Peach Baby Food

In all the peachy goodness around here it was actually kind of fun last night to cut up cherries to dry!

But we love peaches...all of us...especially Baby.

So I am making lots of peach baby food and decided to figure out how much this is costing me!

I bought about 12 dozen peaches on sale for $0.47 per pound. The only thing that stopped me from buying more was the selection....

Each bag of a dozen cost on average $2.00, so 6 peaches cost $1.

Today I pealed and pitted 6 peaches and ran them through the food processor and got 18 ice cubes of peaches, and 2 cubes is about the same as one jar of baby food in the stores.

We made the equivalent of 9 jars of peach baby food for $1, or $0.11 a jar.

Needless to say I am making lots of baby food with these peaches! This is pretty much the rock bottom price on peaches for the year, but even buying fruit and veggies at the "regular price" still results in substantial savings over buying the jars.

Cherry Tomato Overload

Remember when I said that the tomatoes were producing and that I had accidentally double fertilized them? Well, we are at risk of being overwhelmed with cherry tomatoes - such a hardship! :-)

We are eating them and enjoying them heartily! But for Frugal Friday this week I wanted to share with you a very inexpensive pasta sauce recipe that is only good this time of year and only with fresh off the vine cherry tomatoes (we are enjoying the sweet baby girl variety!)

Pasta Fasta

2 cups of fresh cherry tomatoes washed, dried, and halved (quartered if they are big)
2 cloves garlic, diced
2 tbsp dried basil (adjust to your liking, and substitute fresh if your garden is giving you that)
3 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper to taste (I usually just do this at the table as the tomatoes have not needed the salt and pepper is iffy for Miss Pear)

Mix the above ingredients together in the morning, cover, and let marinade on the counter all day, stirring occasionally.

At supper time cook enough pasta for 2-4 according to package directions, drain, return to pot, and toss with marinaded tomatoes (scraping bowl for all that yumminess). Toss well and serve warm.

If you want you could add shredded mozzarella cheese, but we never do and don't miss it!

We figure that last night's supper for three, which will also be enough for tonight's supper as I apparently had a heavy pasta hand, cost all of about $1, total.

Garden of Weeding

To date I have identified 4 ground cover weeds in our garden - this does not include the other kind of weeds...sigh.

The problem with the ground cover weeds is that they keep coming back - even in spots where we dug down over an inch! And weeding is becoming a problem as at 35 weeks the ground seems to be getting further and further away, so the weeds are growing where I cannot reach them.

Not to be outdone by weeds of all things, and refusing to go down in defeat. I decided to try an old trick used to kill grass - put down news paper!

So we carefully put down the newspaper.



Being certain to leave enough room around the fruit trees, plants and sprinklers. Then over top of that we spread compost, grass clippings and leaves.

We began this process a little over 5 weeks ago, and the weeds underneath are slowly dying as the newspaper suffocates them, but not our trees. Unfortunately some are growing out of the holes, but there are a lot less to deal with!

The newspaper is also acting like a mulch, so it is keeping things nice and moist in this heat, which is a nice benefit! Over time the newspaper will break down thanks to the sun, etc. In fact, we have already had to add more paper in some spots.

So the newspaper was part of our regular subscription - no addition money was spent. The water was part of our regular watering except for a bit the day we did the project, just enough to get the paper wet, and the whole project is chemical free.

That definitely sounds frugal to me! Head on over to Crystal's for Frugal Friday!

Money related changes

This past weekend there were a couple articles in the local papers in Southern California that caught me by surprise. One said that economists were claiming that they have not seen these kinds of spending shifts since the 70's and another said that marketing gurus were wondering which of these changes would stick. A final article that caught my attention said that groceries in my region of the country had gone up 8.5% quarter over quarter.

So all that being said, I got to thinking.

First off, I am SO grateful that the Lord prompted me to begin shopping with coupons and sales over a year ago. It left me nicely stocked up and better prepared to deal with these increases. We have yet to increase our grocery/household budget, and all the diapers I have bought in anticipation of baby's arrival have fit into that budget (3 jumbo packs of NB, 5 jumbo packs of size 1, and 2 x 192 count boxes of size 1-2, all Pampers, plus wipes). I say this and note that my household goods are well stocked, except for toilet paper which I am watching for a sale on, and that my pantry is relatively well stocked. My freezer needs a bit of help, but I have not been to Costco yet this month for grocery shopping. (And I don't feel the need to do a huge freezer stock up before baby arrives as my MIL will be here to help, and will take over kitchen duties, when she leaves our church will bring meals every second day for two weeks, and then my mom will be here.)

Will I take a small break from CVS and my multiple store shopping for a month or two when baby arrives? Probably, but I am guessing that on most household items I could go well into November without making a purchase at this point, something I have been working hard on. The only exceptions I see are toilet paper, Kleenex, and possibly dishwasher detergent, but they are on my watch list for the rest of July and August.

The changes we have made in the past year and half in our spending habits have included:

• a set grocery budget each month, and stick to it!
  
• getting all our household (except diapers) to fit in there each month in addition to our groceries
  
• rigorously shopping sales and combining coupons (including CVS)
  
• doing without if it is not on sale (within reason, I will still always buy milk!)
• doing without in general on some items that were not as essential as we thought
• making all our own baked goods (except for when we are sick and need a little help, but I still try to have a stash in our freezer)
• not "stretching" when we bought our new home - we bought what we could afford.
• praying more diligently about our finances
• planting a garden of what we use the most and trying to learn about canning (I am hoping to learn how to make pickles this year!)
• being cautious in how we use our water etc, including collection the water that would just go down the sink when waiting for hot water for dishes - I give our fruit trees extra water this way!
  
• really focusing on using what we have rather than needing new or just running out and buying what strikes my fancy because we have the money.
• making better use of our leftovers and focusing on what we are throwing out so that we know where we are being wasteful.
• sharing and borrowing non-consumable goods with my neighbor rather than buying our own.
  

All this said, I don't believe that any of these changes are ones that are going to die. I think all these changes are here to stay because as the Lord makes more room in our budget there are things we want to do with our money - pay off our house (our only debt), save for retirement, save for our children's education, maybe get a second car eventually (yes, we may very well be the only family in Southern California to live with one vehicle). There are better things to do with our money that just frivolously spend it!

However, we did not need experts to tell us to make these changes, we were already making them when all the talking heads started expounding on the changes we should all make!

Unfortunately I see lots of families in our area who do not have any interest in making these kinds of changes. They just make do now trusting that the markets will recover and they will be able to pay of the debt they are racking up now, if their rebate check is already gone.

So do I think that these changes are lasting for us? Definitely!
Do I think that the majority of people will stick to the changes they are making now? Probably not, especially in Southern California.

What big changes have you made in your spending habits? Do you think they will be permanent changes?

Do you think people will stick to these new spending habits overall, or just a few of us?

For great Frugal Friday ideas, head on over to Crystal's!

Saving drops of water

I have my sick little daughter curled up on the couch watching a favorite video. She was so sick during the night that she was up enough that she is now exhausted, and is too tired to enjoy reading, but is too awake to sleep, so we are in the same room each having our screen time.

But the fever stayed under control last night, and she is drinking stuff well, so I am pleased with that.

So, while I have a quick minute, on to Frugal Friday.

In California we are officially in a drought. I am a little disappointed that the past season's rain was not enough to push us out of this, but will continue to pray for abundant, well spaced rain (if we get too much our canyons have mud slides that are very dangerous).

While we pray for rain, we want to be good stewards of the water we have, including for our garden!

For our garden we have our timers set to what the minimum recommendations are, and we watch to make certain that there is no run off, and indication of over watering. We also check our sprinkler system regularly to ensure that it is working (no broken heads, etc), and we have it run during the night so we do not lose lots of water to evaporation before it can soak in!

We have a newer water efficient dish washer, so I make sure it is full and run it because I cannot wash that many dishes for that little water, and then I try to be very careful with the water for the dishes I have to wash by hand.

When I am running water to wash dishes I discovered that I "waste" over a gallon of water to get hot water! So I keep a plastic jug by the kitchen sink and put all that water in the jug. When it is full I pour it into the garden wherever extra water is needed (hence we can keep our sprinklers at the minimum).

We do enjoy a water table out back and the inflatable pool, but again, we try to reclaim that water for our garden, and Miss Pear loves to help!

We do have a front loader washing machine that is actually rated as water efficient as it adjusts its water level for each load based on sensors. It will adjust down to as small a load as one shirt, but I still try to run at least medium loads so that I am making good use of my water.

Unless there is a good reason not to wait, we shower every second day rather than each day. This also helps our skin to not dry out, and makes my hair cooperate much better (it also means we save on hair gel!)

And the motivation for this? Well, every summer water bills go up in California due to consumption. But as they call for conservation there is the concern that the price per gallon will be upped to make up for lost revenue if we get into a forced conservation situation. So we thought we would begin working on this ahead of time, and then enjoy the benefits now!

Some other things we plan on doing if it becomes to forced conservation is to save the water from starting the showers and baths, and bath water in general.

We are certainly not experts, but are starting to make those baby steps to help us!

Quick and Easy Cookies

This is my plan this week - to use up some of those boxes of cake mix I got for free or next to free before they expire. (I bought them last summer / fall, so the fact that they are expiring is all my fault!) After all, it is only frugal if you use up the free (or next to free) stuff you get!

So today I will be following a recipe I found online. I could not find it again to link directly, but I think it was from Monica. It is the quickest and easiest cookie recipe I have:

Cake Mix Cookies

1 box cake mix, any flavor
2 eggs
1/2 c. vegetable oil or applesauce
any add-ins you want
(i.e. - chocolate chips, heath bits, raisins, craisins, etc.)

Mix together and cook for ~10 min at 350.

We LOVE Spice Cake Mix with Raisins (and either applesauce of pear sauce instead of oil).

Happy Cookie Baking!

Oh - for theology from my daughter who will be 3 next weekend, go here, too funny!

And for some bloggy fun, go here!

For more wonderful Kitchen Tips, head on over to Tammy's! And for lots of great frugal tips, head on over to Crystal's!

Fixing a Sick Camera

Sometimes it just pays to have a family who chats about the silly things, about the boring things, about the everyday things. I mentioned that on Mother's Day our trusty point and shoot Canon digital camera died a painful death - at least it was painful to me! And it was no longer in warranty, the first thing to check when expensive things break! In passing I mentioned this to my brother-in-law, and he had heard in passing from someone he works with about a recall a few years ago.

A few years ago would work as our camera was not exactly new anymore! So we looked into and found this! The exact defect we were having was covered under the recall - they pay all the shipping and fix it for free!

So when something expensive breaks, look around a little bit - you might be pleasantly surprised! More and more we live in a disposable society, and the result is a lot of items are recalled for various reasons, but these things are not always advertised very well if it is not a children's toy, so it really is worth looking into it!

And it is hard to get more Frugal Friday than free!

P.S. I have an important to me post coming up later today.....something special for the long weekend!

Patchwork Aprons

Way back in January I had a dire need for aprons, and had both a charm package and some scraps I wanted to try to use up. The end result was these two aprons.



The squares are 5" x 5" with half and quarter ones being cut as needed to nicely fill in the apron. This was a cheap way to get aprons and a wonderful way to use up scraps. I am now actually just putting aside scraps that can be cut this size for future use! (You may not be able to see it, but darts are sewn into the waist for a good fit).

I wish I could find the web site where I got the original idea, but this design is of my own making because I could not find the web site in January either, plus it original idea was for a full apron. So feel free to use this idea to get through your scrap pile! (If you do make one, lay it out and then sew the rows on the angle - much easier!)

So the two main ideas I employ now for using up scrap material is 5 x 5 goes for aprons, and anything 11 x 11 or larger become napkins! It is great to be able to use up these scraps, even the smaller ones rather than throwing them out, plus be filling a house hold need!

So that has to be frugal, right?

Pizza Casserole

I was able to make this delicious meal straight from the pantry (which I stock with sales) except for the red peppers (2 for $0.33), pepperoni which was purchased on sale and stashed in the freezer, and onions that were a big bag of about 8 to 10 for well under $1. So this recipe ended up being quick, easy and frugal for me, so I thought I would share!

Pizza Casserole

1 1/2 cups pepperoni
2 tsp butter
1 medium onion chopped
15 oz can of tomato sauce
1 can of mushroom pieces drained (I am the only mushroom lover in our home, so I substitute 2 chopped sweet peppers)
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp basil
2 cups tiny shell pasta
3 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese (yes, second amount).

Place pepperoni in 1 and a half cups water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 4-5 minutes, drain (this takes a lot of grease out, so don't skip it).

Melt margarine in saute pan, ad onion, saute until soft. Add tomato sauce, mushrooms, sweet peppers if you are using them, oregano and basil. Stir, remove from heat.

Cook pasta per al dente directions. Drain, turn into 3L casserole (I use 9x13), add parmesan cheese and toss well.

Sprinkle with first amount of mozzarella cheese (or toss this in with the parmesan cheese).

Scatter pepperoni sauces over top.

Cover with tomato-onion sauce.

Sprinkle final cheese amount over top.

Bake, uncovered at 350F for about 30 minutes until bubbly and lightly browned.


To make ahead up to 24 hours in advance, prepare casserole (do not bake), cover, and chill. To serve, bake as above.

To freeze, cover unbaked casserole, label. Freeze up to 2 months. To serve, thaw and bake as above.

Tropical Muffins

This morning we made muffins, and they actually ended up being quite frugal. We doubled the recipe so that we were using a whole can of crushed pineapple rather than just half, and we had picked it up on sale. Plus we used bananas from the freezer - in January the bananas looked so good, but would go from green to brown overnight about half the time, so we ended up with quite the stash in the freezer (you didn't think I would throw them out did you?)

Plus I had picked up the vanilla (real stuff), flour, butter, eggs, baking powder and baking soda at Costco for a fraction of the cost at the supermarket! So this was actually all stuff I had on hand! You have to love that!

And to make this even more frugal, I was able to fit two pans of muffins in my oven!

Oh, and they were also delicious! (After all, it is not frugal if they taste horrible and end up moldy because nobody would eat them!)

Tropical Muffins - Makes 24

1 cup butter
1 1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
3 cups flour
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 cups crushed pineapple (drained but do not squeeze out)
1 1/2 cups mashed ripe banana

Cream sugar and butter together. Add vanilla and egg, beat until light and fluffy. Sift dry ingredients together and add alternately with mixed banana and pineapple. Mix gently until dry ingredients are just moistened.

Place in greased muffin tins and bake at 375 F for 10 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 for another 10-15 minutes.

For more great frugal tips, head on over to Crystal's!

New Garage Storage

I am so thrilled with our new garage storage! We are very close to being able to park our car in the garage, and anticipate being able to do so by the end of the weekend if we all work hard! (Except for Miss Pear, who I anticipate will be playing nearby.)

I decided to share the story of our shopping around experience for garage ceiling storage for this week's Frugal Friday because I honestly did not expect the findings!

We have been talking about ceiling shelves for the garage since we moved in - they are basically shelves that hang from the ceiling. This is necessary in places like Southern California where we have no basements, and the houses have very little storage, and smaller garages (a two car garage does not easily hold two cars here unless they are both compact). So we have been comparing prices.

We priced out shelving at Lowe's (with a 10% off coupon), and we priced Home Depot (no coupon). Both stores required us to pick up the systems and install them ourselves.

I have to be honest, we were a bit hesitant to install these ourselves as we were going to be parking our car underneath, and it sounded a bit iffy to us.

So I started reading the fliers from storage companies.

I found a company who was fully licensed and bonded, with a fabulous reputation, who lived and worked in the immediate area! The clincher was the price. It was cheaper to have them deliver and install the racking than to do it ourselves! Plus they did the work two days after the quote was made!

So it pays to shop around, and consider all your options because while a do-it-yourself attitude can save you lots of money, it is not always the cheapest way to go!

Don't Buy That Cookbook!

If you have been reading around here for long, you may have caught on to the fact that I love to cook, and bake, and generally play in the kitchen.

Which means that when I actually watch TV, which is rare, I often tune into the Food Network! Recently I had borrowed the cookbooks of a few well known chefs on the Food Network from a friend as I had some Christmas money I could use to buy one. I discovered something shocking.

Out of the roughly 25 recipes I was dying to try from one cookbook I was able to find about 21 of them for free on the Food Network's web site, which is free! I will be copying the remaining 4 recipes from my friend's book. Upon further investigation, this held for a lot of the chefs!

The only glaring exception I found was Alton Brown's I'm Just Here for the Food: Food + Heat = Cooking.

Also, it used to be that to peruse Cooking Light's recipe archives you had to have the code from the most recent edition of the magazine. Not so any more! My Recipes features Cooking Light, Southern Living and a few others!

Just a little tip to save on cookbooks but still get the great recipes!

What are some of your favorite online sites for recipes?

What cookbook could you simply never do without?

Christian Books Code

For Frugal Friday this week I have a little tidbit to help save you money on your Christmas shopping.
Christianbook.com is having 10% off your order of $35 or more if you enter coupon code 251447AD between now and December 19!

Of course, we would love it if you would click through our site to theirs as we are affiliates!

Saving on Cheese

I read a great article on saving money on fancy blended cheese by grating your own, and I had to smile to myself because I had just realized that I really do save money by buying my cheddar cheese shredded already! I guess it just depends on where you live and which cheese you are buying, but here is what I found.

The BEST price on cheese I can find in my area is 3 Albertson's brand 8 oz blocks for $4, or $2.67 for a pound.

At Costco I buy a 5 pound bag of Tillamook cheddar cheese, shredded, for $5.99, or $1.20 a pound, less than half the price!

So the frugal lesson is that we have to be careful to compare apples to apples when receiving tips on line and remember that just because it saves money in some ares of the country does not mean it will save in your area too, so be sure to check it out and be sure that it really does save you money in your area of the country!

(But I will be using the great shredding tip to make fancy blended cheese as I cannot find a good price on that!)

Updated: Martha A. you were right, this must have been a sale because the price is now back up to $10.99, or $2.20 a pound according to my friend who went this week. Still a savings, but not as much. It makes me wish I had picked up 2 at that price. Needless to say I just started checking the cheese prices again very carefully, and will have to keep my eyes open for a bit longer to make sure I know what the usual price is! (I have noticed that Costco will drop prices to clear out some older stock, but I keep my cheese frozen, so it is not that big a deal for us.)

Saving at Michael's and Joanne's

It seems I am always making something, or planning to make something, or both. I enjoy crafting tremendously, but if I am not careful it can be very expensive.

We live near both a Michael's and a Joanne's (a super one, with all the extra stuff like knitting, scrap booking, cake making, etc.), and almost every week in the paper there is one coupon for Michael's and one for Joanne's - usually 40% off one item, sometimes 50%.

The nice thing is that you don't have to go to each store as each store takes their competitor's coupons!

Joannes will let you use both in one transaction! Michael's will often make you do two transactions.

I love it - it saves me money and the time hand hassle of going to both stores!

Plus we were there last night to pick up the few items we needed for Christmas crafting (a lot we already had on hand), and the Christmas baking stuff was all 25% off.

Head on over to Crystal's for more Frugal Friday Tips

Printable Coupons Stick

If you have been reading here for a while you will know that I am trying very hard to make my grocery budget go further, even covering all our household expenses! I was even able to get all the canning jars I needed this year to fit into the budget! One of my tools is coupons both from the paper and printed.

I cannot tell you the number of times my printed coupons have stuck together! Usually I would catch it right at the cash register, but frequently I have arrived home and not noticed until I reviewed my receipt.

It is so frustrating!

But the fix is easy!

Just slightly crumple each coupon so that they cannot stick together! That way the cashier does not accidentally miss one!

This may be a silly little thing, but I have had a $4 coupon missed and not been able to get the money back!

Head on over to Crystal's for tips from the experts!

Rebates equal Library Money

One line item in our budget that we all agree we would like to have more money in and just do not because we are trying to SAVE money, and keep me home indefinitely is the library fund.

While it may seem odd to have an actual Library Fund, let me explain to you why it is so important!

1. We are a family of voracious readers, and reread favorites all the time, including Miss Pear's picture books, so books are a good investment around here!
   
2. We live in California, so the libraries carry almost no books that honor God or illuminate the Bible. But are filled with trash I do not want our daughter exposed too! (Same can be said for garage sales and thrift stores! not that we have those here in any abundance)
   
3. Our library fund covers our home schooling expenses. Currently that means quality read alouds, counting and alphabet books.
4. We are a family that actually uses commentaries, Biblical Dictionaries, and Greek and Hebrew books on a regular basis and are trying to slowly build a decent reference library both for the us and for the purpose of home schooling.

So we are creative in our methods.

One thing I do is that when I am shopping I do not calculate the rebate check from certain items into my shopping expenses. For example, I just filled out a form to get $5 from Tylenol for purchasing 3 tylenol products in their Fall Medicine Cabinet stock up. I just waited for a good deal to get them. When the check arrives, I will deposit it and the money will be allocated into the library fund.

The only time I do not do this is with Walgreens where I get my rebate as a gift card to get the 10% bonus and keep rolling it, or any time the rebate is issued as store credit (unless of course it is a book store!)

While it is not a huge amount, every little bit helps, and it motivates me to deposit those little checks into the bank in a timely manner! (Fortunately there is a branch of our bank in a supermarket I frequently shop at!)

How do you creatively boost your library funds?

Of course, I then try to make my library money go as far as possible by watching for best prices, coupons, and sales!

Frugal Friday - Coupon Bar Site

I am always on the hunt for a new coupon site. With so many now deciding that we Mac users are not worth their while (yeah, I'm talking about you Smart Source!) I am branching out!

While I have the list from Crystal's Supermarket Savings class, I am always looking to add more, and this week I stuck gold...er, coupons.

Coupon Bar is a great site that has a list of coupons, often of a higher value than I have seen elsewhere including the paper. You click on the link you want and you can print it!

Very helpful!

What is your favorite source for online coupons?

Cold Supply Savings and Rebate

The topic of cold supplies is currently near and dear to my heart. Before we went on vacation I got a horrible sinus cold, and then Miss Pear got it, and we were very grateful for our stash of cold supplies and kleenex.

Our vacation was wonderful, and we were healthy the whole time! Even flying was not a problem with our recovering sinuses!

However, we got home Monday afternoon, and yesterday Miss Pear woke up with a horrible stuffy nose. She caught the cold the baby sitting next to us on the way home had. And it is all in her nose.

I am so grateful for our stash of cold supplies as I did not have to run out and buy anything full price.

But it did make me want to revisit this post from earlier in the week.

CVS had the special on cold supplies, and I shared that this was my shopping:

2 x Advil cold and sinus ($4 each - $2 coupon Crystal links to)
2 x Robitussin ($6 each - $3 coupon Crystal links to)
2 x Crest Prohealth ($3.29 each - $1 in this past weekend's P&G coupon insert)
1 x Dawn ($0.99 each - $0.50 coupon in this past weekend's P&G coupon insert)
1 pair Save the Day glasses selected by Miss Pear - Children's Binoculars - $3.99 on sale for $0.39, and my girl picked them out all on her own, already she can spot a good deal!

Total before coupons, after sales was $27.96.

After coupons $15.46

Minus ECB of $14.95

Pre tax total of $0.51

Tax was $1.01

So I paid $1.52 for what was originally $44.63 before sales, coupons, and ECB's.

Plus I have $10 in ECB's for the Advil and Robitussin, $6.58 in ECB's from the Crest, and $3 in ECB from my third quarter spending.

(The links I refer to are available in the original post by Crystal)

When I went through the coupons for the two weeks we were gone I found a rebate form from the makers of Robitussin and Advil in the 9/23 coupons. If you buy 3 products you can get a $5 rebate! This just made the deal all that much sweeter! (If you buy 2 products you get $2 back)

So if you took advantage of this offer at CVS this week - check your coupon flier!

If you have not yet taken advantage of it yet, might I suggest you do?

As always, Crystal has some great tips over at her site for Frugal Friday!

Update: I have been searching to find the rebate form online, and I am striking out. I know that it was in the 9/23 paper, and that they are selling them on ebay, and maybe coupon clipper has them, but again, you have to pay. I cannot find a free source. Sorry!

Frugal Friday - Call and Ask!

Lately they have been running big promotions at the grocery stores near me, but do not put all the information in the flier! This makes me nuts because we only have one car, so often it is a family outing to buy groceries. So I don't want to wander around the store finding all the stuff, while my sweet daughter rearranges the shelves and my husband tries to wrangle her while I try to figure out if it is a good price and if I have a coupon for the item included on the store's promotion. Nor do I want to drive all the way there to find out the whole wheat flour I need is not included in the promotion.

So I have just started calling the corporate number or emailing to ask my questions.

This week Vons and Pavilions is doing a $20 of 20 items promotion but do not show all the things included, so I emailed, explaining my need and why, and they emailed me back a 26 page word document with all the included items! I could then sort it to my hearts content! I still want to check the prices at the store before I commit to specific things, but I have a list of the items that I have corresponding coupons to, or that are on the list that I REALLY need, so most of the work is done!

Most stores want your business and will either post more info on their web sites, or happily answer your questions because at they end of the day they know it means sales and happy customers.

This little tip has not only saved me money by allowing me to plan better, it has saved me time, frustration, and gas money!

For lots of great tips, head on over to Crystal's!