This is what we call the essentials - Costco. Of course, no coupons - rarely - and not on this trip.

I cook a lot from scratch - and just happens that I ran out of a lot of my "staple" spices - so I sent DH to Costco - and he did very well sticking to the list (mostly) - the stuff he got is acceptable to our budget as he uses them as snacks to keep at his desk at work rather than hitting the vending machine. Pretty much he got about $50 more stuff than I was expecting -...

Publix: 1/12/2008

Merchandise Purchased: $8.35
Savings: $0.00
OOP: $8.35

Seems fresh fruit and veggies are hard to find coupons for.

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Year To Date:

Merchandise Purchased: $293.28
Savings: $231.41
OOP: $37.25

CVS: 1/12/2008

Total: $77.86
Coupons/Sale: $77.63
OOP: $0.23
Rebate: $29.99
ECB's: $5.00

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Year To Date:

Merchandise Purchased: $284.93
Savings: $231.41
OOP: $28.90

Shopping: CVS
1/8/2008

Total: 117.90
Coupons/Sale: 104.61

OOP: 13.29
ECB's: $24.00
Rebate: 29.99
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Year To Date:

Merchandise Purchased: $207.07
Savings: $153.78
OOP: $28.67

Christmas was a blast! There are two factors which contributed to this: I am on a budget (not a bad word) and I'm using coupons more effectively.

Thanks to my newly found couponing, I was able to have Christmas without the stress I usually do when we are "getting for everyone". And this next year should be even better.

I realized after I'd wrapped everything that I'd spent an amazingly small amount of money for the bounty that was under the tree. It was a great...