Money Management/Saving Money

One topic that I enjoy reading and sharing thoughts about is what everyone is doing during the changing economic times to keep up their households and lifestyles. I admit it....I have become a coupon, rebate and sale watcher. I always shrugged my face at the thought in the past, maybe keeping a great coupon now and then, but normally loosing it or forgetting to take it with us to the store. I have thrown away so many coupons that expired 8 months prior, that it seemed pointless to even attempt saving with coupons. But that has changed. I'm sure you have heard the scenarios of a woman walking into a grocery store and coming out with 2 carts of stuff and paying only $2.00 for it all. Well, I'm not a person to that extent. Between running the business, and household, I don't have the time (or the energy) to be bouncing around to 10 different stores to buy only a few on sale items and using coupons good for that day only, several times a week. But one thing that I have started doing is keeping a much closer eye on the drug store for coupons, rebates and special sales. For instance, this weekend I did make a special trip to buy 2 bottles of Nature Made Cranberry pills. My daughter and I both use them, so it is an item we would need to purchase soon anyway. Walgreens had a sale- buy 1 get 1 free, and on the Nature Made website they had a $2.00 off coupon. So, normally 2 bottles would have cost $16.98, but after their sale and my coupon, I was able to get them for $6.49 (that's a savings of $10.49). I also picked up 4 bars of Rocky Road candy bars---If you haven't tried them-you have to (especially the milk chocolate) Yumm!. I found $3.00 off 2 coupons in the rebate book. They are $1.99 each minus the coupons meant I spent $1.96 for all 4. I wouldn't normally spend $1.99 on a single candy bar, but these are great and with the coupon, very affordable. I will write more about what we are doing to save money...let me know your thoughts or ideas too.