Archive for March, 2009

A few weeks ago, a very good friend of mine held a clothing swap. The last one she held at her house was so successful, that this time she chose to use the parish hall at her church to accommodate the almost 40 people who came.

If you’re not familiar with the concept, its a gathering of people (usually women) who bring in all the clothes they no longer want and then “shop” the clothes brought by others. No money changes hands. There isn’t a minimum “donation” and one is welcome to take whatever clothing they desire. What nobody wants goes to charity. (My friend’s swap was so successful that there were probably 500 or more articles of clothing donated to charity.)

Here are some photos taken by Elaine, one of the other guests:

Even my husband knew how excited this would make me – he carefully laid the ad “just so” I would see it first thing when walking in the kitchen yesterday morning.

As an added bonus, the couponers at Hot Coupon World have been working on the list for several days. (And here I was, all caught up in Bloom triples…)

Anyway, a wonderful HCW poster by the name of Cmricha2 started a spreadsheet for the sale. I used that as a base (with many additions and modifications to the formulas) and created a similar Harris Teeter spreadsheet for the Hampton Roads area. Of note, I should mention when looking up prices (using the Hanbury Rd. Express Lane) I found that our prices are actually lower in most cases from the original lists on Hot Coupon World. That’s fairly unusual! I haven’t finished verifying the coupon values, and to be honest, I didn’t include most of the RedPlum coupons since I no longer get them.

Since I spent the morning garage sale-ing with my husband I didn’t get around to going to Bloom until early evening. The Bloom at Centerville & Mt. Pleasant was reasonably well stocked.

I used 20 coupons and spent $1.52. Here’s what I got:

What a deal! I had to buy the chips to bring me to the plus side! $1.52 total.

With so many items generating overages, I let my son pick out some chips (we still have a lot of free sour cream from the last triples!). The chips were at least on sale (2/$5).

Of note: the cashier was concerned about the IP, and called the manager on duty to make sure it wasn’t a copy. I’m glad they are checking them, I hate to think people cheating will cause them to not accept them anymore. I may even take an expired coupon and make copies so they can hang them on the wall and see what the differences are.

Excellent trip this afternoon. I love double dollars. Thanks to the couponers at HotCouponWorld, I had a reasonably decent list. Just wish I got the RedPlum coupons. (I’m on a rural route, so not only do I not get them in the newspaper, I don’t get them in the mail like everyone else!)

My total at Farm Fresh today was $3.94. (Saved $41.84.)

$3.94. Farm Fresh was doubling up to a dollar. Most of my total was for my produce, though.

I think the cashier actually gave me an extra $4 off when he manually entered 2 coupons that didn’t scan… I see 3 manual entries. Each of those were entered as original and doubles, plus the original scans. Makes sense since I had $3.66 in produce and an .89 loaf of bread. Guess it makes up for a month or go or so when several coupons didn’t double. Too many customers in line and no manager in site, so I think he was flustered.

Jeepers!

Two stores, one trip each. $2.48 + .41, yup… less than $3. (Savings of $90.93.) 8 bags of groceries!

$2.89 sure buys a lot at Bloom during triples. Especially when you consider the bag of coconut in the front cost me $0.99. Jeepers!

Thanks to all the wonderful couponers at HotCouponWorld. You can see the spreadsheet I assembled from the posts by clicking here.