About Me

I am Juli, a 30-something stay at home mom with three kids, ages 11, 9 and almost 4. I love being at home with my children, and in order for that to happen, sometimes we have to get creative! For years, when my husband got paid, we would go immediately to Wal-mart to buy groceries, and were always proud to get out of the store with a bill less than $200 (for one week of groceries and toiletries!) If we managed to get out with spending less than $150, it was cause for celebration!

I have seen for years online how people save a lot of money using coupons, and even dabbled around with coupons for a few weeks in 2009, but got confused and never really understood it enough to start saving much of anything.

In the summer of 2010, it started looking like I was going to have to find a job. I'm not against this, but let's face it, in this economy, I'm not likely to find something that will work around my "kid schedule" (baseball, karate, schools, etc). So I started researching couponing. I started with one site that taught me one particular way to organize coupons...I saved some (enough to thrill me!) but not what I was hoping to do. After a little more research, I found the organization that worked for me, and I was off!

Currently I have both a toiletry and a food stock pile.

My toiletry stockpile includes: 32 men's body wash, 24 men's deodorant, 14 women's deodorant, 30+ tubes of toothpaste, a dozen toothbrushes, 16 nice razors and shaving cream, a dozen shampoo and a dozen conditioner plus kids shampoo and detangler, multiple packs of toilet paper...and much much more. Of the hundreds of things in my stockpile, I have less than $10 in it. I will never again pay for toothpaste, toothbrushes, deodorant, bodywash or razors. When people question why I need so much stuff, my first question is this...when you run out of toothpaste what do you do? Their answer is typically "I go to the store and buy a new tube." At regular price? Well, of course. That is $4 right there, and at my house when we run out of toothpaste, we go to my closet and grab another tube that I got for free. I am not a hoarder, in fact just last week I donated several boxes of toiletries to a local homeless shelter. When I am able to get things for free, I get them even if it isn't something that I can use, knowing that there are so many people and shelters that can use it.

My food stockpile includes: 10 jars of spaghetti sauce, 25 boxes of pasta (all free, plus profit!), 20 boxes of cereal (my 3 kids eat it for breakfast and for snacks), shelves of hamburger/chicken helper, canned foods, salad dressing, muffin mixes, etc...I rotate it out so that nothing goes bad. I also have frozen meats, vegetables and shredded cheese. In all honesty, my family could probably go 6 weeks+ without buying anything except for dairy and bread. I hope not to have to do this, but we could do it if we had to.

And guess what? It's all brand name stuff, not off, store brands. Not to say there is anything wrong with store brands, but I get the brand name stuff for much cheaper than what the store brands cost.

At drug stores, I tend to save 90-95% on my purchases, and my grocery bills tend to show a 60-75% savings. I'd like to save more, but for now I am very content with this.

My family has gone from spending $150-200 a week on groceries and toiletries to spending $150-200 a MONTH on groceries and toiletries (and sometimes less). I am here to tell you that it CAN be done, and the happiness that I get from knowing how much I am saving is something I cannot explain.

In 2011, I am going to keep a running tally of how much I spend and how much I save. I will post my good deals here, along with how I got them, and I will post links to my favorite sites that I use when setting up my deals.

Here's to a great year of saving!