soups - 0,59$ PM

Bananas - 0,67$/lb

4 Black Diamond cheese bars (big 500g ones) - 4,44$

3 Pepsi 6X710ml Pepsi - 1,97$ PM

1 bag Lay's chip - 2,47$

1 Philly dip - 2,47$

* Last 2 purchases for Robert!

Pillsbury crescent rolls 0,87$ (after 1$ coupon)

Puff cereal - 3$

Onion dip - 1$

Fresh-baked Italian bread - 0,97$

5 big family sized boxes cereal (including Frosted Flakes, Corn Pops, Mini Wheats, etc.) - 4,97$ (come with a 5$ gas card per box)

2 Meow Mix special cups (free with coupons!)

Baking powder - 2,58$

Salad dressing - 1,42$

Helman's real mayo - 3,49$

153 piece heavy duty clear cutlery pack - 5,98$

Alcan aluminum foil - 3,98$ for 100' (I like quality in my foil!)

Parchment paper - 2,97$

Ribbon - 3,50$ (to make MANY "I Spy" bags including favors!)

2 extra strength Aspirin boxes (50 counts) - (MADE me 1$ each!)

Topsy Turvy upside-down strawberry plan holder (since bugs keep eating my nice strawberries!) - 5$ on clearance from 12,97$!

So the grand total is 175$ (since the 1st cashier we had made a mistake on the green peppers, the 3rd one just gave them for free since it was way too complicated to fix after we had payed). And we have 25$ coming back to us in gas (that we need anyways!). So really, 150$ for ALL that stuff. We had 3 big Costco bags and we didn't have enough room. Even the grocery cart was overflowing!

Since we did not yet receive the 25$ gas card, I will put the original total.

Paid: 175$

Would have paid: 258$

Total saved: Almost 84$!!! Plus 25$ coming to us!

Future Shop Gift Card Giveaway!

As this blog is about my life and that includes saving money, I will no be doing the Future Shop challenges to get up to 20$ in gift certificates and chances to win the grand prize.

One of the activities that give you 3 credits (you can get 1-3 credits per activity) is to tell the story of how you broke an electronic device. I have a lot of experience with this, so here's my story!

We bought a nice laptop in 2008 (so it's just under 3 years) and I love the thing. Used it many time a day. The thing is, I don't really know how to take care of things, so I just used it, used it and USED IT. The screen was so dirty you could barely see (I tried cleaning it with a cloth, but nothing fancy like a screen cleaner), you could barely hear from the speakers and the keyboard was barely working. You also have to keep it plugged all.the.time or it would die. Oh! I forgot! The fan in it wasn't working, so it would overheat all the time! Instead of getting it fixed, I just kept using it.

One day, I decided to unplug it to let it get a break. Well, next time I came to plug it in, I started it and it just would boot-up. It was dead... I laid it to rest on it's shelve in the kitchen cabinet and left it there. I missed it a lot.

My brother-in-law wanted to take it to see if he could do something about it. I felt bad that I let it get that bad. But SOMEHOW, he managed to make it live again!!!

So I'm not typing on my nice laptop once more and it's almost like brand new! Except the battery. But I don't care! It works and I will try to take care of it from now on!

Not much to say today...

I'm tired because my baby (almost 3 years old) is stuffy AGAIN. His health has been a constant issue for the past 2 years (he's sick pretty much all the time since he's been 7 months old and caught the first wave of the at-the-time-unknown H1N1 flu. He was even due for his 18 month vaccination (since he was never able to get them!) and the nurse cancelled them again today because he's not 100%... I hope he gets better soon! Poor thing is stuffy and whiny and just isn't himself. And he's up all night! Well, we had a nice month of good sleep...

Here's my little always sick angel:

Homemade pizza poppers

For anyone that likes pizza in any form, I've got a real treat for you!

I don't know if you know what pizza poppers are, but they're little balls of pizza.

These are not the ones I made, but it's to give you an idea. Anyways, as I was saying, they are wonderful! I used a lazy way of making them - using my bread machine! I made a quick & easy dough using water, flour, yeast, oregano and garlic powder (found a recipe online). While the machine was working, I cut 24 cubes of mozzarella cheese, I cut 24 slices of pepperoni (I bought a full sausage - they cost a lot less and taste better!) I then got working on the sauce. Once again, I searched online (well, Robert did) and I made the sauce. When the dough was ready (1h25min later), I separated the ball in 24 pieces and then I flattened each little walnut-size piece in a 5" circle and then added a dab of sauce, then the mozzarella cube and then the pepperoni (I made some with a whole slice and some with minced pepperoni) and to finished them, I folded the dough up to the center and placed them seam down on the cookie sheet. Then they went in the oven for 18 min. at 400 degrees and voila! Great homemade pizza poppers!

School is starting soon!

And that means that my baby is starting school - REAL school!!! He's going to be 5 in 12 short days! He's going to maternelle (kindergarden - when they start where I live).

This means SCHOOL SUPPLIES! As child and teenager, this was my favorite time of the year. I like it as much as Christmas! It meant I got to reuse last year's stuff that was still in good shape and buy bright new clean things to help me through my school year. Then I got to sort it, organize it and label everything! I know I'm weird, but I always loved school. Kind of fitting that I became a teacher. Where I work (other province), everything is supplied by the school except for school bags and lunch boxes. It would make me sad to NOT have to buy things for my kids, but I wouldn't mind saving the money! School supplies where I live cost a fortune! Thankfully my son is only starting kindergarden, so it's not that bad! And he might get a few things for his birthday from people too, so that will help. He did however want an orange school back and lunch box (he LOVES orange). So we bought the ones we saw since there was only 1 orange lunch box at ALL the store I search in and only 2 kinds of bags and 1 felt cheap and wasn't as nice (like a dull orange). I will take pictures and post them. His new bags are very nice and he's extremely anxious to start school and take the big yellow bus every day!

For anyone with kids looking for deals, this week at Bureau en Gros (Staples in Ottawa), the Crayola wax crayons are 0,80$ and the Crayola colored pencils are 1,25$! They also have cheap eraser, glue sticks, exercise books, etc. But my son doesn't need all that - he's still young!

My first "extreme couponing" experiences

Before I share a few of my shopping experiences, I will tell you a few ways to save money while shopping.

First of all, ALWAYS check the "quick sale" rack or "discount" rack. Usually things will be 30%-50% off and sometimes even 75%-90% off!!! Usually there are clothes items missing a button or a zipper (super easy and cheap to fix) or food that expires that day or within a few days. This is no big deal because you can just freeze the stuff! I once bought 14 huge bananas for 1,50$! That's a steal!

Secondly, try to only shop on the "outer aisles" of the store. You pass through the deli counter, fruits and vegetables, breads, meats, frozen things and milk products. We do groceries like this most of the time and actually go "in" the middle aisles once a month for things like canned soups, pasta, or cereal! These middle aisles are usually processed stuff or prepackaged things that you can prepare yourself at home.

Next is: price match. Stores like Walmart, Maxi and I'm sure they are more in Ontario price match. You just bring in flyers from other stores and they will match the price! We always save about 25% of the total grocery bill because of this!

We usually try to plan meals around specials (if zucchini is on special, then we can make a zucchini bake, stir fries, zucchini sticks, zucchini muffins or freeze them!) You have to be flexible, but it makes things a little less boring!

Moving along, we have coupons. Within the last few weeks, I have been following blogs (like MrsJanuary) and Facebook pages (SweetCoupons) and been checking out sites like save.ca or websaver.ca . I also joined many sites to see upcoming deals, specials or coupons. I have also contacted most companies we use by email to tell them how much our family enjoys their products and if they had any coupons to send to us. And most of them did! I wrote them back to thank them all. I only emailed the companies we buy from (or would), so there's no waste. The next way to get good coupons are from newspaper inserts. I have none of these because we don't read the newspaper (prefer reading online or for free at work), but I have asked a few people that don't use coupons but that buy newspapers to save them for us! I will also contact newspaper stands and other places to see if I can buy some (or get them for free) the next day. If not, I will start buying newspapers! The next good insert is due to come out on August 4th by the way! Stores also have coupons. Walmart accepts all stores' coupons, so you don't necessarily have to shop at 10 different stores to get the discounts.

So without any further blabbing from me, here are our best deals!

First trip - Walmart - Total 30$ before coupons or price matching

We bought all this and we got BACK 2,50$!

Next shopping trip was at Walmart again but this time we got 30$ worth of stuff for only 13$

More about my life

So yesterday I left off with my wonderful children and promised to come back and talk about my new extreme couponing experience.

I will start by explaining WHY I started to use coupons. I consider myself to be a person who doesn't like to waste money for nothing. I always look for deals, specials or coupons whenever possible. But over the years, with jobs and two kids, I didn't find the time to do this as often as I should have. All changed not too long ago. My husband decided to follow his dream of opening a video store in a time when video stores were going downhill with all this new technology and cheap DVD & Blu-Ray discs at any store. It wouldn't have been so bad if he had had the time and money to invest in his business, but he did not. Everything (including the business) was bought on credit. On top of that, I was 6 months pregnant with number 2 and had pregnancy-related health issues. NOT the best time to start up a business, but it was his dream. So we went along with it.

Less than a year into it, he realized it wasn't making enough money. He decided to work more at the store. A few months later, he realized how bad things were getting. The store was eating all the money we were making (which wasn't much since I was only working 3 days a week). He then started working at the store about 40hrs a week on top of his regular job. I had become a single mother to two boys and had to take care of the house, the kids and still go to work and make everything work somehow! I was exhausted, he was killing himself and the kids missed their father. At this same time, on the anniversary of my father's death, I learnt my mother had uterine cancer. For months I insisted she had something wrong, but doctors would say it was nothing. But it was. I was now faced with loosing my only parent left. This was not an option. So because of my mother and my husband's failing store, we decided to move and make a full apartment suite in the basement for my mother. We found a great neighborhood and built a new house. It was really nice!

In the mean time, the store was lost. We couldn't keep making it live. It was costing us thousands of dollars a month just to keep afloat. It couldn't continue. It was for sale, but with bad numbers and no profit, it was a loss. We sold what we could for peanuts and just absorbs then debt into our new mortgage. At this point, our credit was shot too. We just had too much debt. So we moved with hardly no money to survive. But we were determined to make it work!

So we moved, got stuff done, under estimated how much it would cost to make the house and land "livable" with 2 young kids (like a fence, grass and a deck for the 6' high patio door!) So I had to start working more hours, cutting into my family time. But what had to be done had to be done!

I know I'm blabbing on about how I got here, but I must explain for you to understand and to clear everything up in my head (to explain it to myself I guess!)

I will continue... I worked as much as I could as a supply teacher since I have to decide 6 months before time if I want to work full time or not and 6 months earlier, we seemed to be in OK shape. But even with that, we weren't making it. The work was not steady enough and we had a lot of debt to repay. At the end of the month, after making all payments, we couldn't live. So we had to pay for gas with our credit cards and buy food with the line of credit. Things were not getting paid off. Even our house taxes were late! We were in BAD shape. We cut everywhere we could, but things just added up too fast. We were sinking. Then winter came, and a 2-week break from school. Which I usually love, but not this year. It meant no supply teaching and no extra pay. My regular little 3-day pay would be nothing. This year, the kids got less than 10$ worth of gifts for Christmas and my husband & I got each other nothing for the second year in a row. We just couldn't afford it.

By January, we couldn't afford groceries. I would depend on people to bring us leftover or for us to use what we could from our freezer or cupboards. It was not ideal at all. We were living on meal plans, but barely making it. Even with skipping a bunch of payments (most lenders let you skip a payment a year if you ask them), we weren't making it! So my point was to work as much as I could while school was still on and think of something to make us live through the summer months (while I was off). I had a small sewing business on the side, but only making a big max of 10$/month (you don't go far with that these days!)

And then COUPONING came into the picture!

I had heard people talk about a show called Extreme Couponing. I hadn't seen it before, so I decided to watch it. It was VERY interesting! My husband & I were discussing how it would be great to be able to do this in Canada, but that it wasn't possible. But then I stumbled upon a site on Internet (Mrs. January) that explains how to extreme coupon in Canada! So I became addicted!

At the moment, I think our grocery bill hangs around the 500$ mark for a month for 4 people who eat a lot. That's great in my opinion! The first thing I started doing was price matching (they do this at Walmart and Maxi where I live - you bring in competitors' flyers and coupons and they will match them). Then, the coupons. I will not go into details at the moment, but I will leave you with this:

We went to Walmart, bought 30$ worth of food and products and they GAVE us 1,50$ back!!! Now that's impressive!

What we got...