Thought I'd share...

7 Simple Budget Cuts that make a BIG difference

Some of these ideas aren't new but it's great to be reminded and hopefully draw some motivation from others successes.

Chicken Fingers with Chipotle Honey Sauce

This is from Cook This Not That (Kitchen Survival Guide). Definitely check out this cookbook!
I made these tonight and they were very easy and fast to make!
(Alisa, I wanted to post this on your other blog in response to your post. Feel free to repost there if you want).

Makes 4 servings. $2/serving.
Compare to Chili's Crispy Honey-Chipotle Crispers and save 1,680 calories, 4000 mg sodium, and $6.99!!!!

You'll Need:
1 lb boneless, skinless chicken tenders
salt & black pepper to taste
3 egg whites, lightly beaten
2 cups panko bread crumbs (find in asian section of supermarket. These give crunch without having to fry in bubbling fat. I found these at HEB.)
2 Tbsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp chipotle pepper puree. (you can also just use the "juice" from canned chipotle peppers. Also, if young kids will be eating, leave this out or set aside for adults)

1 Tbsp honey

How to Make it:
Place egg whites in shallow bowl and beat.
Place crumbs on a plate and season with s&p.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Season chicken with salt & pepper.
Dip chicken tenders into egg, then toss in the crumbs, being sure to coat fully.
Place breaded chicken pieces on baking sheet coasted with nonstick cooking spray and bake for 20-30 minutes, until crumbs have browned and chicken is firm.
 While cooking, combine mustard, chipotle, & honey in large bowl. You can either toss the cooked chicken tenders in the mixture so they are all evenly coated with the sauce or you can just drizzle the sauce over the chicken.

Disney flip flop & sunglasses

The Disney store had all their flip flops and sunglasses on clearance for $1.99, reg $6.50!

Also, JCP had lots of clearance racks in every department!

Kohls

Kohls is having a great sale on clothing for men, women, and kids. I got button up shirts for my husband for $7.80 each at 80% off. There was still tons left, but the girl at the checkout said the sale ends saturday night.
Awhile ago in the mail there was a $10 of any purchase of $10 or more that ends tomorrow. That would make a great deal. If you have that coupon and aren't going to use it, please call me and I'll come get it from you! :)

I found this new website with all baby and children's deals called Baby Cheapskate. I really love the "Top Diaper and Formula Deals for the Week" posts!

FREE Exercise shorts

At the Target by Lakeline Mall (not sure about any other locations) there are some C9 by Champion women's work out shorts on clearance 75% off. They just went from 50% to 75 % today because I was there yesterday along with today and noticed the price drop! They are marked either at $2.98 or $4.98. They are located in the athletic section by the dressing rooms.

A $5/1 coupon is available on Target.com which will make them FREE!

If you are in need of socks instead C9 by Champion has some for $5.99, after coupon $.99!

"Extreme" ways to be frugal

I really liked this post from Money Saving Mom. Along with the link she provided from Getting Freedom's corresponding post.

A little over a year ago in my efforts to become more frugal I made a baby step by getting rid of my beloved swifter for an "old fashioned" mop. Nothing extreme about it. I actually still use my swifer for my upstair bathrooms since they are small spaces and I don't want to lug a wet mop up the stairs. Which may change soon...

This portion of Getting Freedom's post reminded me of my new mop instead of swifers...

"• Toss the disposables. Cross the paper towels, napkins, and diapers off of your grocery list. Purchase or make affordable reusable alternatives; old rags are usually free! (It has now been over three years since I bought my last roll of paper towels, and my cloth cleaning rags are still working great!) Nurtured Family offers an affordable, basic kit of “one size” cloth diapers from Econobum that can fill the need (and they don’t even need pins!). Or, contact The Cloth Diaper Foundation (formerly Miracle Diapers) for assistance. (You can always decide to “upgrade” your cloth diapers later, when your budget allows, if you want to.)"

So I am taking another baby step. I ran out of lysol/clorox wipes along with swifter wets last week and I am NOT going to buy any more!! I'll be using towels/sponges and cleaners to clean my counters, ect... from now on.

I don't have an amount that I have saved from using my mop instead of my swifer over the past year+ but I know I have saved just by the amount of swifers I used to use/buy compared to the amount of cleaner I use/buy now with my mop today. And I usually can get the cleaners for cents with sales and coupons!

I also plan to stop buying paper towels when I run out of them. I have a large package in my garage so that baby step is not upon me yet. Can you believe that my girls used about 5 paper towels one night at dinner??? That's when I knew it was a bigger expense than I realize.

What new or old baby steps are you doing to be more frugal?

Randall's deals this week (thru Tuesday)

Goldfish $.88 (Sat/Sun only)

Hip2save posted a $.50/1 coupon here

coupons.com had a $.75/1 a few weeks ago, use zip 90210. (not sure if still available)

Also I had a printable $.35/1 Q (can't remember where) and it doubled!

Select Nabisco Cracker and cookies are $.99

Included: Cheese Nips, Nutter Butters (bag), Chocolate Chip Cookies (bag), Animal Crackers(bag), ect...

$1/2 Q Nabisco crackers from newspaper

$1/2 Q Nabisco crackers or cookies from mailer

3 Musketeer mint candy bar on clearance for 50% reg. $.49

if you want to chance it like I did, mine had no problems scanning on it's own...

expired Q for $.25/1 3 musketeer candy bar (mine doubled!) from newspaper

Kraft Dressings $1.49

$1/1 Q from newspaper

$27

I remembered Alisa's $25/week challenge and I'm proud to say that so far I have stuck to it this week. I have no plans to spend anything today or tomorrow. To make this work, I went through my freezer and planned meals based on what I had in there. When meat goes on sale I usually buy extra and stock up my freezer.
Then I made a list of what I needed at the store to supplement and I kept it to $27 this week! Buying my produce at Sprouts has been helping me keep my grocery bill down while still getting to enjoy the good stuff. :)
I am sharing because when I hear things like this from my friends it inspires me. If I can do it, so can you!

H-E-BUDDY

I was at HEB and saw that they have a H-E-Buddy Summer Reading Program. I've heard of it but haven't seen the info. in stores before. They are located by the ball/sticker machine where the H-E-Buddy forms are for their kids rewards. The form states if you read 10 books, write them down, have an adult/parent mark them off, and send in the form (by Oct 1st) you'll get "cool prizes". On the form it does have a place to choice shirt sizes but it doesn't state what other "cool stuff" you'll receive.
Here is an online copy of the form in stores.

And WOW! I didn't know they had so many cool kids club reward opportunities. Like Healthy Buddy Kids, Max's Birthday Club (for your pet), and of course the H-E-Buddy Birthday Club.

Aunt Barbara’s Sweet and Sour Pork Serve 5 to 7

2 lbs uncooked pork to dredge pork 4 T. cornstarch

2 cups water

4 T. soy sauce

Combine for sweet and sour sauce

4 T. cornstarch (add last)

1 cup water

1/3 cup vinegar (apple cider vinegar)*

¼ cup soy sauce

¾ cup sugar

¾ cup green pepper (shredded) (can omit)

¾ cup carrots (roll cut) (Oblique cut some, like triangle)

¾ cup onions (shredded)

¾ cup chunk pineapple

2 T. oil for stir-frying

Oil for deep fat frying (390 degrees)

Preparation

Cut uncooked pork into 2” X 2” pieces. Put into heavy sauce pan with 2 cups cold water, bring to boil and simmer for 20 minutes. Take from pan and let cool.

Drain pineapple. Shred green pepper and onion. Roll cut carrots.

Combine sugar, soy sauce, vinegar, cornstarch and water in sauce pan. Cook over low heat until thickened.

Heat pan. Add oil. Add carrots: stir-fry 1 minute, remove to sweet and sour sauce. Heat oil to 390 degrees for deep fat frying.

Dredge cool pork in mixture of 4 T. cornstarch and 4 T. soy sauce. (leave 10-15 minutes improves flavor, add all pork at once, stir) Deep fry until pork is a deep rich brown. Then add to sweet and sour sauce. Heat all ingredients through, do not boil. Serve at once.

(Put rice on big platter then pour sweet and sour over)

*For milder sweet and sour sauce, substitute juice from chunks of pineapple

(Boil and deep fry meat in morning. Do cutting also. Then before serving make sauce, add fried meat, onion. Then stir fry carrots and green pepper.)

Slow Cooked Pork

This is easy and budget friendly. Pork loin is very affordable (I have gotten it for $1/lb) and everything else you should have on hand with your spices. We like to use HEB's fresh tortillas with steamed broccoli on the side.

I got this from Rachelle's blog here. She also posted some other kid friendly dinners that her kids help her make in the same post, so you might want to check it out.

2 lb pork loin roast (I like the kind from Costco that comes individually wrapped in a 4-pack)
1 t. garlic powder
1/2 t. rosemary
1/2 T. minced onion
¾ t. salt
1 t. oregano
1/2 t. marjoram
1/2 t. celery seed
1/4 t. red pepper

Mix all the seasonings together. Sprinkle over meat and gently rub in. Cook meat in crock pot (with just a little broth/water to cover the bottom) on LOW for 8-9 hours, or until meat pulls apart easily. Shred and stuff in pita pocket, tortilla, or on the new Orowheat Sandwich Thins.

Plastic Jungle

http://www.plasticjungle.com

You can buy gift cards at up to 20% off the face value and shipping is free. Some that interested me were Bath and Body Works, Fandango, Budget Car Rental, and Barnes and Noble.
Pair this with a deal or coupon and you can get an even better deal!

Children's Place stores are having an awesome sale.

Yesterday I got baby shoes, shirt, jeans, and hat for a total of $12!!

Also check at your Target for good toy clearance prices. Ours had Toy Story toys on clearance for really cheap. They also had some caterpillar game for less than $5.

Vocalpoint has a chance to try a three pack of Ultra-thin Pampers Cruisers, which I am crossing my fingers come with some great coupons too. If you are not a member, sign up! It's free! You get lots of samples and high value coupons.

After reading this post of Alisa's and Natalie's comment, I was thinking of money saving. And food is a BIG expense for us, and probably most families. Natalie brought up that she tries to making eating out a special occasion. I agree and try to limit eating out to weekends only. Which doesn't always work.

After wanting to "just pick something up" today for lunch and then for dinner (I was SO good and didn't for either!) I ended making Baked Potato Soup for dinner. It was so good. I thought to myself "this is better than anything I would have picked up somewhere."

It's an easy go to meal of ours that everyone in the family likes! Here is the recipe!

If any of the ladies want to share, please do! I'd love to find some more go to meals.We can make it a monthly challenge here at CP Coupon Diva's. We can all make a post of an old or new meal we've cooked recently that our families really liked.

Any amount saved, pays!

The last month or so I have not done a lot of coupon or deal shopping. I haven't gone through my binder or bought a newspaper much in the last few weeks. I didn't even go to the store last week except to get bread, milk, and eggs. Which sounds good for the budget but we ended up eating out more often...so it technically wasn't!

I headed to Target yesterday morning to get a deal I saw on Deal Seeking Mom and needed to shop. I usually would just head to HEB for food shopping without a coupon plan in hand. I went a head and tried to pair some coupons with items I needed at Target. I ended up saving $40.90 and spending $66.78 (after a $10 GC from a pharmacy visit).

Not bad?

It's no awe inspiring.

But it made me think...saving any amount is better than nothing. Yeah I spent more than I saved. No I didn't find any excitable deals.

My point...we all like to pat ourselves on the back, brag a little, when we do a phenomenal job at saving with coupons and deals. But that shouldn't discourage us or others.

Because weather it's $5, $40, or $100 saved through coupons and sales. It adds up. Anyone should be proud and happy to have paid less.

And realistically the majority of couponers probably don't save like what we see on all those news segments and 'brag' posts every single time they go to the store.

I don't. I know it's hard to believe, but it's true!

So, Keep clipping and remember any amount saved, pays.

Kids clothing deals

Childrens Place is having 50% off the sale price
GAP is having 40% off the sale price
I got shirts for $2.50-$4 at both places. I got pajamas for $5 at both places. I got dresses at GAP for $6-$9!!
There is a coupon out there for Childrens Place if you have signed up to get the mailers. Also when you make your purchase at GAP they will give you a bunch of 40% off one full price item on wednesdays. So I've got a bunch of those if anyone wants to grab one from me.
Here is a link to Childrens Place coupon: http://www.retailmenot.com/view/childrensplace.com

Anyone ever have problems with the coupon printer?

Every time I try to print from Coupon Mom, only Coupon Mom not other sites, it prompts me to download the coupon printer.

EVERY. FREAKIN'. TIME.

It's driving me crazy!

Buy 5 save $5

Randalls is having their Buy 5 save $5 again this week. If you need to get cereal this is your week to stock up! Don't forget to stack those coupons with this sale to get great deals!

I also noticed they have a 99 cent sale. Items in ad include: SoBe, Kraft mac and cheese, Duncan Hines Cake mix, Baby peeled carrots, and Del Monte canned fruit.

And advertised is get $10 off coupon(catalina) for your next purchase when you buy $25 in P&G products in a single transaction.

Sales good thru April 2oth.

$2.50 John Frieda coupon

I got an email about a $2.50 coupon from John Frieda. I had to fill out my hair profile, but at the end I was able to print out 2 $2.50 coupons! Go HERE for yours!

Sneak Peak at Target Ad

Check out Totally Target for a sneak peak at next week's ad and get a jump start on planning!

Target Mailers

Hi everyone! I keep getting Target mailers for some reason. I LOVE them, but most coupons are baby ones. If anyone needs some, email me what brands you are interested in and I can mail them to you! I just threw a lot away the other day that expired and it made me really sad! Like throwing money down the drain. These are all Target qs, so they can be stacked!

Soft Scrub Total Deal

Check out Totally Target for a great deal on Soft Scrub Total.

FREE Complete after ECB (limit 1)

This week at CVS the one deal I am doing is the Complete contact solution for 8.99, and receive 8.99 in ECB, making it FREE! I do not have any ECB at the moment (used them on papers last week), but this is a good way to get going again. I do not know of any coupons.

Thanks, I HEART CVS!