Broccoli Salad

We harvested another big bunch of broccoli tonight, so I decided to make some frugal broccoli salad! I used free garden broccoli, $.50/lb bacon and sale Vidalia onions, mayo and cheese. Simply delicious! This salad tastes even better the next day. The recipe is originally from Allrecipes.

Bodacious Broccoli Salad

8 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled
2 heads fresh broccoli, chopped
1 1/2 cups sharp Cheddar cheese, shredded
1/2 large red onion, chopped
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/8 cup white sugar
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup mayonnaise
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

In a large bowl, combine broccoli, cheese, bacon and onion.

Prepare the dressing in a small bowl by whisking together the red wine vinegar, sugar, pepper, salt, mayonnaise and lemon juice.

Combine dressing with salad. Cover, and refrigerate until ready to serve. Makes approximately 12 servings.

Free Sierra Mist and Free (or almost) Nail Polish at CVS

CVS had a few great deals this Memorial Day weekend. These particular sales are good only May 25 and 26, so hurry!


FREE SIERRA MIST: Sierra Mist is on sale buy-one-get-one-free. Visit coupons.com to print out a BOGO coupon. You should be able to print two coupons. Pick up 4 bottles, present your two coupons and all four should be free!

FREE NAIL POLISH (after ECB's): All Revlon Nail polish are on sale for $3.99. Purchase the Colorstay variety and use the $2 Revlon Color Product coupon from the 5/18 Smart Source insert for $1.99 OOP. Then, you'll receive $3 ECB's! Limit is 3.


$.16 MUSTARD: French's Mustard is on sale for $.66. Print off a coupon here (or use insert coupons from March 9 Smart Source) and pay only $.16.

Square Foot Garden Update... May 24

It’s been almost a month since I last posted a garden update (shame on me). Since that time the little garden has exploded! We’ve harvested green onions, spinach, radishes, broccoli, herbs, lettuce and a few strawberries. I have enough lettuce for daily salads and the butter lettuce is so tasty I hope I never have to go back to grocery store bagged lettuce again!

The broccoli is just amazing. We’ve harvested several heads and there are tons of new heads forming. Despite having three broccoli lovers in the family, I think I will be blessed to be able to freeze some for later!

I’ve pulled out my old Ronco dehydrator and have dried green onions and lots of parsley. I plan to dry other herbs if they start getting overgrown.

My newest garden project is starting a compost bin. Well, a compost trash can actually. Our homeowner’s association won’t allow compost bins but I turned an old Rubbermade trash can into a bin. I just put it together today and added grass clippings, kitchen peelings and scraps, and shredded newspaper. Hopefully Mother Nature will do her magic and turn the garbage into wonderful, rich soil over time. We’ll find out!

Graduation on a Budget

When every extra dollar goes to pay off debt, extra expenses like planning a graduation puts creativity to the test. My son Mark graduated 8th grade from his Catholic grade school and at our school it’s a big event. An entire week of fun graduation activites are planned for the kids, such as 8th grade vs. teacher volleyball game, trip to Worlds of Fun, bowling and pizza, etc., etc. All these events are covered by the school budget, but not the famous "surprise locker decoration day"!

It’s a tradition for the parents to decorate the kids’ lockers in with their new high school colors to surprise the kids on one of the last days. As I watched other moms and dads decorate their student’s lockers I couldn’t believe the amount of $$ that was spent! Helium balloons, custom high school pennants, candy, stuffed animals, etc. But I could secretly smile because, while my son’s locker may not have been the fanciest, it was for sure the CHEAPEST... and he loved it!

The only real out-of-pocket expense was for the navy foam to create the Lee’s Summit West high school banner. I used a logo printed off their website for decoration, along with odds and ends of paper from my scrapbook stash. I blew up a few balloons from home, and taped on 2008 graduation sunglasses and a homemade visor. The sunglasses, as well as the candy, bear and other goodies inside the locker were purchased using Walgreen’s register rewards. I also "bought" with RR’s a frame that could be autographed by all of Mark’s classmates.

It took a little bit of work and ingenuity, but even a tightwad like me could create a fairly decorative locker!

Walgreens Totals... 5/24

I am so slow in posting my Walgreens totals, but here they are:

8 Gillette 2-in-1 body wash
36 Nabisco cookies (Oreos, Nilla Wafers, Chips Ahoy, etc.)
2 Cascade
5 Charmin wipes
20 Venus Embrace razors
91 Crest Pro Health Toothpaste
12 Zantac
145 Covergirl make-up (shown above)
plus miscellaneous fillers such as popcorn and chicken broth

Total OOP = approximately $50

Earned RR’s $311


All the RR’s are finally spent which was no small feat in itself. My local Walgreens will allow only one RR with each order so I did multiple small orders to keep my OOP as low as possible. I’m too lazy to pull out all my receipts to get exact totals, but I purchased the following items:

clearance outdoor solar lights
potting mix
chocolate milk
eggs
bacon
lunchmeat
hamburger buns
tons of popcorn
honey
olives
canned fruit
ice cream for the kids
some WAG May rebate items
hand cream
dried fruit
paper plates
plastic cups
graduation gifts and decorating items
Mother’s Day cards
etc, etc.

I’m exhausted but this latest Procter & Gamble deal was the best. Thanks Walgreens!!

How I Love Walgreens!

Walgreens has a spectacular deal this week with Procter & Gamble products! Check out today's ad, pages 5, 28 and 29. What makes the deal even sweeter are the fantastic P&G coupons in today's newspaper. Hence the extra copies I bought, shown above.

This picture shows what I am referring to as "Stage 1" of the P&G deal. I'm going back throughout the week to buy more, if that's possible. This P&G deal can roll into the Zantac $3 RR and Venus Embrace $6RR so your OOP total is very low even with minimal coupons.

The best deal if you don't have a huge stash of Q's is to purchase 9 of the Crest Pro Health 4.2 oz toothpaste. Use the $3 off 2 coupon found in the Walgreen's May EasySaver catalog (or you can print the coupon from Walgreen's web site). OOP will be $9 plus tax and you'll earn $20 RR!

My totals for Sunday morning:

• 60 Crest Pro Health Toothpaste
• 4 Venus Embrace Razors
• 2 Cascade
• 7 Zantac
• 10 Newspapers
• 6 Covergirl eye shadows
• 2 Covergirl bronzers
• 3 Covergirl blush
• 6 Covergirl Lipslicks
• 2 Covergirl Nail Polish
• 4 Candy Bars (fillers)

Total OOP ("real cash money paid") was approximately $24. Best of all, I still have $151 RR's left to spend!!! They will be used to continue the deal this week, to buy items for the May monthly rebates, and miscellaneous items we "need."

What's stopping YOU from getting a great deal too??!!

Walgreens Haul...May 1

My favorite kind of shopping is when I come home with multiple bags of "stuff" and no money spent out of pocket. Shouldn't it be like this all the time??

Walgreens had some fairly good deals this week both with and without coupons. I paid using my last two $6 RR's from the Suave deal and about $4 on my Walgreens gift card which I received from doing last month's rebates.

The Butterball chicken broth also goes toward May's EasySaver rebate. Amazingly, all of these items are things I will actually use!!

3 Bounty Basic

5 Jello

8 Butterball chicken broth

6 Reynolds foil

6 Softsoap pumps

4 Morton Salt

TOTAL OOP = $0!!

Our first harvest??

If a few sprigs of oregano and some radish thinnings mixed in with our pasta count, then yes!

The square foot garden is doing great. The green onions are almost 6 inches tall (which I've read is when you can start yanking them), the broccoli has really grown and has formed what we call "baby broccoli," and lettuce and radishes are growing great.

This weekend, if time allows we'll get plant tomatoes and peppers, chives and basil. I might even attempt growing one zucchini plant vertically... yum!

Debt Snowball Garage Sale...a success!

Last weekend we held a garage sale to raise money toward debt payoff. Since our neighborhood only allows two garage sales per year (and they pick the dates) we were forced to open on Friday despite unseasonably cold temperatures and rain.

These pictures were taken on Saturday which had (unbelievably) even less traffic than Friday! However, we managed to net $452, most of which was from my coupon deals, books and kids clothes.

After treating ourselves to a frugal barbecue dinner (using a coupon from restaurant.com) and subtracting some well-deserved blow money, we applied the remaining $420 to our debt snowball. Hurray!