Super Saturday Savings at Macy's

Super Saturday Savings at Macy's

Everyone who knows me well, knows that I am all about Macy's!  They have a lot of the classic looks I love and they carry the latest from a lot of my favorite designers.  I also love that you can coordinate an entire look (accessories, shoes, purses, etc.) all in one place!  I wanted to get a couple of cute dresses for back-to-school, but not break the bank!

Macy's always has coupons, sales and discounts.  Now with the Plenti card - you can earn points for shopping there!  In fact, we saved $9.00 off of gas at Exxon using the Plenti Points we had earned by shopping at Macy's.   That's another great benefit of the Plenti Card - you can use it at several different places (points accumulate quickly this way) and you can redeem it at any of the participating stores!

Today's AMAZING FIND:  2 dresses for $50.00 ($5.00 of that was for the donation to March of Dimes and I received a savings pass of 30% off).   Both dresses were marked down 65% , plus the 30% off - it was a steal!! These aren't just any dresses - they are designer dresses, great cut, beautiful fabric, high quality dresses!  I also used a gift card, so it was like getting the dresses for free!

Floral on the left - American Living
Yellow on the right - Calvin Klein


www.macys.com

www.plenti.com

www.calvinklein.com

Thrifting Haul: Shoe Finds

Ladies - who doesn't LOVE a great shoe deal!?  I'll be hitting up the thrift stores and consignment shops really soon for some excellent savings on back-to-school clothes and shoes! This is my friend April - check out her channel and subscribe!  ENJOY!

Back-to-School Savings!

Back-to-School Savings!

All your writing, drawing, and coloring needs!

 

All of you thrifty parents and savvy, saving teachers listen up!!  Staples and Office Depot/OfficeMax are practically giving away school supplies!

Check out these INCREDIBLE back-to-school savings!!

At STAPLES I saved a bunch on these great items:

Crayola Markers - 75 cents for the 8 count, 97 cents for the 10 count

Crayola Crayons - 50 cents each for a 24 count box

Crayola Colored Pencils - 97 cents for a 12 count box

Regular, #2 Staples Brand pencils (not sharpened) - 68 cents for a 12 count box


At OFFICEMAX I saved on these fantastic back-to-school essentials:

Pocket folders - 1 cent each (limit ten per household, but I had my hubby go in a different line and buy another ten - so I got 20)  1 cent each - THAT'S RIGHT - 1 CENT!! 

Pencil Boxes - 50 cents each

Composition Notebooks - 1.00 each (you might be able to find these cheaper at Wal-Mart or another store, but for the purpose of not wanting to shop around too much...I got them here)

Glue Sticks - 50 cents each for a 4 pack

Erasers (that go on the end of a pencil) - 1 cent for a 12 pack - 1 CENT!!!

White Copy Paper - after mail-in rebate - 1 ream (500 sheets) for 1 CENT!!


I spent a total of $22.08 and got :
2 packs of multi-purpose white paper
6 pencil boxes
8 glue sticks
2 packs of markers
2 packs of crayons
2 packs of pencils
3 packs of pencil-top erasers
20 pocket folders
6 composition notebooks

THREE CHEERS FOR THE FRU GAL!!  Happy back-to-school everyone!

Can you tell I'm going for a purple theme this year? :)
 

http://www.officedepot.com/

http://www.staples.com/

Fun at the Park

Fun at the Park

Three Lakes Park Nature Center

I love parks!  I grew up camping and spending a lot of time outside. Walking in the park helps rejuvenate me and calms my soul. One of the best things about our local parks here in Richmond is they are FREE!

Today I went to Three Lakes Park (for the second time this week) in Henrico County for a good three mile walk.  This park is great because it has a free nature center, two different play areas for kids, walking trails, fishing piers and a few covered picnic areas. Earlier this week I went there with my niece, my friend and her son.  We explored the nature center and my niece played for a while on the playground.  It's a great place! I hadn't heard of it before and now I love it. I wanted to share it with you! 

A couple other favorites of ours are Maymont Park and Byrd Park in Richmond - also FREE with a ton of great things to see and do!

Check out your local parks - they are a FREE place to get your exercise, play with the kids, and enjoy the outdoors!

http://henrico.us/rec/parks/

https://maymont.org/

http://www.richmondgov.com/parks/parkByrd.aspx

Great Grocery Savings

Great Grocery Savings

We all have to grocery shop - single, married, kids, no kids - everyone has to eat!  No matter the size of your grocery cart or your grocery list - here are some helpful hints that I use to save money at the grocery store!

1) Re-usable bags - this is a double benefit, you help the environment by not creating more waste and you also can get money off at most grocery stores by using your own bag! At our Kroger we get 5 cents off per bag and our last trip we saved 50 cents.  That's like a coupon! Other stores give discounts for re-usable bags, too, like Target!!

2) Coupons! Coupons! Coupons! - these days you have a couple of different options for coupons.  There are electronic coupons - either on your phone through various apps or web sites or my favorite - going to the store site and loading the coupons directly to your store savings card!  Of course you can also clip the coupons from the newspaper ads or many stores send paper coupons in the mail.  Our last trip to the grocery store, we saved $29.00 using both electronic and paper coupons! 

3) Rewards - our Kroger has fuel points (and most stores do) so not only do you save on groceries, but you save on gas!  Yesterday, we saved 20 cents a gallon using our fuel points!  Make sure you go to the gas station required and make sure you use the points before they expire! Keep an eye out for additional rewards promotions throughout the year. Currently, Kroger is running a promotion where you can earn 4X the fuel points when purchasing gift cards.

4) Apps - so this is my new venture and I'm going to keep you posted on the progress of how it's going.  My sister is a HUGE grocery savings gal (she has two kids and my nephew is already at age 2, showing how much he's capable of eating!) and she uses several different apps.  The one she's got me using now is called ibotta - you choose from the available offers what you're going to buy, scan the bar codes, and the store receipt and you get savings!  On just one trip,  I earned $3.00 - once you get up to $10.00 you can redeem your money towards various items like gift cards and even a pay pal account. I'll  keep you posted on the savings and if it's worth it! My sister is pushing me to try a few other apps that she likes, but I'll keep you posted on those, too.

5) Shops Store Brands and Clearance Items-  read the labels and  you will often find the store brand has the exact same ingredients as the name brands, for a lot less money! You can also check the clearance section for items that might be slightly damaged or about to expire and find big savings there.

This is a picture of our last grocery receipt showing the coupon savings and fuel points!

www.kroger.com

Bargain Books

Bargain Books

 

Teachers, parents and/or book enthusiasts everywhere love a great book sale!  Everyone who knows me knows I LOVE the library.  We took my niece and nephew to the library to get some books and videos to keep them occupied and learning over these last few weeks of summer.  Turns out they were having a book sale! 

At this library sale and many others like it, there were a wide variety of books and genres for super cheap!  You can always use more books and brand new books are beautiful and wonderful as gifts, but if you're looking to build a children's library or for good books to read on the beach - you don't want to spend a lot! 

This is not my first book sale at a library and I'm always on the look out for great books for the classroom!  I am currently a teacher and many of my students don't have books of their own, so I have a library in my classroom that my students can check out books from.  I also give books to kids if I see they have a real passion and interest.  I have a library full of donated books, books I've bought at various sales and places on clearance or in bulk.  This time I got 26 books for $20.50!!

So here's the new additions to my collection (these are great books and in excellent condition):

All of these great books for just $20!!

Date Night

Date Night

 

Who doesn't love an inexpensive and fun date night?  We all know that going out on the town can get pricey, but if you follow some great tips from The Fru Gal - you can have an enjoyable night and not break the bank!

Going to the movies is expensive these days, but there's a way to still go out to see a movie inexpensively here in Richmond. "The Byrd Theater" is located in an eclectic, funky part of town called Carytown.  It's a historic theater that now shows current movies at a big discount.  The price of a ticket is only $1.99 per person and the refreshments are very reasonable.  Tonight we had a large popcorn, large drink and two adult tickets for a total of $13.00.  If you go on Saturday night you can hear "The Mighty Wurlitzer" played just before the show! 

The Byrd (as it's affectionately known to locals) is a hometown gem!  If you live in Richmond and you've never been, you MUST GO!  It's worth it. It's in need of some TLC these days - so feel free to donate to http://byrdtheatrefoundation.org/ to keep a great place alive and running.

Check out what's playing:
http://byrdtheatre.com/

If you don't live in Richmond, there might be a place similar to this in your hometown, look into it!

Abundance

Abundance

I had lunch with a very dear friend recently.  She is an inspiration and one of the most kind, giving and generous people I know!  She graciously paid for my lunch (ate at Panera and she only got a pastry which I used my rewards card and got her for only 99 cents!).   We talked about everything under the sun and then some!  During our conversation we, of course, discussed finances and the blog, etc.  She has been working very hard for a few years now to pay down her school debt and she's almost there!  I was so impressed.  She also has one of the BEST attitudes.  I asked her, What's the secret?  Of course, there are practical things, goal setting and budgeting and a lot of tips, etc., but the key she said is living in abundance.   This is NOT living above or beyond your means or in excess, but finding the abundance in your life and recognizing it and relishing in it! Living in abundance, believing you have everything you need, believing you are doing well, and most of all, practicing gratitude. 

She told me that every day driving to work, she would literally say out loud every thing she was grateful for...right down to the coffee she was drinking.  On her way back the things she would be grateful for were related to her work day - no matter how difficult the day had been or how many things might have not gone exactly the way she had hoped, etc.  She would do this every single day and she believed she was living in abundance.  Despite whatever difficulties she has faced - she had faith that she would be fine and she believed good things were happening. Again, an inspiration, so I'm going to try it!  I will keep you posted, dear readers, on how it goes!