The Cat Came Back

You know that little ditty, right? "The cat came back, he just couldn't stay away..." I feel like that cat. I just can't seem to stay away from Target. This is probably mostly because I live in an area where my other option is Wal-Mart. But now that I know a little more about these coupon glitches (thanks to Kerry at Totally Target), I feel more confident that I'll be able to either avoid it or catch it at the register and have the cashier fix it.

Anyway, I went to Target last night and found a few really good deals that I wanted to share.

Kraft Cheese 7 or 8 oz Blocks or Shredded, Assorted Varieties $2
I bought 5 bags of shredded cheese = $10
- 2x $1/2 Kraft Shredded or Block Cheese 7 or 8 oz Target Coupon HERE
- $5/5 Kraft Dairy Products Manufacturer Coupon HERE
= $3 for 5 bags of cheese or $0.60 each

*NOTE: You have to watch when your cashier scans the $5/5 MQ because it will most likely ring up at $0.00. Make sure you point it out right away and have them correct it.

Buy Any 5 Select Glade Holiday Air Care Items, Get a $5 Target Gift Card
I bought 10 candles @ $2.99 each = $29.90
- 5x B1G1 Free Glade Jar Candle, any 4 oz Manufacturer Coupon (9-26 SS)
- 2x $1.50/2 Glade Jar Candle, any 4 oz Manufacturer Coupon HERE
- $10 Target Gift Cards
= $1.95 for 10 candles, or about $0.20 each

* NOTE: This deal is effected by the $10 invisible manufacturer coupon gift card glitch so make sure you watch it.

Tag Junior Deal is a No Go :(

I just got this e-mail from Target:

Hi from Target.com.

Due to an unexpected error, the following item(s) you have ordered were incorrectly priced at the time of your order.

LeapFrog Tag Junior Book Pal

We're sorry, but we are unable to offer this item for the incorrect price. The correct price is $29.99. We have canceled your order for
this item.

Despite our best efforts, a small number of items on our site are occasionally mis-priced. We do, however, verify prices as part of our
shipping procedures. If an item's correct price is lower than our stated price, we charge the lower amount and ship you the item. If an item's
correct price is higher than our stated price we will cancel your order and notify you of such cancellation via email. This pricing policy is posted in the
Help section on Target.com as well as on the order acknowledgment that you received.

Again, we regret any inconvenience this may have caused you. Thank you for being our valued guest.


Sincerely,
Online Guest Services
Target.com

This is not the first time something like this has happened. Back in 2008 when I was trying to get pregnant the first time, I ordered a Britax car seat for like, $40 or something ridiculously cheap like that. It turned out to be an error and they cancelled all the orders and gave everyone a $5 or $10 (I can't remember which one it was) e-gift certificate. I didn't really care then because I wasn't even pregnant yet. But I really wanted these Tag Junior things! :(

I don't know about you anymore, Target. I feel as though you have your head up your ass nowadays. Let me know when you get your poop in a group and maybe I'll see you again someday.

Cautious Target Trip

I say cautious because I don't totally trust Target anymore because of this ongoing coupon computer glitch. But I fould a lot of great deals at Target with sales and coupons and such, so I decided to give it a go. I watched very, very closely when the cashier was scanning them and made sure they all went through correctly.

Here are the fruits of my labor:

I'm not going to write exactly how I got these deals with links like I usually do, simply because I just don't have time. But I will tell you how much each things regular price vs. the price I got it for. If you want details on something, just ask me.

Hungry Man (2) - Reg. $2.94 each, Paid $0.94 each.
Kraft Homestyle Mac & Cheese (2) - Reg.$2.28 each, Paid $0.53 each.
Curel Hand Repair Lotion (2) - Reg. $4.49 each, Paid $0 (FREE plus $0.02 money maker!).
Quaker Oatmeal 18 pack instant oatmeal - Sale $2.50, Paid $0.50.
Quaker Oatmeal 10 pack instant oatmeal - Sale $2.39, Paid $0.39.
Herbal Essences conditioner - Reg. $2.99, Paid $1.99.
Reach dental floss - Reg. $0.98, Paid $0.00 (FREE!)
Crest toothpaste - Reg. $2.49, Paid $0.49.
LeapFrog Tag Junior books - Reg. $10.99 each, Paid $5.00 each.

I paid $16.29 for all of this, which is great considering that the Tag Junior books alone would normally cost more than that. Without coupons and sales, this would have cost me $52.75. I saved about 70%! Go me!

My favorite deal was the LeapFrog Tag Junior books.

They are on sale this week for $10, plus I used this $5/1 MQ! The Curious George one is for Isaac for Christmas, and the Sesame Street one is for my niece for her birthday. Which brings me to the next thing I want to talk about...

I bought two Tag Junior Book Pals earlier today on Target.com.

These babies are normally $29.99 and for some odd reason, the green ones (not the purple ones, even though they're the same) were on sale for $9.99 + free shipping for a few short hours today. About 10 minutes after I placed my order, they went out of stock. In fact, it's not even on their website anymore. I actually checked my email before posting this to make sure they didn't cancel my order. I'll be keeping the receipt for the books just in case. I'd love Isaac to have one of these, so it's a great, cheap Christmas present! And my nieces birthday was earlier this month, and we haven't bought her a gift yet because we probably won't see her until Thanksgiving. I think this Tag Junior Book Pal plus the Sesame Street book is a great gift!

After I ordered the Tag Junior Book Pals, I went here and signed up for my free Tag Junior book!

Whew! What a day full or good deals! :)

$0.48 Toilet Paper

I hate buying toilet paper. It's expensive and gets used up fast. But it's a necessity, so I buy it anyway. But I don't like it.

So when I found out that I could get a $20 Groupon + free shippin to Soap.com (a website that sells household products) for $10, I jumped at the chance. Things are generally a little more expensive at Soap.com, but getting 50% off plus free shipping more than makes up for that. Here's my order summary:

So that's 30 packs of TP for $0.48! Well, actually $10.48, since I had to buy the Groupon, but still a pretty good deal! Plus I don't have to go out to buy it. They deliver it right to my door for free! I ordered it on Friday evening and will get it on Wednesday.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Groupon, it's a site where you can buy gift certificates (or Groupons) for certain stores, restaurants, salons, etc... in various cities in the US and Canada. This is what their website says about it:

"Groupon negotiates huge discounts on popular local goods, services and cultural events. Then we offer the deals to thousands of subscribers in a free daily email. The deals are activated only when a minimum number of people agree to buy. So our subscribers get a great deal and the business gets a ton of new customers. Win-win."

If you live in a bigger city, you'll have lots to choose from! Usually there are one or two deals per day for each city. However, if you live in a podunk town in a podunk state, you'll still have a few options. Not local options, but occasionally Groupon will have deals for online stores, like Soap.com. It's a pretty awesome deal! You can sign up here.

Free Stuff!

Looky what I got in the mail yesterday!

Back in May or June, the teacher with whom I work (who is also addicted to couponing and free stuff) won a Schick instant win game. She won a gift pack for herself and a friend. She knows I like free stuff too, so she picked me! :) Anyway, it came today. It's a four-pack of disposable razors (really nice ones!) and a Trim Style razor, which is a razor on the top and a battery operated bikini trimmer on the bottom. Sweet! I never treat myself to good razors. I guess now I'll have to shave my legs.

I just love free stuff!

I also love extremely discounted stuff. Like the two FoodSaver Handheld Vacuum Sealing Systems I got in the mail yesterday (what can I say, it was a good mail day!).

I didn't take a picture so I used a stock photo from the website. Anyway, these babies are regularly $19.99 each and I got them for $3.60 each (shipped!) by using a coupon code I found on Hip2Save. I bought one for myself and one for my mom. My parents just happened to be at our house when they were delivered, and my mom told me she didn't want it, so I guess maybe I'll give it to my mother-in-law or someone else. Anyone want a Foodsaver handheld vacuum sealer?

Windows!

Guess what we got this week? You guessed it! New windows! They look great!

We opted to do the jam extentions and inside trim ourselves to save about $1K, so that isn't going to get done for a little while. James talked to his dad tonight and he said they could come up next weekend to help with that. That's WAY faster than I thought it would get done! Makes me happy! I hate half finished projects.

So in addition to the $7K we spent on windows, we also had to drop $350 on blinds. It maybe wouldn't have to cost so much, but for some reason, my husband has his heart set on vertical blinds. Apparently those are spendy. And apparently we have one humongo window at 108 inches, plus you want the blinds to hang past the window a few inches. The biggest pre-fab vertical blinds you can get are 104 inches. So, of course, we have to special order it. I ended up getting them online. They're fabric and really nice. I'm excited to get them.

But until we get the blinds delivered, we have no window treatments in the living room. This is what our house looks like from the outside at night.

You can see right through the living room and into the kitchen. As you can imagine, we're feeling a bit exposed. I mean, you can see what's on TV, for crying out loud! Most evenings, once Isaac goes to bed, I retreat to the bedroom where I can relax safely behind our curtains.

In other news, I'm sick. I have a cold and a possible sinus infection (I've had a headache for over a week and now I'm blowing my nose a LOT). Tonight will be a NyQuil kind of night.

I Learned a New Trick!

Sometimes I do random Google searches for things like, "how to create modern looking photos with photoshop elements". Last night I searched for exactly that, and came up with a site that showed me, step-by-step, "how to make a modern photo look vintage". It showed a before and after photo, and I thought it looked kinda cool! So I gave it a shot and here's what I got. (Note: the before photos have already been edited to enhance the color and clarity.)

Before:

After:

Pretty neat, huh? I bookmarked that site for future use. This process involved a lot of steps, so there's no way I'll remember how to do this again next time.

I liked this effect so much that I tried it on another photo. I don't like the second one as much as the first, but it's still pretty cool.

Before:

After:

Click to Give

As I was browsing one of my favorite money saving blogs this evening, I happened upon a post about a site called Click to Give. It's one of those sites that donates things (like 1/2 cup of rice to starving children, 1/2 cup of dog food to animal shelters, etc...) when you click on that cause. The best part is that you don't have to choose among all the causes listed in the above banner; you can click on them all once every day!

Please take a minute to go to this site. It takes 30 seconds, but makes a very large impact. You can also sign up for daily e-mail reminders. It's never been easier to donate to your favorite cause - for free!

Giving Up on Target (For Now)

James and I went on our bi-weekly shopping trip on Friday. Usually we go to Target because I have all sorts of coupons. This time, we went to Wal-Mart. You heard me right - Wal-Mart. It's true that I am an avid Wal-Mart hater, but Target is really getting on my nerves lately.

For the last month or so, every single time I go to Target and use lots of coupons, there is at least one coupon that rang up for less than the full amount. It's frustrating. Target has been having these issues all over the country since June. I started having problems in September. I usually watch my receipt very closely, but it's irritating when I have to go to customer service to get money back for my coupons every. single. time. I go shopping. Plus, then I get the money back in cash, which I don't want. I want it taken off my order so I don't have to pay as much initially! That's the point of a coupon!

I think the thing that bothers me the most is that Target knows about this issue. It has been happening since June. Why haven't they fixed it yet? Probably because when they send the coupons in to the manufacturer, they get reimbursed the full amount - yet Target isn't giving the full amount to the customer; therefore, they are making money on this "glitch".

So unless I only have one or two coupons, I think I'll steer clear of Target until they can get this whole thing figured out.