Harris Teeter Triple Coupons!

November 5, 2009 at 6:56 pm (Life in General, Money)
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My shopping trip from Harris Teeter Triples…

All right, here we go, I must state that I did not go into the store with any preplanned list. I had no concrete idea of what I was going to get.  I know I said I was going to do a list but I gave up I just didn’t want to go through all that sitting up there on those hard chairs. I figured since my coupons were all nicely organized I could just thumb through them in store and if something was on sale that I wanted/needed I could decided if I wanted to buy it.

For those of you who don’t know Harris Teeter triples all coupons up to .99, so if something is .75 (I’ve never seen one for .99- if it’s a $1 or more it doesn’t triple or double) it will triple to $2.25. That’s a good thing. However there is a limit to 20 coupons used in one transaction, and if I’m not mistaken in one day…it’s linked to your VIC card…if don’t have one go get one now!

Okay so first thing first my receipt was over a foot long. I got some things for free, a lot of things for under $1 and the rest on some good sales. I only had a few rules, only get things that was on sale and I had a coupon for and if it wasn’t on sale I had to have a coupon that made it close to free as possible if not free at all. For instance Bird’s Eye frozen vegetables were not on sale, it was $2.69 and I got for .44. I got it because it’s the Asian Medley…that would be perfect for when I try the fried rice again.

Here’s are some things that I’m really excited about:

  1. Airwick’s compact I-motion starter kit, originally for $10.99 on sale for $7.99 I had a $4 off coupon, got it for $3.99. I’ve been wanting to try this for a while, since I don’t like air freshener sprays.
  2. Bounce Dryer Bar (2 months) originally for $4.99, on sale for 3.99. I had a .50 off coupon, tripled for $1.50, got it for $2.49. (Not an awesome deal but it made it worth my while to try a new product.)
  3. Scrubbing Bubbles Foam Shower Cleaner, originally $3.49, on sale for $2.50. I had a .75 off, tripled to $2.25. Got it for .25.
  4. I got two Oral B toothbrushes for free ^_^
  5. Prilosec OTC 14 day originally $11.49 on sale for $9.99, I had a $3 off coupon, got it for $7.99. Again not an awesome deal, but my mom just got prescribed to take these by her doctor. But since they are over the counter, her insurance doesn’t cover them, they way to expensive…$12 for a 14 day supply…really? I’m glad I was able to grab these for her. That’s $12 she can save. And I’m out $8.

In total I spent $31.94 and save a whopping $49.01. Just under $50. I paid just over $30 for $80 worth of food. That’s super awesome in my eyes.

Then I had to go to Target to get some Clorox Toilet Bowel Cleaner Wand Pads Refills, I was down to my last one after cleaning my bathroom today. Harris Teeter had them for sale $3.99 for a 6pk. Well I didn’t have a coupon and my friend said I would be able to get them cheaper at Target. So went there and guess what they weren’t cheaper. Well not really, the thing was their 6pk and their 10pk for some odd reason were the same price $4.10. Of course I got the 10pk, in theory it’s a better price to get the extra 4 pads for just .11 more.

So that was this week’s shopping, for dinner I cooked “Chicken” and Broccoli Alfredo. It turned out all right but the noodles could have been cooked just a bit longer and the fake chicken just tastes funny no matter what I stick it in. *Sigh* Now I’m going to bed.

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Weekly Update

November 5, 2009 at 2:56 pm (Family, Fiction Writing, Life in General, Money, Personal Finances, School)
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I don’t think I’ll ever be one of those people who can write in a blog/journal every single day. I just don’t think my life is ever going to be that interesting. So anyway, I did start the NaNo story and promptly fell behind. But that’s okay I’m going to catch up one day…like soon. I promise. It’s just so many things distracting me. And I didn’t plan and so now I’m winging it and that’s not an excuse it’s just facts. I haven’t written in so long that I’m out of practice. So I’m not focusing on getting to 50,000 or even 25,000, I’m just focusing on writing a story. I think the basis of my story is awesome. Granted because I’ve been so wrapped up in Halloween the past month that it’s going to have a tinged of dark side in there. But it’s going to be an awesome story even if it kills me…which it probably will because as of now the plot stinks like no body’s business.

In other news I’m breaking down and going to pay for internet. I know shocking, but since last weekend my hacked connection has been very weak. And I don’t like that, not at all. I live off the internet.

I got an A on my fun project…she was really impressed with my knowledge of cartoons and creating websites. Go me. I’ve got some serious papers due this month, another reason why I need the internet, it’s not convenient to come up to the wireless cafe (these seats hurt my bottom) or ride up to campus. I don’t want to be there all day and then I don’t want to ride the with my friend back…her car is still not cleaned out. Plus her husband always wants to ride there and he doesn’t understand the fact that I’m not there to keep him company. It still wouldn’t be worth having a car over either.

So my mom and brother did come last weekend but we didn’t make it to the Faire, I felt like crap the next morning and then it was rainy and muggy and just plain gross. So we opted not to go. Instead we went out to Cracker Barrell, I hadn’t been there in years, in fact I’ve only been there once and I didn’t like it. But they love it so we went and it was a lot better this time. Still can’t eat a full serving of pancakes anymore but the syrup was so good. We then we shopping, so I could find a winter/fall coat…then I realize I don’t wear coats. So I got a hoodie from the man’s department in Target. It’s so comfy.

I tried one of those new recipes I found on MorningStar Farms site, and it was pretty good. I’m going grocery shopping again today because Harris Teeter is have triple coupon. I hope my friend’s husband has to work…I don’t like going shopping with him. He’s like a spoiled five year old who keeps asking are we done and throws a fit if he can’t get something special. I’m still trying to see what she saw in him other than a chance to have a kid without birthing the sucker. Oh well. Laters!

B.J.

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Weekly Grocery Shopping Trip-10/31

October 31, 2009 at 2:38 pm (Life in General, Money)
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I forgot to write a post about my grocery-shopping trip last week. So I’m going to write and post this as if I had written it last week.

Before I went to the store I stopped and got $40 dollars out of the bank. I had hoped only to spend that much at the store total. I originally only planned on going to Harris Teeter. The on down the street from my house, so you do know neither one of those things happened right?

Okay so we did go to the Harris Teeter, and the problem was that there just weren’t a lot of things on sale in general. Nothing that I needed rather was on sale. I still have a problem of compulsive spending, i.e. two 12pack soda. Granted I spent $2.50 on each. There were too many things I bought that weren’t on sale, but I tried to get things that I had coupons for. In total I spent $35.52, and I saved $17.81.

Why go to the other store? Well, I didn’t get any of my staples, because in general Harris Teeter’s staple prices are very expensive, compared to Lowe’s Food. So we went to Lowe’s Food. I spent way more here, not that many things I had coupons for. For instance like the Pamprin that I needed to get or else I would die from pain. However there were a number of things that were on sale. For instance the Morning Star Farms items were 3 for $9.99 like I said. Although Harris Teeter did have some of the items on sale and for .33 cheaper, but not all of those were the ones I wanted to get. In total I spent $62.80, yeah I know I so didn’t want to spend that much but I needed a lot of things since I was almost out. I saved $20.07 most of that was rewards savings. I hate that they’ve changed their rewards system. Although I never actually cashed in any green points, I wanted to save them for a rainy day. Now I have to wait till I get $5 in rewards before I get a $5 print out. I’m at $1.22. I’m still not sure how the system works; to me it doesn’t seem worth it.

In total I spent $98.32 and saved $32.88. But I now have way too much soda in my fridge, the two 12pks and a 6pk (it was on sale at Lowe’s for $1.35- it was on sale and then there was a coupon on the item itself.)

B.J.

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The Pains of Changing

October 29, 2009 at 3:51 pm (Life in General, Money)
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I hate when I have to replace things.

For instance I have that awesome all in one printer I got a couple of years ago at the university dorm sale thing, you know where everything left in the dorm rooms is put into this huge room and they sale for .50 cents. At first it didn’t work completely with my IBM, then I got shiba-chan and it worked perfectly. But then Shiba left, so  I had a printer but no computer. Well I’ve got Mac Kegor, guess what the scanner no longer works with Snow Leopard. There’s no drivers for it and doesn’t seem like there will be one created. They aren’t even selling that model anymore, or even the model line. In theory I could just suck it up and not have a scanner, but that’s part of getting an all in one to begin with. But that’s not the only problem, the ink for this model is pricey. For the combo pack, it’s $60. For the individual color it’s $25-$40 (various one’s work in the printer) the black on is $25. So I’m looking at $50 to $80 on just ink. And the ink doesn’t last long…last than 200 pages.

I’m thinking I could get another printer for that much. In fact Target has a all in one HP printer for $40 this week. For what I’ve been able to find say’s  it’s compatible with Mac. No one has said otherwise. The inks are cheaper, the combo is $35, color-$20, black is $15. But the same problem could happen, what if the scanner doesn’t work with snow leopard. It is a new model so a driver might be developed.

So what do I do? I can’t see me affording $60 on ink, I would have to start a separate savings plan just for ink. But should I chuck the old printer and get a new one? GAH! I need a printer, I don’t want to down grade. I do use the scanner and copier functions a lot.

I asked Jen, she was like well could you use the printer without the scanner and just a black ink printer at that? My sister says if I can budget to get the printer than go for it. S.B. says to get the new printer. What do you guys say?

Same thing for my camera, the replacement charger is $40-50…would it be better to get a new camera? The one I got…it was free.

Replacing sucks why can’t things last for ever?

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PAYDAY!

October 28, 2009 at 2:33 pm (Income, Money)
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Oh yeah, I just checked my account and I just got paid! I was down to my very last $6. Let me tell you how happy I am to have some money up in there. Woot! I applied for another savings account to be added on to my other account that way I can keep my money separate from my savings. I went ahead and moved $100 into my savings account for November.

I’m going to wait until Friday to actually go grocery shopping so I have time to make a list and give me time to finish eating the stuff I have in the freezer. Plus I’m gonna try to create a meal plan. A lot of days I eat late or don’t eat all cause I don’t know what to cook. I think my eating out is going to have to be switched from once a week to twice a month. I’ll just have to make sure I cook enough on Sunday nights so that I can eat the rest on Monday. I’m also going to have to stop feeding my friend. Every time she comes over I feel like I have to feed her…and well I can’t afford to do that. It’s not like she doesn’t have a job or anything, she makes more than I do…but she also has to pay for a lot cause her husband sucks and wont go get a job that pays him more.

I want to cut down on my grocery shopping. Why? Well I would still like more money to do stuff with. You know like buy make-up, or other luxury items. I’m a girl after all. I don’t want to deprive myself of things or else I won’t want to keep to this budget living. I looked on the USDA website, according to them the average amount spent on food for a female my age in a household of 1 in a thrifty budget is $147.70, low cost budget is $185.80, and a moderate cost budget is $229.40 a month. That breaks down to about $36, $46, and $57 (respectively) a week. I’m currently average at $40. I think if I try really hard I can get down to $36. This means actually cooking, not buying a lot of frozen pre-made food. My baked spaghetti I’ve been creating from scratch is better than the stouffer’s lasagna, and a lot cheaper.

The Stouffer’s lasagna the larger individual size one (come on the smaller ones are like a snack not a meal) are on sale for $2.50, regular they cost $3.32 at Lowe’s, that’s .23/oz. I buy some spaghetti sauce at $2.19 (.08/oz), some noodles at $1.51 (.09/oz), and a bag of shredded 6 Italian Cheeses at $2.54 (.32/oz) costs me $6.24 (.39/oz). Yeah it looks like the pre-made is cheaper but all that gives me six servings, that’s about three dinners and lunches at $1.04 each. The family size lasagna (if I can ever find one that’s vegetarian and not the vegetable one) cost $8.10, that’s $1.35 a meal. That’s not even accounting coupons I might have for these things, usually the coupons for the Stouffer’s involves buying three or more.

Ughhh…I started this post earlier and had to abandon it for several hours I have no idea where I was going with this so I’m going to go ahead and end it. I’ve got another post to write right after this one.

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I’m not bad at money management

October 17, 2009 at 10:53 pm (Money, Personal Finances)
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So I ‘ve been wondering how I could have mismanaged my money so badly. I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to handle being on my own. And then I got an email from the lady in charged of the sub-commitee of the scholarship I got. Well it turns out I never got paid for October. See what happened was I got a big school return in August, plus my first stipend payment for August. And then for some reason they paid us for September early. Since I moved in mid August my rent was prorated and due when I moved in. I paid that with my return money. I decided to go ahead pay my September and October rent with my stipend money. And that’s what got me off in my calculations. For some odd unknown reason I put in my head that I had been payed for October. So I managed to live off of two months worth of stipend money for nearly three months (Most of the return went to moving in expenses and setting up my apartment…furniture is expensive and the rest went to help with my dad’s funeral). And I still haven’t had to officially ask for any money.

So I’m not that bad at managing money. The real test will be coming up though, you see the email was to say that they would be paying us our stipend money for October, November, and December at the end of the month. Why? I don’t know I guess our financial aid people didn’t want to be bothered with it every month. So what I plan on doing is first paying my November rent. It’s due the first of every month and considered late on the 6th. I’m also going to prepay for December and January. Even though technically I could just not prepay for January since I will be getting another check for January, I don’t know when I would be getting that check. I would rather be safe then sorry.

I’m then going to place the money that is left over from the extra two months into my savings and leave the money for November in my checking and move the money for the following months into my checking at the first of the month (and not a day before). Following the spending plan I crafted I can see if I have any holes. I’m going to be pinching pennies as much as possible so I can get some good Christmas gifts, last year I wasn’t able to get anyone anything. That makes me sad. I’m also thinking about opening up another savings account. I have like three already.

One at the bank my sister works at, but that’s the problem she’s always checking my account. If she needs money, she’ll check mines and know when to ask for money. I don’t keep much in there any more. Originally I was going to keep my savings in there but yeah that’s a bad idea. I have an online savings but I’m still worry about online banking, I don’t keep much in there either. I have a main account at the state employee’s union, checking and savings. Maybe I can link another savings to that one. Well see. I don’t like having so many accounts. I need to look into my options.

Well it’s been a long day…I spent most of it cleaning. I’m heading to bed. Laters!

B.J.

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My Spending Plan

October 16, 2009 at 2:33 pm (Money, Personal Finances)
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Okay this is the budget I made before I moved in. I did the estimates based on research I did through reading and asking others.

Rent: $875/month (includes rent, electric, water, trash, cable, and washer & dryer rental)

Internet: $45/month

Cellphone: $56/month

Food: $200/month ($50 a week)

Household goods: $80/month

Transportation Cost: $10/month

Savings: $100/month

Debt repayment: $50/month

Leaving me with $84 dollars of extra cash. It all honest it’s a good spending plan/budget. So what happened this month? Ihave no idea, I just lost track of money. For starters I’m not paying for internet, I’m close enough to the clubhouse to tap unto our wireless cafe. I also average $40 a week on groceries. Plus I originally thought I would have to pay to ride the city bus every now and then, but turns out I can use my student i.d. card and I get on free.  In theory I should have $179 dollars extra, this makes me happy.

I think I’m going to stick to this plan as much as possible this upcoming month. I already have an issue I can’t afford my cell phone for this month. It might just have to be cut off for a while. I mean I have the cell phone where I could just get a few prepaid minutes and call it a day. I mean I don’t use my phone a lot, but everyone is like I need one since I’m by myself. I don’t know. I do call my mom everyday. It might be cheaper to do that anyway.  I’m going to look in to it. If I could shave some money off that bill I’ll be even happier.

I also I have to be more on top of my grocery shopping. I have been doing coupons and look at sales. The only problem is that being a vegetarian who isn’t a great big fan of veggies…the bases of my diet is vegetable protein, in other words fake meat. My favorite brand is Morning Star. The problem is they rarely go on sale. The last time they were on a good sale was this past July when Lowe’s had them for 3/$9.99. They usually cost almost $5 an item. Now I do get a printed coupon from the groceries stores almost every trip. But they aren’t good enough unless they are on sale. Lately I’ve been doing heavy pizza items, I’m starting to get tired of pizzas. When my favorite vegetarian restaurant starts selling their sauces I’ll be ever so happy.

After all next month is November I need to start thinking about Christmas. I’m gonna go eat cake.

B.J.

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The pains of living on my own

October 13, 2009 at 9:58 pm (Money, Personal Finances)
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OKay so I’ve stated before that I’m on a stipend, right? Well I am and I only get “paid” once a month. But for some reason they thought it would be good for us to get both August and September in the middle of August. Which means we don’t get another payment until the end of October. Well that sounded fine to begin with, I went ahead and paid my rent for August (out of my school refund check), September and October (out of my stipend money). I just checked my account and I have like $18 to last til the end of this month. I’m not really worried because I’ve got nothing due before then. The only thing I am worried about is food. I think I have enough I’ve been doing good grocery shopping, which is what mainly took most of my money. I must admit I did waste a good chunk of it, things I could have done without.

I think the next few weeks is going to see how well I can adapt on my on. I don’t want to ask anyone to borrow money because that starts a cycle that’s hard to break. However if my mom comes and wants to treat me to some groceries…I will not turn her down. I had wanted to use some money this next check to go buy a battery charge for my camera but I don’t know if I will be able to. It’s like $50 for a replacement charger. When you are on a tight budget that’s a lot. I really need to look at my budget again. I created one before I moved in but I haven’t really looked at it because it’s been so hectic and abnormal these past few months.

I know now that the goal is not to spend anymore money till next pay day. I might have to spend a dollar or two…I need to buy some peanut butter. I bought some and went to use it and found that the safety seal was not connected to the jar. I stood there for a while thinking on whether or not I could eat it but I decided not to. But I need peanut butter, to make pb&js that’s the only kind of sandwiches I eat…well homemade one’s.

Well I’m gonna go look at my budget and wait for my snuggle bunny to come online. Laters

B.J.

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Helium

February 12, 2008 at 12:33 am (Fiction Writing, Money)
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girl-with-coffee-and-laptop.jpg

As promised in this post, here is a detail post about the new service called Helium. Basically Helium is a website were writers go and post articles on a wide range of things. There is three aspects of Helium and how it can earn you money. Here’s a quick break down:

1. Write and Rate: This aspect of Helium is quite easy. First after signing up, you can go in to main part of Helium and find a channel you like, Arts and Humanities, Politics, Science, whatever you can think of there’s a spot for it. Once you choose a channel you will find different prompts under the channel. For instance under the Society and Lifestyle channel, you have four major sub-channels: African-American Issues, Lifestyle, Racism, and Society & Lifestyle (other). In the sub-channels you will find topics to write on. Examples in African-American Issues: Barack Obama: Christian or Radical liberal?, Lifestyle: Living unconventional lifestyles, Racism: Passing on our prejudice is a disservice to our children, and S & L (other): Dating and the disabled. Once you find the topic you want to write on, you write. I suggest you write in a word processing program of some sort, that has a good spell and grammar check. Usually there is a word limit of 1200 or more, but sometimes it’s less. After you wrote your article, re-read a couple of times, just like any other writing. And then go back to the site, click on the topic and it will take you to the page where you can post your article. After you go through the posting process, you will be taking to two articles on the same topic. Your asked to read both articles and rate which one is better than the other. After you post your first article you can start rating others.

How do you earn money? You can earn money from this by writing good articles and writing a lot of them. Just like you rated the other articles, someone else is rating yours. And the higher it goes the more it earns. So the more articles you have out there that are well-written, the more money your going to earn. Right now they are doing a reward-athon, the more articles you post under a certain criteria you earn stars, after you earn a star you get paid a certain amount for every article you post, if you post more articles that meet the criteria more stars, more money.

2. The Marketplace: If you are looking to earn a lot of money quickly, then this is the aspect of Helium you want to pay attention to. In the Marketplace you will find postings from editors and publishers on all sorts of topics. They post the topic and the amount they will pay for the article, for example one of the latest was from a children’s magazine looking for mystery stories (even a chance for it to be turned into a series.) If they chose your story, they were going to pay $50 for one. There are pay-outs from as low as $16 to as high as $150 an article. Because of the high pay-outs, these articles are highly competitive (they also have expiring dates- so read the whole post before starting something.).

How do you earn money? Pick a title and write some of the best stuff you’ve every written before. You could earn up to $150 for just one article. But remember that this section is very competitive and the titles needed can be scarce sometimes.

3. Contests: This is kind of self-explanatory. A collection of writing competitions for many different topics. It’s basically like the Write and Rate section, except you have less choice in the subject manner, and it deals with a point system. You collect points by writing as many highly rated articles as you can, under the channel (which has several different titles to chose from.) But if any of your articles drop below the top 50% points will be taken away from you.

How do you earn money? Like the first two, write good articles. First prize is $75, 2nd is $25, 3rd is $10, and 4th is $5.

So with a good combination of all three, you could really make a killing do what you like best writing. Is it worth the time and effort? I think it is, if you enjoy writing, then you really aren’t going to be to bothered about the time and effort it takes to craft a good article. It’s going to come natural to you. And like I said if you find a good combination of the three aspects, then yeah it could be worth it. Plus you are putting your name out there, publishers are looking at this site too. There are tons of success stories form people who were picked up full time (well freelance full time) from magazines.

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Job Related News: The Interview

February 7, 2008 at 9:44 pm (Job Search, Money, Personal Finances)
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Well I went to the interview. I was a bit early, but no harm in that right? Once they were ready for me, I was given a tour. Although it was a quick tour cause I’ve been there times before. Then I observed one of the teachers with a kid. This one kid was one of the aggressive kids, there are a total of four of these kids. He wasn’t that aggressive and he didn’t have a “tantrum”, so it wasn’t that bad. After about twenty minutes of that I had my interview with two of consultants. I think it went fine, I was asked about my ability to be silly in front of others…I held back a sarcastic look…I think there’s a bit dramaticization (is that a word) to me that I can be silly in front of others…Although it’s not like I’m use to being such a way in front of others. I only had one question to ask of them, and that was the training process…there’s a probationary time of one month before I would be by myself on the schedule. As I walked around I got second thoughts, I was still doubting myself. But then I came home and saw a comment from my friend on my personal blog about the interview and that made me smile. I didn’t ask about the salary but my mom told me later.

The base pay of $22,000 (I think the last time I said this was the highest well that’s for assistant teachers, but because I have a four degree I can be a teacher) a year (before taxes), is still less then what I want to making (which is probably what I would get yet is still much better than the $18,000 base for the assistant teacher), roughly $1,833.33 a month.

The highest is $26,000 a year before taxes, which is roughly $2,166.67 pre-tax. That’s almost $200 surplus and also a no need for a part time job. Which would be a good thing to cover some of the unknowns that I wasn’t able to accurately depict in my preliminary budget.

(Just for kicks, the median would be $24,000 a year, $2,000 a month, a $19.20 surplus…it’s a surplus not much but it’s something. I would probably still get a part-time job but probably after a few months…like a summer job or something.)

So if they gave me the job at the base pay I would still need to get a part time job that would net me just short of $200 a month. Which isn’t that bad…I mean if I got a job at say for instance Walgreens at minimum wage, $6.15/hr (NC’s minimum) and work for two days a week Saturday and Sunday (although I’ve always been told not to work on Sunday that whole Christian thing *shrugs her shoulders* I needs the money to get out of here…I’ll do it.) a total of 16 hours a weekend. That’s just short of $400 a month (that’s $200 more than what I’ve guessed I would need.), and $4,723.20 annually pre-tax, that’s a good chunk of extra cash. So if I chose to do the job as a summer job (starting in May and going to the end of July), I could still make $1,771.20 pre-tax, and only have to make up another $228 (perhaps in non-salary ways).

But this is all contingent on me actually getting the job. This is as much planning have done concerning this job and as much as I’m going to do until I get a job offer (which wouldn’t be sometime in the next week or so). I’m trying to be positive, but I swear it’s the waiting that kills me. I wish they would just tell you right there if you got it or not. All my other jobs were like that…although for all my other jobs I didn’t really have an interview either. I just put in an application and it was a “When an you start” deal. Oh I miss those days.

Well I’m off to watch something on the telly. Has anyone tried the Thule trail game yet?

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