Deals

I have a little addiction. Well, maybe a big addiction. I like to coupon and find deals. I wrote about it a little in this post but figured that I would write a more comprehensive post later. Well, here it is. It all started out so innocently - a sojourn with the computer and some friends' blogs during naptime got me linked to this blog, Being Frugal is Fabulous (website is now defunct). And I thought, what a wonderful idea - a blog about being frugal - now that is something that is useful and that I don't need to feel guilty about spending my time on (as opposed to spending hours on Facebook looking at pictures of old high school classmates that I haven't talked to or seen since high school or craft blogs of crafts that I will never do, but that is another post for another time).

Well, it got added to my blog roll and I checked it out whenever I was on and sometimes, there was some really cool deal that I would follow up on and other times, the posts just didn't apply to me. Oftentimes, there would be multiple posts per day so I was checking it at least daily and then noticed that in the posts, there were often thanks to other bloggers for finding the deal and a link to that blogger's blog. So I started clicking away and discovering this whole community of frugal blogs and each one got added to my blog roll. It got to the point where I was probably following 6 or 7 frugality blogs. And then I started to notice that the blogs were all posting the same things from each others' blogs! I finally whittled my following down to two of the most comprehensive blogs and subscribed to their daily e-mails and took them off my blog roll so I wouldn't compulsively check them every time I went on the computer (which is sometimes multiple times per day). I figured that once a day is enough for me and any really, really hot deals can wait until the next day.

Here are the two blogs that got me started on my addiction of deal savvyness: For the Mommas and My Frugal Adventures. They both have huge followings and I wonder if there is not some friendly competition between them. But they both make dozens of posts per day about new coupons, free samples, store sales, and everything in between. I still find that a lot of what they post doesn't apply to me so there is a lot of sifting that I do. And it can be a little overwhelming at first because there are so many deals, but you have to start off small and figure out how much time and effort that you want to put into your own frugality ventures (because there is definitely an opportunity cost to this and a pretty steep learning curve to figure out how this system works - at least for me).

I just started by signing up for free samples (I joke with my husband and sisters that I have prostituted my name and address out to the online world). Then I started signing up for rewards programs - and get made fun of by my husband and friends for being part of Pampers Village and being a fan of Huggies on Facebook and anything else on there that will give me a free sample or coupon. There are also quite a few coupons available to print that I have to be careful about too because I could seriously use up all my ink on coupons for products that I won't buy or wouldn't normally buy.

Most recently though, my biggest time sink has been drugstore deals. I used to never shop at Rite Aid or Walgreens. I actually wondered who in the world shopped at those stores because they seemed so expensive and why would you go there when you can go to Target or Walmart? But I kept seeing these bloggers get these incredible deals there. So I finally jumped in and started to figure out the system.

I can't really reasonably explain how it all works in this post because it would take a while and if you are really that interested, it's better to check out the blogs that I have listed above. But I just have to post (and perhaps boast a little bit) about these incredible deals that I have got, not just from the drugstores but from everywhere. I can't even imagine paying full price for some of these things now because you can always find coupons to stack with good sales. I still consider myself quite a deal amatuer, but it is turning into a fun little hobby although I have to constantly keep myself in check to not obsess about every deal and go chasing them unreasonably. But since I'm a stay-at-home mom, I have some flexibility to make multiple, quick shopping trips.

Anyway, on to the deals...