Coupons

Okay Sam. First you need to find out the coupon policy at the stores you shop at. Find out if they double/triple coupons (no-one around here triples them, but I hear there are places that do). Also find out how many coupons you can use at once (walmart here will let you go through the self checkout with up to $20 worth of coupons. After that, you need manager approval). Some stores put a limit on how many like coupons you can use. The Kroger here will let you use a certain number of the same coupon (say- I buy 5 boxes of cereal. Kroger will only let me double 3 of those coupons. The other 2 are at face value). Also find out if they accept internet printed coupons. Some don't, most do.

The next part- a notebook might help with, but I don't use one. I have a general idea of how low prices will go on most of the items we buy a lot of. The bags/boxes of pasta I never buy when they're more than $1. Sometimes I can find them at Meijers "buy 10 for $10 and get the 11th free" sale. That's as low as I've ever seen them go. Watch the sales. If you need to, write in a notebook how low the prices go on whatever items you use the most (salad dressings, pastas, canned goods, etc). This will be a running list so not something you can just sit down and do today :)

Clip your coupons! I buy the Sunday paper. It's my weekly endulgence. It usually takes me until Thursday to read it all. LOL! But I mostly buy it for the coupons. Clip them all (unless it's obviously something you'll never in a million years use). Don't make the same mistake I've made on many occaisions. I'll skip a coupon thinking "that costs too much anyway, it'll never go down in price enough to make the $.50 coupon worth it". You'd be surprised!

Get even more coupons online. Here is one good link to a ton of printable coupons. Here is a link to Meijer's coupons, since I know you have a Meijer. In the box on the right, click on the "specials" tab to find the coupons. I've also found some yummy looking recipes on here.

Now DON'T run out and use all those coupons! Here's the key- you have to use them at the right time. So remember back when I told you to watch the sales and see how low they get? When they're at their lowest is when you act on your coupons. So, for example, a couple months ago there were Lowry's Marinades coupons in the Sunday paper ($.50 off 1). Right now at Meijer the Lowry's Marinades are 10/$10 get the 11th free. In that Meijer link above there's a coupon for $.50 off the purchase of 5 Lowry's Marinades. I can't remember off the top of my head how many like coupons Meijer will let you use, but I know you can double up on coupons and use Manufacturers coupons and Meijers coupons for the same product. So if I could use 5 of the coupons that were in the paper you can use this situation....

Buy 5 Lowry's marinades- $5
Minus 5 coupons ($.50 off, mine doubles so minus $5)
Minus the Meijer coupons (doubles to make it $1)
So Meijer is paying me $1 to take these marinades out of their stores.

The key to doing that is you need to buy more stuff so that you don't end up with something like that at checkout. So, if I were to do this deal I would also do this....

2 Kraft Miracle Whip (on sale for 2/$4)
1 Cool Whip (on sale for 10/$10)
1 Planters Peanuts (on sale for $3)
Minus 1 Miracle Whip coupon (in the Meijer link- $1.50 off 2)
Minus 1 Planters coupon (in the first link- $3 off Planters nuts when you purchase 3 kraft, nabisco or oscar mayer items).

Total- $3.50
Minus the $1 overage from the Marinades and this is what I get....

5 Lowry's marinades
2 Miracle Whip
1 Cool Whip
1 jar of Planters Peanuts

For a total of $2.50.

In that first coupon link.... a couple of my favorites....

Honey Bunches of Oats- $2 off (our walmart has them for $1.98ish so it's free, Meijer is just over $2)
Johnson's Buddies- $1 off (you can find them for less than $1.... but I guess you have no need for these. LOL!)
Knorr/Lipton- $1 off (lowest price is $1 so it's free)
Kraft LiveActive cereal- $3 off (walmart has it for less than $3, Meijer is just a few cents over $3 so it's essentially free)
Land O'Frost Taste Escape- free (it's lunch meat, but I haven't been able to find it around here)
Muir Glen, if you can find it- $1 off (canned tomato products, great coupon if you can find the product!)
Planters- $3 off when you buy 3 kraft, nabisco or oscar mayer products
V8 Fusion- $2 off (It's been on sale for $2.50 before, making it $.50)
Vlassic- $1 off (cheap pickles... yay! LOL!)

Mom- don't read this next little part.... LOL!

Oh, and my Durex coupons. It's got to be one of my favorites. LOL! $2 off any box of Durex condoms. Don't know why condoms are so darn expensive in the first place. The Durex Play ones are interesting. It's for $5 off any Durex Play. At Walmart they're less than $5 so it makes them free. Not that I have a need for condoms or anything. Nope. No sex until marriage. Just stocking up now is all ;)

Another key- Just because it says on the front of the coupon that it's for a certain kind, it doesn't mean it won't work on others. Take the V8 Fusion. It says it's for the Acai Berry juice. It'll work on any of the V8 Fusion juices. How can you tell this? Look under the barcode on the coupon. If the first 4 numbers match the first 4 numbers on the barcode of the item you want to buy, it'll work. Now, if you go to a cashier they might say you can't do that. I usually go to the self check-out, unless I see a really friendly cashier.

If you poke around on the slickdeals website (in the drugstore forum and coupon forums especially) you can learn alot. You can also find links to coupons that people have made into 4 or 6 or whatever per sheet of paper, to help cut down on the cost of printing them.

Pantry and Garden

I finally tackled the pantry closet. Woo-hoo! It got delayed slightly because Jason hurt his foot playing soccer so I had to take him to get x-rays. It's not broken, but it's hurt pretty bad. So he's on crutches and has to keep it elevated as much as possible, which means he's now my second baby ;) But, anyway, finally got the closet taken care of....

After I took everything out of the closet and put them in groups.

Organized! At last! On the bottom are stacking bins. The bottom bin has random cans (tomatoes, chili, ect), middle has soups and top has all the fruits. Next to the bins are unopened boxes of cereal and juices. The first shelf has a bin on the left with all our different snack bars (we eat a lot. LOL!). The next bin has opened chips/crackers. Next to that are a few boxes of opened crackers and 2 boxes of open cereal (we try not to have more than 2 boxes open at once) and some oatmeal.

On the bottom shelf in this picture on the left is a bin with all the sauce/condiments/dressings. Next to that is some random stuff that had nowhere else to go. LOL! Next to that is a bin with all the smaller baking things. On the middle shelf is tea, all the way on the left. Boxes of pasta and rice in the middle and the bin has all the bags of pasta/rice. There's also the little shelf hanging down with all the bags/saran wrap/wax paper/foil. The top shelf has my 3 bins of flours and all the unopened boxes of things we won't need right away.

I LOVE how organized it is now! Before I would open the door and just get so frustrated. I never knew what we had or where it was. This is soooo much better.

Garden pictures!

Cucumber. Okay, this thing is now my fun joke. It does NOT grow! Like, as one leaf grows another dies and falls off. It's an endless cycle and it never seems to get any bigger. I'm stumped. I don't think we'll get any cucumbers this year!

But at least we'll get a green pepper!!

How do you like my tomato twig? It should not even have a tomato it's so twiggy. I don't even think it can support the weight of a tomato. LOL! Oh well. This is the early girl tomato.

But my zucchini is finally doing awesome!!! Look at all the big GREEN growth!!!

The basil (which will NOT stop growing and I can't seem to catch up! LOL!) and the cherry tomato. Again, this tomato plant is so small it doesn't seem like it should be able to support tomatoes. But it is, so far. There's 4 on there right now.

Yellow squash. Like the zucchini, it's finally perking up! Lots of good green growth. Yay!

Red pepper. Woo!

Parsley and chives. I need to cut it more often. The new growth looks great, but I haven't been using it as much as I should so the older stuff just tends to die off.

We are just relaxing this weekend. Monday Jason and I both took off work. We had planned on going to the Louisville zoo after Owen's therapy, we probably still will. I may even push Jason in a wheel chair. LOL! Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are normal days. Wednesday is Owen's other therapy day, Thursday I work all day. Friday we both have off, we'll probably try to find some fireworks. Friday and Saturday will be spent packing and on Sunday we leave for Florida! We're going to the beach for a week. Yay! We'll be driving, with Jason's parents (we rented a van). We'll be breaking it up and staying in Alabama overnight on the way there and the way back. We come back the following Sunday.

Next post... coupon talk! LOL!

Trains and chores.

Toys R Us has out an awesome coupon right now (in memory of George Carlin) for a free train (thomas, harold, rheneas or the musical caboose). Last week they had out a coupon for a free train 12.99 and under. We took advantage of that and got 3 (only gave 1 to O, the other 2 are hiding). I guess people were going out and "buying" DOZENS of free trains (way to kill a nice deal, huh?) so Toys R Us disabled that coupon and issued the new one. The new one is only good today through Thursday. I think I might take O today and get the 2 he doesn't have yet (rheneas and the musical caboose). He'll be one happy little boy :)

Owen decided yesterday that he wants a chore. His one and only chore now is to set the table for dinner. He LOVES doing this. It was so cute to watch yesterday. It's the little things that bring him so much joy.

Tonight after work we're going to a place called Bounce U. It's exactly as it sounds.... a whole place with inflatable bouncy things. We've never been there (even though it's within walking distance of our house) but the local autism group is having a meeting there. They rented one of the rooms for 2 hours so we'll go and O can have some fun. Should be interesting.

I need help.

I need some help. It appears I've turned into a compulsive shopper. Fortunately for the family, it's groceries I'm buying and nothing we won't use. However, I'm not a terribly organized person, so this is what our pantry now looks like.



Yes, I'm a little embarrassed to admit that's my pantry. LOL! But, in all seriousness, I am learning how to coupon effectively (not just taking the random coupon to the store at a random time). I'm searching out coupons and using them when the time is right (when that item is at it's lowest point so it ends up free, or almost free). In yesterday's trip alone I got a couple Pasta Roni's free, a couple boxes of cereal free (actually, the coupon was worth more than the cereal so the store ended up paying ME to take them), those cereal cups were free (2) and one was 9 cents. The Planters peanuts on the ground were $.39.

Anyway, needless to say, I've been finding some great deals that are hard to turn down. But, I need help organizing it now! LOL! So, as motivation, I'm posting these before pictures. When I'm done, I'll post after.

Random pictures and garden pictures

Jumping into the pool

Brrr it's a little cold.... but the sidewalk is nice and warm!

Early girl tomato, not doing too well.

Cucumbers, that haven't grown at ALL since I planted them. LOL! They're stunted. I did thin them down even more to just 2 plants so maybe they'll grow. If not, I may plant a few seeds in there.

Green pepper, doing okay.

With my first tiny green pepper!

Parsley and chives, doing well.

Red pepper. Look how big it got in a week!!!

Yellow squash. Finally some good green growth!!

Basil (which I cut a whole lot of leaves off and used this week because, as you can see from last weeks pictures, they were starting to flower! So I cut off the flowers and a bunch of leaves) and cherry tomato (ummm... yeah.... after my post last week about Owen better not pick any more, I accidently knocked one off. Oops!)

Zucchini..... with green growth!!

And look! The tomato Owen picked is ripe! I can't exactly call it "vine ripened", lol, but that's okay. We'll feast on it tonight :)

Owen

I was debating whether to post anything here, but I decided to. I usually post good things, happy things about Owen but today I'm just so sad. I'm sitting up, almost 3:00 in the morning, worried about him. This is what I posted on another board, for parents of kids with special needs.

"It's been a long day, so bear with me if this gets long.

Owen is 4 1/2. He has been diagnosed with autism/pdd-nos/developmental delays (depending on who you listen to). He's usually not really violent towards other people, except when he gets in his rages. These are normally directed at me (because I step in when I see it coming) or my partner, Jason, who also will step in if he sees the rage starting.

It didn't use to happen that much, now it's happening up to 3, 4, 5 times a day.

I'm worn out. I'm bruised. After a particularly bad time at Best Buy we came home and I took a shower. After I got out I noticed a large bruise on my chest. It goes along nicely with the ones on my arms and legs. I don't even remember getting the bruise, but I'm sure it happened in best buy. All I remember is hands and feet flying while I tried like heck to get out of there.

What do I do? I'm at my wits end. He's getting bigger and stronger. I won't be able to pick him up and carry him out of the store for long. He's going to do some serious harm to me before long.

He's such a sweet boy though. After his rage is over and he's calmed down he is so sad. A couple days ago he told me "I just want you to be happy mama" after he threw a (mostly non-violent) fit at dinner. But he doesn't even understand what he's doing. After the best buy incident today I got him calmed down in the car. I tried to talk to him about it and he had NO clue what happened. All he did was repeat over and over again lines from a Thomas movie (he does echolalia a LOT).

I'm so sad for my sweet little boy but I have no idea where to turn for help. "

Things have been getting worse and worse here lately. Some days are good. Some days are bad. The bad are starting to outnumber the good. We used to have days, even weeks, where Owen was doing great. But he's getting more and more violent lately. He gets into these rages where he can't control himself even if he wanted to. It's like, once he's there, there's no turning back. I usually have to carry him, kicking and screaming, from wherever we are. Sometimes I can snap him out of these, but not always. And it can be anything that sets him off. Monday at therapy it was because a drop of water got on his shirt after he washed his hands. Of course he can't wear a shirt that has a drop of water on it so we took it off (leaving his white undershirt on). But I didn't have a spare shirt in the car, so he had a huge fit/meltdown because I wouldn't/couldn't drive all the way across town to get him a shirt for therapy. Or today, at best buy, was because he kept running off. He wanted to look at movies, which was fine, BUT he HAS to tell me first and wait for me to come with him. No negotiations on that. Despite me reminding him to use his words and tell me what he wanted, he kept running off. He saw me coming after him (because he was running off) so melted down. He decided he was going to the movies alone and didn't want me to follow him. Uhhhh... no. Doesn't work that way. Huge meltdown/tantrum/fit/rage (whatever you want to call it) as I try to get out of the store as quickly as possible. He's got a scream like none other. One of Jason's friends works at best buy. He happened to be there today and heard the scream. He instantly knew it was Owen so went looking for us. Yup, my baby is well known for his killer scream. LOL!

Owen had an appointment with his ped on Friday to talk about getting another evaluation. He goes back on Wednesday, at which time we'll decide where we want to send him. It's between Cincinnati Children's Hospital or the Weisskopf Center in Louisville. I've heard that both will do a good, thorough evaluation on him (which is all I've been asking for for YEARS now). I am sad that we have to do this, but I can't put it off any longer. He needs help. I need help. Honestly, I don't care what they label him as (autism/pdd-nos/developmental delays) I just want to know what he needs to help him succeed and how I can get him that. That's all I want is for him to succeed and be happy.

On a positive note though... he did AWESOME at dinner tonight. We went to Carrabbas because Jason had the day off (a rare treat). For reasons we won't mention now (the kitchen SUCKED today!) dinner took about 1 1/2 HOURS! But Owen did great. He really did. He stayed in his chair almost the whole time AND he actually ate (a couple slices of bread, a whole kids pizza (minus the toppings and the edge crust) and a few bites of ice cream). I am very thankful for that, as we all needed a bit of a rest/break tonight!

Garden pictures

And a couple Owen pictures. Don't ask why, but I somehow didn't take a single picture when the family was here this weekend. Oops! Look to Sam's blog, I think she might have taken some!

Owen on a picnic this afternoon. I got these awesome containers at Target Friday. They're lunch containers, they have 3 sections. A large one (probably hold a sandwich cut in half) and 2 small sections. It has a tight lid with a fork and knife on the top. Best part? It was on clearance for $1.49! I got a pink and a blue one. Jason and I are on a new mission to save money by bringing lunches to work (me everytime I work a full day and Jason 2-3 times a week).

The little tomato he picked.

Cucumbers

Green peppers

Parsley and chives

red pepper

zucchini

basil and cherry tomato

3 little tomatoes (that the boy had better not pick!!)

yellow squash

early girl tomato

My first little baby red pepper!!

Nothing like a bowl of ice cream at the end of a long, hot day!

Now I'll *really* cry....

Dad, Sam, her fiance and Holly are coming down here this weekend. Jason and I have been working hard getting the place cleaned up and looking nice. We took last night to relax. He went out golfing with 2 friends and then they all came back here and, after Owen went to bed, we sat out on the patio talking and watching the lightening show (lots of lightening, but at that time there was no rain). After awhile the rain started coming down so we packed up and went inside. Not even 10 minutes later Jason hears glass shattering. Our patio table blew over and broke!


No, correction, it shattered into a billion pieces. I don't have a clue how I'll get all that glass out of the grass. Owen walks in the grass barefoot all the time, playing on the slip and slide and such. How in the world am I going to get it all cleaned up so he doesn't get cut? The picture doesn't even do it justice. There's glass all the way to that back fence.

We were planning on grilling out this weekend. But.... uhhh.... now we have no table! I cleaned some of it, but I'm stuck on how to get the stuff in the grass. I have no clue. I tried raking it but that didn't work. Sweeping it doesn't work either.

Crap.

I'm going to cry...

Owen and I were outside working on our plants. I turn around for one second and hear Owen saying "What's this mama". I turn around to see him holding our biggest tomato. It's been growing for weeks. And now it's gone. It was finally starting to turn an orangish color too. I'm bummed. Such is the life of gardening with a 4 year old.

How does my garden grow?

It doesn't :( I tried all week long to bring my garden back to life but it just kept getting worse and worse. I found out today that Jason's dad has been coming over and watering my plants. Why? I have no clue. We had asked him to water the plants when we were out of town on Memorial weekend so he did. Apparently he never stopped. So my plants were getting WAY overwatered (I had no clue he was watering them so I was too). Now they're not looking so good.

Zucchini

Cherry tomatoes and basil

Again

Chives, parsley (behind chives) and green pepper (notice all the leaves falling off?)

Cucumbers (how they have flowers when they haven't grown any.... I don't know)

Red pepper

tomato

Yellow squash

Owen pictures in a bit....