For those of you who were asking, Frugal Farm Wife converted my Crockpot Cinnamon Biscuits recipe to be gluten-free! Check out her Gluten-Free Crockpot Cinnamon Biscuits Recipe here.
Summer Bucket List
Classic View
Grid View
Losing Power, Gaining Focus
Guest post from Jenn of Hang On, Baby, We’re Almost… Somewhere.
When a storm blew through the DC area and left millions without power the week before the 4th of July, we were among the millions. I am thankful that, for us, the outage ended relatively quickly — in 72 hours. Still, in three hot summer days, we learned some lessons that I think speak to my budget-aware side.
1. Without an Air Conditioner or Electricity, Our Day Revolved Around the Sun
Our awareness grew of the time of day, position of the sun, and maximizing light and air flow while minimizing heat. We all pitched in to manage our environment, raising or lowering shades, opening or closing doors and windows, re-icing the food we kept in coolers.
The day seemed more purposeful, less “Where does the time go?” than when we rely on a thermostat to control our temperature. I am using some of these techniques now to try to lower our electric bill.
2. Cold Showers Aren’t As Bad As I Thought!
Even in the hottest part of summer, I’ve always taken hot showers. I’m cold-natured, I’ve thought for years, and I need hot showers to stay comfortable.
Turns out, I live in a chilly climate, albeit an electrically-powered one. You plop me down outside for three straight days of weather in the upper 90’s (mid-30’s in Celsius), and I like a cool shower as much as the next gal!
3. Storm Shades Really Do Work
We discovered that the pulley-run storm shades that are on the windows of our home are one of the best ways to manage heat flow in the house. We loved them already because we can make our bedrooms almost completely dark even in broad daylight, but they made an enormous difference while fighting the heat.
Installing them here in the U.S. would most likely be expensive (we’re blessed that the home we rent already had them installed!), but similar methods can be adopted using things like blackout curtains, window film, and wooden blinds.
4. We Survived Just Fine Without TV.
My kids don’t enjoy TV as much as I thought they did, but my 10-year-old son does love the computer as much as we thought he did.
We talked more and were outside more, but we didn’t have to resort to major outings to manage to pass our time together. We just did simpler things, mostly at home.
All that focus on being kind to each other and building good relationships sure paid off when we didn’t have the distractions of TV, the Internet, video games, cooking, ironing, and laundry. That realization was the most valuable of all these lessons.
Jenn LeBow is a native Texan; lover of Jesus; happy wife of Honey, a Diplomatic Security Special Agent; mom of four (mostly) delightful kids: Cartwheel, 21; Einstein, 10; Blossom, 8; and Ladybug, 3; debt-free; and a voracious reader, whose appetite for books is reluctantly subjugated to other duties in her life. She blogs at Hang On, Baby, We’re Almost… Somewhere.
Free printable Oven-Free Menu
15 Ways to Have More Energy (Part 5)
We’ve been talking about ways to have more energy this week. If you missed the first two posts in this series, read them here.
13. Choose Gratitude
Your attitude can make or break your situation. You can choose to focus on what you don’t have or you can choose to be thankful for what you do have.
There is always, always, always something to be thankful for. When you have a thankful, grateful spirit, you’ll automatically have more joy, zest for life, and energy. It’s the natural outflow of gratitude. And not only will you have more energy, but I promise you’ll just plain enjoy and appreciate life a lot more if you choose gratitude.
Struggling to be thankful in the midst of hard circumstances? Try writing down a list of your blessings. As I’ve found, when you start writing down your blessings, you just may have trouble stopping!
14. Don’t Compare Yourself to Others
Don’t compare yourself to others. It’s never productive and it’s a great way to waste great amounts of time and energy.
I recently learned this lesson in a very personal way. Here’s a snippet from my post
It hit me anew just how easy it is to want what we don’t have–better hair, better decorating skills, a better personality, more creativity, more spunk… there’s always someone who it seems we’d like to trade places with because they have what we want.
But trading places with someone wouldn’t fix anything; we’d just inherit a new set of things we wish we could change. No one has it altogether. Everyone has struggles and difficulties.
Comparison only leads to discontentment.
We can’t change who we are, but we can make the most of our situation. We can’t choose the personality we are born with, but we can choose to be thankful–even in the midst of difficulty.
And we can choose to be intentional and purposeful in how we live our lives so that we make the most of all that we’ve been given instead of wishing we were someone else.
15. Wrap Your Life Around Things That Matter
When you spend your life dedicated to what really matters, you’ll have so much more energy and excitement for waking up and living each day. I try to ask myself often, “What will matter in 25 years from now?” And then I seek to wrap my life and invest my days into those things.
Live your life with outstretched arms. The more you live for others, the more you step outside your comfort zone, the more you give freely and generously of your resources and time, the more you’ll wake up feeling blessed, motivated, and inspired to life to the fullest!
At the end of my life, I don’t want to look back with a lot of regrets and wistful thinking. I want to give everything I have to this one life I have — because I only get one shot at life!
photo courtesy of BigStock
Olympic Rings Fruit Pizza
In celebration of the Summer Olympics beginning today, we did some fun activities today:
We used chocolate-covered sunflower seeds I got at the health food store to make Olympic Rings.
Silas had a little bit of trouble lining up the seeds with the lines, so I ended up just having him match the colors and put them in the circles.
The kids were looking at Pinterest with me the other day and saw a picture for Olympic Rings Fruit Pizza and begged if we could make it.
While our Olympic Rings Fruit Pizza didn’t look quite as great as the original recipe, the kids had so much fun making it and were so excited to show Jesse when he got home from work!
Freebies In My Mailbox
I got some great freebies this past week!
Free Schick Hydro Razor
Free Arm & Hammer Sensitive Toothpaste sample
Free Tide Pods
Free Febreze Set & Refresh Air Freshener
Free Tea Forte samples
Free Tampax sample pack
Free Escada Perfume sample
What freebies have arrived in your mailbox this week?
By the way, if you want to start getting great freebies in your mailbox, just start signing up for the freebies I post every day that interest you. Within 4-6 weeks, your mailbox will start filling up with great freebies!
Reader Tip: How to Avoid Garage Sale Pitfalls
Jessica emailed in the following tip:
Summer is in full swing and like many bargain hunters, I love a good garage sale. It’s like a treasure hunt. Looking though one box or pile after another, searching for that one needed item.
Garage sales, however, can have their downsides as well. Here are three pitfalls to avoid when going to a garage sale:
1. Don’t buy what you don’t need.
Just because it’s cheap doesn’t mean you need it. Spending a $1 on a set of curtains may be a great deal but if you have three sets of curtains at home and have no need for another why waste the money.
The best way to garage sale is to have a list of items that you need and are looking for. I also try to make a list of my children’s clothing sizes so I can purchase a size up of off season clothing they will need in the future.
Also remember to travel with a tape measure this will keep you from buying that item you just knew would fit but turns out to be too big for your space.
2. Try before you buy.
If you are going to buy electronics, kitchen appliances, yard equipment, or anything that requires electricity or batteries, make sure you try before you buy. In my experience garage sale hosts are happy to demo an item for you to show you all the bells and whistles.
Make sure you run it through all the cycles and ask if the owner has had any problems with the item. I may just be blessed but I have never had a bad experience buying any items such as these at a garage sale most people are honest with the things they sell but you always want to do your due diligence.
3. Watch your mileage.
When you go out hunting for your treasures have a plan. Look through your local sale papers, check Craigslist, and look online for other garage sale postings in your area. Most will have a list of items that they are selling and this will help you decided on a route before you leave the house.
Driving around on a Friday or Saturday morning just searching for signs or going all the way across town for a sale that turns out to be nothing can be hard on your gas tank and eat up your garage sale savings.
Garage sales can be a lot of fun and a great way to stretch the family budget. Just remember to set some simple guidelines for yourself before you start and you can really watch the savings add up.
15 Ways to Have More Energy (Part 4)
We’ve been talking about ways to have more energy this week. If you missed the first two posts in this series, read them here.
10. Laugh Often
It’s well been said, “Laughter is the best medicine.” It’s amazing how smiling, laughing, and seeing the humorous side of life can just make life more enjoyable — and give you much more zest for life!
We laugh a lot at our house. We laugh at ourselves, we laugh at each other, and we sometimes laugh for seemingly no reason at all — or at least we forgot what it was that we were first laughing about. 🙂
Yes, sometimes we’re just a bit on the crazy side around here — like when Jesse and I decided to create a good night cheer for the kids before bed the other night. We were all pretty much rolling on the floor after our attempts at putting together a cheer with chant, jumps, hand motions, and all. 😉 However, we believe life is meant to be savored — and sometimes being silly just makes it a whole lot more fun!
I’m always on the lookout for a funny story to share with Jesse from something the children say or do. If I find some funny photo or saying on Pinterest, I’ll email it to Jesse or save it to show him when he comes home. And we also love to watch comedy clips or funny movies as a family.
Look for the humor in life — and you’ll probably start to find it just about everywhere!
11. Clear the Clutter
Whether it’s paper clutter, an overloaded email inbox, or lots of stuff in your house that you don’t love and use, clutter can drain you, bog you down, and zap your energy and creativity.
Everyone has a different level of clutter tolerance, but if you’re tripping over excess stuff at your house and struggling to find stuff in piles of unopened mail, chances are your home could use a little purging.
Going through my house from top to bottom twice a year and doing a complete clutter overhaul is something that has been extremely effective in helping us keep a handle on clutter. I also find it helpful to ask myself five questions about what I own:
::Do I need this item?
::Do I use this item on a regular basis?
::Do I like this item?
::Is this item taking up space I don’t have?
::Could I bless someone else with this item?
12. Stop Worrying
We can waste precious amounts of time, energy, and thought worrying. And how much of the time do the things we worry about actual come to pass?
Instead of letting yourself just go round and round fretting over what probably never will be, redirect that energy into something positive. Anytime I catch myself worrying, I try to instead pour that energy and time into something more productive: reading, writing, exercising, listening to an audiobook, cleaning, singing, or serving someone else. Most of the time, I quickly forget about what I was worrying about!
As a Christian, I also have made a commitment to pray instead of worry. When I start mulling over something and being concerned or fearful over what might be, I try to remember to refocus my thoughts on what I know to be true: God is in control and He will give me grace for whatever situation comes my way. And then I pray and commit that situation over to Him — and I get busy doing something else that’s much more important and productive than worrying.
…To be continued tomorrow.
photo courtesy of BigStock
Crockpot Cinnamon Biscuits
These slow cooker cinnamon biscuits taste just as good as cinnamon rolls without all the extra time and effort. Plus, since they bake in a slow cooker, you won’t heat up your kitchen!
I recently came across a recipe slow cooker “Cinnamon Rolls” and I was very intrigued. So naturally, I had to try it for myself.
But in typical Crystal fashion, I had to tweak the recipe a bit, too. 🙂
Spoiler Alert — We LOVED them!
I was really happy with how they turned out.
They were yummy, easy to make, and with the alterations I made, they are good for you, too.
Best of all, we had hot biscuits without heating up the house!
Now I’m all inspired to try making other breads in the crockpot!
While the original recipe calls these Cinnamon Rolls, since they aren’t rolled up in any manner, I changed the name of the recipe to Cinnamon Biscuits, as that seemed better suited.
Ingredients for Slow Cooker Cinnamon Biscuits
- 1 recipe of your favorite biscuit dough (I used Homemade Whole-Wheat Baking Mix mixed with enough milk to make it into a biscuit dough.)
- 1/4 cup butter melted
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1/2 cup raw sugar (you could also use brown sugar or regular sugar)
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
How to Make Cinnamon Biscuits in the Slow Cooker
1. Thoroughly grease the crockpot with butter or shortening.
2. In a small bowl, melt butter in the microwave and stir vanilla into it.
3. In another small bowl, combine sugar and cinnamon.
4. Roll out biscuit dough and cut into biscuits with a biscuit cutter.
5. Dip biscuits into melted butter mixture, then into cinnamon sugar mixture. Put in crockpot in a single layer.
6. Cover the crockpot with a tea towel or paper towel (to reduce condensation) and put lid on.
7. Turn crockpot on low and bake biscuits for 2-3 hours until done.
You can glaze with a powdered sugar & milk glaze, if you’d like. Or you can leave them unglazed like I did. I thought they were plenty sweet without the glaze!
I let Silas make his own biscuits with some of the leftover dough!
Recipe
Slow Cooker Cinnamon Biscuits
Ingredients
- 1 recipe of your favorite biscuit dough (see notes below)
- 1/4 cup butter melted
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1/2 cup raw sugar or brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
Instructions
- Thoroughly grease the crockpot with butter or shortening.
- In a small bowl, melt butter in the microwave and stir vanilla into it.
- In another small bowl, combine sugar and cinnamon.
- Roll out biscuit dough and cut into biscuits with a biscuit cutter.
- Dip biscuits into melted butter mixture, then into cinnamon sugar mixture. Put in crockpot in a single layer.
- Cover the crockpot with a tea towel or paper towel (to reduce condensation) and put lid on.
- Turn crockpot on low and bake biscuits for 2-3 hours until done.
- You can glaze with a powdered sugar & milk glaze, if you’d like. Or you can leave them unglazed like I did. I thought they were plenty sweet without the glaze!
Notes
I used Homemade Whole-Wheat Baking Mix mixed with enough milk to make it into a biscuit dough for my biscuit dough recipe.
Recipe adapted from Get Crocked
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Today’s shopping trips: The health food store & Walgreens
We went to the health food store and Walgreens today. Here were our purchases:
The Health Food Store Shopping Trip
Ezekiel Sprouted Tortillas –$3.99
Raw Cheddar Cheese from a local farm — $5.93
Quinoa — $2.42
Pears — $0.99/lb. — $1.69 total
Chocolate Covered Sunflower Seeds (we’re going to use these for some Olympics-themed activities — I was looking for an alternative to M&Ms and these fit the bill!) — $6.70Total with tax: $22.24
I’ve never purchased quinoa (can you believe it?!) and have been wanting to try it. I was surprised at the price tag on it from the bulk bins, so I’m going to be on the hunt for a better deal on it since I’ve heard it’s really good and good for you. If you have a recommendation for where to get a good deal on it, I’d love to hear!
Walgreens Shopping Trip
10 Memo/Composition books — $0.20 each with coupon
5 Highlighters — $0.19 each with in-ad coupon
Glue — $0.39
Jumbo Glue Stick — $0.39
Erasers — $0.39
2 packages Sticky Page Markers –$0.39 each
2 packages of Wexford Dividers — $0.39
3 Clear School Boxes — $0.49 each with in-ad coupon (2 not shown as they were snagged to be put to use by two eager kiddos as soon as we got home!)
Total with tax : $8.21
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Shared Jul 26, 2012
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How we save money and keep life simple by using the resources in our community
How we save money and keep life simple by using the resources in our community
Stephanie emailed in recently and I thought you’d be inspired by what she shared:
Have you ever thought about simple, small ways in which you can use the resources in your community to save, and also to teach your children simplicity and the basics of life? The reward of hunting and gathering is immense.
Here are a few of the ways we’ve used the resources available to us in our community to save money and keep life simple:
–My husband hunts. That provides considerable deer, hog, bullfrog and fowl meat for us. We also fish.
–My 6-year-old son and I have collected at least a gallon of mulberries in the last two weeks and we are freezing those for future use.
–We collect black walnuts (we live in Kansas) in the fall, let them sit all winter, then crack them in the spring.
–We pick rhubarb from my husband’s grandmother’s house, it comes up every year.
–A kind farmer let us ride his combine and gave us a bucket of wheat which we will grind into flour.
–I save the crusts off his bread and make my own bread crumbs.
–We save rain water and use it for our garden (though the drought has hindered that some!)
What are some ways that you save money by using the resources available to you in your community?
We Paid Cash: Our hospital birth
A testimony from Lydia who blogs at Five4Five Meals
There is this book we read to our son called Wherever You Are: My Love Will Find You. The first line reads, “I wanted you more than you’ll ever know, so I sent love to follow wherever you go.”
If I wrote this book for my son, the first line would read, “I wanted you more than you’ll ever know, so I did some serious saving to pay for the hospital bills.”
You see, when I was ready to have my baby I was a newspaper journalist working for cheap at a company that offered bargain basement benefits, so long before I got pregnant, we started saving.
Months later, I found myself pregnant, thrilled, and sitting in the insurance coordinator’s cubicle at my obstetrician’s office. She was telling me that my insurance was covering little and my deductible was among the highest she had ever seen. I was fully aware that my benefits amounted to a latex bandage and two chewable vitamins, not the $5,000+ it would take to have this little guy.
When I told her we had been saving for a baby her eyes grew misty. “That is the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard,” she said.
We started saving six months before I was pregnant, cutting out everything from sodas from the drink machine at work, to coffee to lunch outings. Because of this, we were both able to sock away $50 a week from each paycheck.
We also saved any money we got for Christmas, birthdays, tax refunds, and the cash we were graciously given as shower gifts.
At the time, my husband worked out of town a lot, so per diem checks also went in savings along with spare change, gas reimbursement checks, funds from freelance writing gigs, and a few things sold on Amazon and eBay.
When my baby boy was born the night before our sixth wedding anniversary, I was not worried where the cash would come from to pay for his delivery.
I have to be honest, there was still a fair amount of sticker shock that came when the hospital bill finally arrived and I was grateful my husband and I had padded our savings. I was even able to get a 20 percent discount from the hospital when I paid our bill in full instead of in installments. That equaled a savings of over $2,000!
Life has changed so much since our son was born, and not just because we are new parents. My husband was offered a job — out of the blue — that pays excellent benefits and afforded us the opportunity to move closer to my parents and, due to our new-found savings habit, allows me to stay home.
This has been everything I prayed for.
While the saving was tough and the bills were expensive, my son is worth every penny. Some things you just can’t put a price on.
Lydia Senn is former stressed out journalist turned freelance writer and stay at home mom, who blogs about cooking on a budget and cleaning green. You can check out her blog at Five4FiveMeals.com.
Have you saved up and paid cash for something — large or small? Submit your story for possible publication here.
Do It Yourself: Raspberry Vinaigrette
Life Blessons shows you how to make homemade Raspberry Vinaigrette.
Do you have a fun and frugal DIY idea to share? I’d love to hear about it! Read the submission guidelines and submit it here.
15 Ways to Have More Energy (Part 3)
We’ve been talking about ways to have more energy this week. If you missed the first two posts in this series, read them here.
Here are three more ways to have more energy:
7. Set Goals
Without goals, you have no real purpose for going through your days. If you’re aiming at nothing, you’re not going to feel inspired, motivated, or driven. Goals give you momentum, passion for life, and a reason to wake up every morning excited about what lies ahead of you.
Good goals need to be specific, measurable, and realistic. I find it’s helpful to break big goals down into simple bite-sized pieces. Instead of setting a goal to read a book in one week, I’ll set a goal to read 2-3 chapters each day — enough to easily finish the book in a week.
By breaking my goals down into smaller chunks, it makes them much more manageable and doable — and I usually end up following through with more of them that way, too!
If you don’t have goals, start with something simple. At the beginning of the week, pick one or two small goals to accomplish, write them down, and then break them down into smaller pieces — and work on knocking them out little by little.
You’ll probably be amazed at how much more zest for life you’ll have when you actually have a destination in mind and a plan to get there. And you just might find that your renewed zeal for life helps you attack all of life with more energy and excitement!
8. Go To Bed Early
If you’re a night owl, you’re already shaking your head and skipping over this one. And it might not work for you.
For me personally, though, going to bed early on a consistent basis really helps me to feel more rested. When I feel more rested, I’m naturally much more energetic and cheerful. Rather than dragging through each day trying to keep my eyes open with toothpicks, I’m meeting the day with gusto.
I’ve found that I can’t commit to going to bed at 9 p.m. every single night, but if I aim to go to bed at 9 p.m., I’m much more likely to be in bed close to 10 p.m. It doesn’t always happen and I usually have one or two nights per week when I’m up past 11 p.m., but I rarely every stay up much past 11 p.m. — that’s really late for me! 🙂
As a result, I get more sleep — and I’m able to get up early most mornings, something that gives me a huge headstart on the day.
If you’d like to start going to bed earlier but you just feel like it’s not possible, sit down and really think through what your hindrances are. Do you need to cut out some of your evening activities or just turn off the TV or computer earlier? Do you need to eat dinner earlier and start your bedtime routine right after dinner?
For those of you who want to go to bed earlier but can’t seem to fall asleep much earlier than midnight, try getting up really early for two or three days in a row, plus adding some exercise into your schedule. You’ll probably find that by the second or third day, you’re starting to feel tired by 10 p.m.
And by the way, if you can at all help it: go to bed when you first start to feel drowsy at night. Don’t wait for your second wind to kick in. Just go to bed — you’ll be glad you did in the morning!
9. Make the Most of Your Mornings
What you do in the first two hours of your morning sets the tone for your whole day.
If you drag yourself out of bed after hitting the snooze button eight times, stumble into the kitchen, turn on your laptop or phone and waste 45 minutes trying to wake yourself up, you’re not setting yourself up for a day of success.
Think about what five things you’d really like to do in the same order each morning, write these down, and commit to getting up and doing them every single morning for the next three weeks.
It will be hard to follow your five things morning routine at first, but stick with it and it will pay off. I promise!
Making the most of your mornings will give you momentum for the rest of your day!
{And by the way, for those of you moms out there who are already feeling defeated because your mornings are so unpredictable when you have little people underfoot: don’t feel badly if you don’t always do all five things perfectly in the same order every day for three weeks. Life happens and perfection is impossible. Do the best you can do and remember that making progress in the right direction — even if it seems like microscopic progress — is still moving in the right direction!}
…To be continued tomorrow.
photo courtesy of BigStock
Shared Jul 25, 2012
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Help! I’m so frustrated with trying to use coupons that I’m thinking of giving up!
Help! I’m so frustrated with trying to use coupons that I’m thinking of giving up!
I’m giving up on coupons! Kroger accused me of “fraudulently” printing a coupon for a free package of Kings Hawaiian Bread, which was sent to me via a Facebook offer. Then today at Walart, they refused three of my coupons that were printed from Coupons.com because they didn’t have the right bar code.
Is this a common occurrence for users of coupons? Is there something I need to be doing differently with my coupons. I just wonder is this is something that happens to others. Hints, tips, and suggestions as to how to avoid these issues in the future? -Cyndi
I think most all of us couponers have had a bad experience or three while using coupons, so we feel your pain and frustration.The bad experiences are usually very minimal in comparison to the good experiences, but they happen to all of us at one time or another.
A number of years ago, I was accused of cheating and firmly asked never to come back to a store by a manager. Truth be told, although I replied kindly and left the store, I was shaking and wanted to give up coupons then and there.
Instead, because I knew that the manager was misinformed on coupons and had overstepped his bounds in the way he had treated me, I went home, wrote out all of the details of what had happened, and placed a call to that store’s corporate office the next morning.
You know what? They apologized profusely, reiterated the fact that I was using coupons in accordance with their policy, and were very concerned with how the manager had treated me.
In fact, they asked me if I’d like for them to have him call me and personally apologize! I said that wouldn’t be necessary, but I just wanted to ask if they could make sure the manager was better informed as to what their coupon policy was so that I and other couponers who shopped there in the future wouldn’t have such a difficult time using coupons.
I never found out exactly what happened, but I do know that from then on, that store became a much more coupon-friendly store and the manager never gave me or my other couponing friends who shopped there any issues.
So don’t give up — even when you feel frustrated! Your wallet will thank you and I promise that not every experience using coupons will be so bad in the future.
Here are some suggestions as to ways to prevent as many bad couponing experiences as possible in the future:
1. Make Sure You Know the Deals & Store Policies Well
Get a copy of the store’s corporate coupon policy and bring it with you when you shop. Know it backwards and forwards. That way, if there is any question regarding your coupon use, you are well educated and can make a clear case for why you are using coupons in accordance with the store’s corporate coupon policy.
2. Look for Efficient and Cheerful Cashiers
I always scan the checkout lanes before heading into one and look for a cashier that is speedy, efficient, and cheerful. For some reason, I always seem to have better success in using coupons with these types of cashiers.
In addition, I’ll look for people who are using coupons and checkout and if I see that the cashier is running them through cheerfully, I’ll head to that line. As the cashier is usually what makes or breaks your coupon-shopping experience, finding cashiers who are coupon-friendly go a long way toward a pleasant checkout.
3. Be Polite and Courteous, But Firm
Unfortunately, many cashiers do not know the store’s coupon policies. I can’t count the number of times a cashier has told me they can’t accept a coupon for one reason or another.
While their reason might be 100% true and valid, more often than not, I’ve found that they will tell me something that I know is not right per the store’s coupon policy. When this happens, I politely, but firmly explain what the store’s coupon policy is. More often than not, this is all it takes and they willingly accept all of my coupons, no questions asked.
Be a polite and informed customer, follow the store’s coupon policies to a tee, and you’ll usually earn the respect of the cashiers. When they respect you, they are much less likely to question your usage of coupons.
4. Don’t Make a Big Stink
In some instances, I’ve cordially explained the coupon policies and a cashier won’t budge. Instead of getting frustrated or upset, I just calmly ask them to remove the item from my transaction and return my coupon.
Yes, I miss out on some deals, but I’d rather leave the store without the deal if it means I avoid holding up the line and making a scene at the cash register. Plus, in many instances, I can use the coupon at another store to get a great deal.
5. Work on Lowering Your Grocery Bill Without Using Coupons
While I’m a big advocate of using coupons, I think they are just one piece of the grocery-savings pie. If you live in an area with few coupon-friendly stores, you might find that you just aren’t going to see the savings that someone with a lot of store options and stores that double or triple coupons is going to see.
Don’t be discouraged by this! There are many, many other ways to save money without using coupons. Pick a few of these to implement each month and determine which ones work best for your family.
Not everything that works for someone else will work for you, but I’m sure you’ll find many simple ways to lower your grocery bill without using coupons. Paired with the savings you can also obtain by using coupons, you can eventually really see significant savings!
What advice do the rest of you have for Cyndi? I’d love to hear your suggestions and tips!
photo courtesy of Big Stock