iCoupon.

The cost of living where I am is absolutely absurd, but I am beginning to grow accustom to the mayhem on the highways from 6am-10am and 3pm-7pm, the HOV lanes that require 3 passengers, the red lanes, which are strictly only to be used for rush hour, the people who ride my bumper when I'm already going 15 over the speed limit, 'tis the life of living in the DMV. Along with the hustle and bustle comes people who make good money, which thereby leaves them feeling privileged and entitled. When I first moved to this area at 17 after graduating high school, it was astonishing that people didn't hold the door open for you when you were clearly walking directly behind them. At the middle school I work at, a couple of the boys have stepped aside and held the door open for me on occasion, I almost broke down in tears because I was so happy to see them acting as young men should.

Seeing as how I just graduated from my Masters program, I make good money, but it aint good enough, so coupons are necessary. LOL! Meaning, I can't shop as much as I would like to. While in grad school, I watched a lot of Extreme Couponing, so that got me into couponing heavily. Although at the time, I used coupons for other things. I found grocery coupons on the internet (coupons.com, couponsuzy.com, googling the brand and searching coupons), but my system just wasn't good enough. That is until one beautiful Christmas day, my mom got me a real deal coupon binder. I'm talking side pockets, printed out labels for each section, my name on the top, baseball card holders (what you use to put your coupons in), 3 zip pouches, calculator, grocery list, and scissors. At the moment, it was solidified why God placed me on this Earth...TO SHOP with coupons! I began to buy 2 Sunday papers, which have all the coupons in them. My grocery store, Giant, and Safeway does this as well, sell the paper in a bundle of 2 where you can save a dollar (2 papers for $4 instead of 1 paper for $2.50). The newspaper shows at the top right hand corner on the front page how much the coupon values are inside "$210 of savings inside". When the value is in the $100s or below it's a pretty trash Sunday for me, but when it's $250+ I smize. That is when I know whether I should buy 2 papers or 1. Usually when it's $100 or below you can find a bunch of household product coupons. There are other ways to get newspapers, but I can't say that on these internet streets. The feds may be watching.

<---Yesterday's trip

From there, it takes about 2-3 hours to clip and organize the coupons I want, I don't throw away the ones I don't want, I hold on to it, sometimes I change my mind and will buy a product or I'll keep it and send the coupons to my mom that she wants. Most of the time, I'll go to the grocery store that week and match the store sales ads with the coupons I have. They ALWAYS overlap. I will not buy a product unless it's on sale, it will always go on sale and then I will stock up on the item. I haven't purchased laundry detergent, dish soap, dishwasher soap, body wash, or cleaning products in months.

People are constantly asking me to teach them to coupon, but I honestly don't believe most will actually implement the techniques so I just say "buy the Sunday paper" because I don't want to waste my time. But I've given you some of the things I do, you can find more information here ---> The Krazy Coupon Lady.

A little bit of store insight:

Target

You save $0.05 for each reusable bag you bring in

Open up a Target DEBIT card, not credit, you save 5% on all of your purchases. It's a card linked directly to your checking account, just go in with a blank check for your banking info. You'll also get extra days to return items and free shipping.

They often have sales where you buy 2-3 of something and you'll get a $5 Target gift card, break your transaction up into 2 or more and you can use the gift card right at that moment for optimum savings

You can use manufacturers + their store coupons on the same item

They do NOT double coupons

Giant

They double coupons valued at $0.99 and below. Meaning I enjoy my $0.75 coupons more than my $1.00 coupons because they turn into $1.50

$0.05 per reusable bag

They often have coupons in their sales add, where when you buy $50 of groceries you get 300 gas points at Shell ($0.30 off of gas/gallon)

These are the only stores I coupon for groceries at really, WalMart does not double and they act incompetent when it comes to coupons and I aint got time for dat.  Look online to see what your store's coupon policy says and also make sure you read the print on the coupon.

Last tip:

Go to the young cashiers, they always process a coupon through, the old people always read the fine print and take their job way too seriously :)

Happy couponing.