Safeway Haul

I am pooped! I hit Safeway hard today. I made 2 trips and did 3 transactions.


My out of pocket was higher than I liked but overall, I am pretty satisfied. It would have been much lower if Hubbs hadn't decided he wanted to make Chinese Food tomorrow as I was walking out the door.


First, this is what I got
18 Bertolli Pasta Sauces
1 Oreo Fun Stix
6 6-packs of Arrowhead waters
1 Gallon of Milk
1 big bottle of French Vanilla Creamer
3 black Safeway totes
3 18-packs of Coors Light
1 BBQ Sauce
1 Tartar Sauce
2 Quaker Rice Cakes
2 cans of Ortega Green Chilies
2 packages of Fish Fry Batter
1 package of Egg Drop Soup mix
1 package of Hot and Sour Soup mix
2 Sweet and Sour Sauce
17 Capri Sun Sunrise
2 Ziploc Gallon freezer bags
2 All Small and Mighty
2 Daisy Cottage Cheese
1 Round Steak
and 1 Ham


Total before coupons: $387.32
Total out of pocket: $107.95
Total saved with coupons and club card: $279.37


My Safeway has refused to take my IP (printed from online) coupons in the past but I took them with me today to try my luck yet again. On my first trip, I managed to get in at the register the Assistant Manager was at and he took the IPs without bating an eye. So the other cashiers that have refused them and their bullshit excuse of "Safeway doesn't take printed coupons" has been proven wrong.


On my second trip, I divided my stuff into 2 transactions to save a trip. I felt kind of bad for holding up the line for that long but the dude behind me was cool with it, plus the kids were at my Mom's house so I HAD to maximise my trip. When the cashier saw me unloading my cart she got really pissy but when she saw my total drop, so did her jaw. She was super nice from then on.

I ended up giving away a bit of my haul and some of my stockpile today too. My dad hurt his shoulder a few months ago and hasn't worked in a while. Plus they watch Bobblehead most days during the week so I gave them a bag of Bertolli sauce and a stack of Capri Suns. My neighbors (the big bad biker dude, his girlfriend and her son) are struggling too. She drives a school bus and he has been laid off for as long as Hubbs has but without unemployment so I gave them some Capri Suns when I was unloading the car and I have a bag of stuff (more Bertolli sauce, some pasta, salad dressing, and some of my left over coupons) sitting by my door that I need to take over tonight. I also took some Bertolli sauce, salad dressing and Arrowhead water over to my grandma.

I know it isn't much but it is something. We are lucky that I am working full time again, that unemployment is still going strong, that I know how to coupon and meal plan, that I started my stockpile when times were good, and we had the foresight to sock every extra penny into our savings account. Stupid economy. Our friends and family are a close knit group and I know that they would give me and my family ANYTHING if we asked for it and we would give them ANYTHING as well. I also 100% believe in what goes around, comes around. A few bucks here gives back a whole lot of good karma. Ok, that's enough of my rambling about karma.

Next weeks flier looks pretty tame and the next promo doesn't interest me too much so I probably won't go grocery shopping for a while except for milk and some veggies.

Tomorrow, I promise

to have a better post for you.

Today, I am leaving work early so I can switch my pantry and playroom without Monk Man and Bobblehead under my feet.

Why am I switching things up?

Well, Hubbs bought me a freezer for Christmas. Yay! And it is being delivered in the morning. Double yay! He paid cash for it, btw.

The pantry has a TV already set up but the playroom doesn't. So instead of having DirecTv come out and run another cable, I am moving the rooms around. Yeah, I don't do anything the easy way. The pantry would be better accessible in the playroom anyway.

Don't laugh. It makes sense to me.

I promise to take before/after pictures. And actually post them.

Well, I am at home

But the dude is still on the loose.

Monk Man's daycare lady's husband works for the city and had some new information.

The police found the handcuffs in my neighborhood but not the dude.

I am willing to bet money that he is long gone to Mexico by now. At least I hope so.

You had better believe our house will be locked up tight and I will be anally overprotective for the next few days. Because I wouldn't be me if I didn't over-react about something once a week.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On a side note, the dogs got into my pantry while I was at work.

They managed to eat a good part of my stockpiled Nilla Wafers. 3 damn boxes.

I can't decide if they are the smartest or the dumbest dogs on the planet.

I really hope they don't get sick. But if they do, I hope it is outside and not on the carpet.

Shitheads.

Things you can/can not freeze

I *just* discovered the Hot Coupon World forums this weekend. If you want to join and want a referral, use peachykornkitten!

I have learned sooo much about couponing and stockpiling. Yes, this has become a little of an obsession.

I didn't know you can freeze
-Flavored Coffee Creamer
-Tortillas
-Eggs
-Canned biscuits
-Lunch meat
-Go-gurt
-Plain Yogurt

And and I didn't know you shouldn't freeze
-Anything with mayonnaise in it
-Sour Cream
-Flavored Yogurt
-Block cheese you plan to slice

Looky what I did this weekend

Ugh. I caught the cleaning bug again.

I am exhausted! But I did get a lot done.

My Stockpile in progress: Its so organized and pretty!


My baking stuff, spices and bread


My Fudge making stuff


Under my sink


The rest of under my sink



The storage in my "Office"


More of my "Office"--Who else do you know that eats THAT much Ramen Noodles?



Another shot of under the sink


2 1/2 empty shelves!


The hall pantry is being cleaned out for all my appliances. Like the crock pots, the deep fryers, the coffee machines, extra dishes. Notice everything is a plural? When we had our wedding shower we received a lot of duplicates. All that stuff is spread out all over our house. I have a deep fryer in my bathroom cabinet, 2 sets of good occasion dishes in my bedroom, you get the idea.

It makes me feel really good about myself that I am actually (finally) getting one of the things done that I had planned on doing while Hubbs is gone.

My Pantry

My Formula Stash


Baby Food, Bottle Liners and Baby Snacks


My Baking Supplies


My Cookbooks


Pasta & Mexican food stuff


Soups


Fruits & Veggies


BBQ Sauce, Chili, Mayo, Jelly and other stuff


No Place to Put these yet-Flour, Sugar, Rice


Potatoes, Onions and Oil


Mac & Cheese, Hamburger Helper & Brownie Mix


Cereals


Crackers


Trash bags, Ziplocks, popcorn, bread & Tortillias




It is a VERY small stash compared to other people. But I am just starting out and going very slowly. I would hate to overdraw the checking account. Again.

I have a pantry project planned for this weekend. Hubbs is going out of town to pick up his work truck. While he is gone, I am going to turn part of my office/junk room into better pantry space and put my small appliances like the deep fryer and crock pots in the hall pantry so I can have a little less clutter in the bedroom.

Yes, I am going to try to build some shelving. Never done this before so keep your fingers crossed I don't pull the walls down while trying to get this accomplished!

Stockpiling food? WTF?

http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-budgeting/article/104914/Load-Up-the-Pantry

In case you don't want to read the whole article, this is the VERY FIRST LINE! "I don't want to alarm anybody, but maybe it's time for Americans to start stockpiling food.
No, this is not a drill."

Ummm, yeah. You DO want to alarm people, otherwise this would not have been the opening sentence and it would not have been on Yahoo's homepage. STUPID as HELL! Bring on the rioters.

I was brought up LDS and as you probably already know, that church recommends that families keep a year supply. I don't exactly think that is a bad idea. In fact, I know a few people that actually had to use it and their family would not have eaten if it wasn't for the year supply.

But when I hear stockpiling my mind automatically goes to The Great Depression type scenarios. Not good.

But I guess I really SHOULD have more canned goods in my pantry. But if things get as bad as in the past (Great Depression), I better load up on ammo too. And have some cash on hand.

But let me be honest. This is a mobile home, a trailer. It isn't exactly the epitome of storage space. KWIM? He he he, we could always hide the food UNDER the trailer....

For the record, no, I am not JoJoBob. For those of you that were wondering. :)