I had lots of fun couponing this week!  Today I popped into my local CVS and got some sweet clearance deals, including a 6-pack of Gatorade for $1.75 and some of Bobby’s fave Neutrogena for Men face lotion for $1.62. WHAT UP!??  Here was my biggest trip, at the beginning of the week:

Three Pantene @ $2.99 each = $8.97

4 Soy Joy bars clearance at 65 cents each = $2.60

Complete contact solution $8.99

Skintimate shave gel $3.99

Colgate Total $2.99

Total = $27.54

coupons:

- $5 CVS $5/$25 email coupon

- $2 any Pantene (mailer from Vocalpoint)

- $3 off 2 Pantene manu coupon

-$.65 B2G1 Soy Joy manu coupon

-$.75 Colgate manu coupon

I paid with 10 ECBs, paid $7 & change cash (including tax) and got back 3 ECB for Pantene, 2 ECB for Soy Joy, 2 for Colgate, 3 for Skintimate and $8.99 for the Complete! So I went home with 18.99 ECB!  Woohoo!

Ok, now on to Rite Aid, which is really becoming near and dear to my heart!  This week’s deal  has a bit of a back story, and since I know my mom all you faithful readers love a good back story, HERE GOES!

Three weeks or so ago, I asked my sister-in-law Sarah what I could get her from the drugstores.  Sarah’s dad has been undergoing treatment for leukemia and Sarah was busy helping with her dad’s care, not to mention being a wife to my (very hairy – just had to throw that in there) brother and homeschooling mom to 4 kiddos ages 7-12.  So I told her I wanted to get as much of their family’s household crap that I could while her dad was in treatment, to help them out. SO. Anyhoo.

She said one thing they really needed a good deal on (besides my toilet paper-snob brother’s fave toilet paper – Charmin Ultra STRONG, not Soft, but STRONG) was Zyrtec allergy meds, because she and my nephew both take it.  My son also takes it so I knew it was really hard to find good deals on the stuff.  I considered myself up for QUITE a challenge.

So I started going through the drugstore ads and coupon blogs and looking for printable coupons and all that jazz, and before long I found that Rite Aid just “happened” to have Zyrtec on a rebate of Johnson & Johnson products, buy $50 get back $25.  And they also just “happened” to have Rite Aid Zyrtec coupons on their Video Values site.  And it just so “happened” that you could print a $4 off coupon off of Zyrtec’s site.  And Rite Aid also “happens” to have an Allergy Rewards program which Zyrtec qualifies for!  So I got them a ton of Zyrtec!  I spent a good bit out of pocket, but got alot and with both rebates, actually made about $8 once my rebates come!  Now THAT is a God thing, in my opinion. I was thinking I’d be hard-pressed to find a good Zyrtec deal, and I actually made a profit!  Woohoo!

So all that to say, (Cortney, it’s all about the journey!) that this week Rite Aid has their generic Rite Aid brand Zyrtec on sale buy one get one free.  And it just “happens” to qualify for another rebate this month, buy $50 get $25.  And they just “happened” to email me $5 off coupons for this stuff last week!!  So here is what I got this week!

I did two transactions.  First:

Two Rite Aid Cetirizine 30 count, BOGO Free, so $17.99 for two

Zyrtec children’s liquid $9.99 (for my son)

total = $27.98

I used a $5/$20 Rite Aid video values coupon, two $5 off Rite Aid cetrizine coupons, and a $2 off Rite Aid children’s Zyrtec coupon (got both of those coupons in my email, thanks Rite Aid!)

total = $10.98 plus tax

Next transaction:

Two Rite Aid Cetirizine 60 count BOGO free, so $22.99 for two

Sunglasses for hubby, clearance $5.49

total = $28.48

I used a $5/$20 Rite Aid video values coupon, and two $5 off Rite Aid Cetirizine coupons.

Total = $13.48 plus tax

So my total spent on allergy meds before coupons was $50.97, so I’ll get back a $25 Rite Aid gift card, when I only spent $24.46 (including the sunglasses!) out of pocket!

Woohoo! God is good, and my sis-in-law and nephew should now have enough Zyrtec to last the both of them all summer!

(And let me say that as I write this, my kitchen floor is being re-done by my wonderful husband as a 10th anniversary present! I am so excited! But most of my kitchen is now in my dining room which means the only clean surface I had to take this picture on was my couch!)

Lemme tell you a little secret which you may already know. A lot of CVS stores start the following week’s deals on Saturday afternoon instead of Sunday morning. *So* if you are a nerd like me and look ahead on the internetz to what is going to be on sale the next week, you can shop on Saturday night and get the current week’s deals PLUS the next week’s deals. Which is what I did this week! And it was awesome! Here’s how it played out:

Pampers $8.97 (current week’s deal)

2 Huggies $17.98 (next week’s deal)

3 Listerine $5.97 (next week’s deal)

Huggies wipes $3.49 (regular price)

Secret deodorant $1.37 (clearance I could not resist!)

Total = $37.78

coupons:

CVS $5/$30 email coupon (expired but my store takes for 30 days)

- $1.50 Pampers manu q

- $6 two Huggies $3 off printables

- $3 three Listerine manu q’s (from paper and printables)

-$3 off 3 Listerine CVS printable coupon from CVS.com

-.75 Huggies printable q

-$.50 off Secret manu q

- $4 CVS CRT when you buy Huggies wipes and diapers

- $3 CVS CRT any Huggies Supreme diapers

- $2 CVS CRT off any $10 baby care purchase

total = $9.03

I paid with 7 ECB, paid $4.21 cash including tax, and got back 8 ECB – 3 for the Pampers and 5 for the Huggies!  Holla!  I was super-excited to be able to use all those CVS CRT’s from the magic coupon machine at the same time!!

Thanks to the great diaper sales at CVS, Rite Aid and Walgreens lately, I am SUPER-STOCKED on diapers and wipes.  I keep buying them even though I am going to start to work with Sophie on the potty training thing again soon because a) she is still REALLY opposed to the idea and b) if I don’t use them I have a few good friends with babies in size 4 I can give them to!  Here’s my giant stockpile!

Um, there’s also an unopened jumbo pack of Huggies in Sophie’s bedroom!

Ok, so I may have a little problem…but I’m not going over budget…no one’s getting hurt, right!??

Stop #1 CVS: My friend Jen and I went in, since I am her coupon guru and she is my apprentice. It was lots of fun, we made friends with the new manager at my fave store, and I got some sweet deals!

Huggies box diapers $19.99
2 Excedrin $2.50 each
CVS pain relief $2
SoftSoap body wash $4.99
Total = $31.98

Coupons:
CVS $5/$30 email coupon
$2 Huggies printable coupon
$4 off Huggies big box diapers CVS CRT
Two $2 off Excedrin printable coupons
$3/2 Excedrin CVS email coupon
$.75 cents off SoftSoap printable coupon
$1 off any body wash CVS CRT
total = $14.23
I paid with 12-ish extra care buck and paid $2.63 cash including tax, and got back 8 ECB, 4 for the diapers and 4 for the body wash. YAY!!!

Next stop, Rite Aid! I am recently love, love loving Rite Aid. They have great printable coupons available through their Video Values program where you watch short commercials and get to print high-value coupons. SCORE!

2 Suave shampoo/conditioner $1.99 each
2 Carefree pantiliners .99 each
2 Nivea lip balm .99 each
Tampax $2.99 each
Satin care shave gel $1.99
Listerine pocketpaks $3.99
Garnier styler $2.99 (one of my fave hair products, I have been waiting for a sale for forever!)
$19.90

Coupons:
Rite Aid $3/$15 printable coupon
$1/2 Suave manu coupon
$2 off Carefree Rite Aid video values coupon
$1/2 Carefree manu coupon
$1 off Garnier Rite Aid video values coupon
$1 off Garnier manu coupon
$1 off Tampax manu coupon
50 cents off Listerine manu coupon
99 cents (BOGO free) Nivea lip balm coupon

Total = $8.41 – paid in cash and I will get $6 single check rebate, 1 for the Suave, 1 for the Tampax, 3 for the Listerine and 1 for the Gillette shave gel.

Finally, WALGREENS. Now I will tell you that Walgreens is my THIRD-favorite drugstore. However I was in there about 80 bajillion times this week because they had some sweet deals I could not pass up. And I CAN BE BOUGHT. I do the coupon shopping for my BFF Luanne (because she is coupon challenged, and I LOVE her) and I went in a couple times to load her family up on toilet paper, paper towels (VIVA!!), laundry detergent, Kleenex, and feminine care products (she has two daughters, they need their own Fort Kotex) and I did a few transactions for myself as well (Viva, Kleenex, laundry detergent, clearance diapers, lots of free plus overage Tylenol PM!) Here’s a couple examples:

2 Purex BOGO free, $5.99
6 Kleenex, BOGO free $2.19 (for two)
total = $12.56
coupons:
BOGO Free Purex – $5.99
two 50 cents off 3 Kleenex – $1
total = $5.57 and I got back 3 register rewards for buying the Kleenex, yippee!

Then, much to my frugal delight, I made a magical discovery in the baby aisle at Walgreens. They had some sizes of Walgreens brand jumbo pack diapers clearanced to $2.29. YES, I SAID $2.29 FOR A JUMBO PACK!! I about died of nerdy happiness. I got SIX packs as I have some peeps to get baby gifts for. I used several register rewards I had accumulated through the weeks and paid less than $5 total out of pocket. WHEEEE!! Oh, and I got two more bottles of Purex, (pictured with the kleenex above), WHAT UP!? Somebody give me a high five!

Ok, that’s all for me this week. From Fort Kotex and the Viva Palace, I bid you happy couponing!

Wanna see some more sweet deals?? Check out the round-up at Shopping SUperstars at the Thrifty Mama’s place!

I did two transactions.
Transaction #1:
Contour meter $14.99
Two Santa hats, $7.98
Gillette shave gel $1.99
Neosporin lip balm $2.78
total = $27.74

Coupons: $5/$25 Rite Aid coupon (my CVS accepts competitor q’s!)
$14.99 (up to $30 off off) Contour meter manu q
$1 off Gillette manu q
$3 off Neosporin (adjusted to $2.78) manu q
Total = $3.75
paid with 2 ECBs and a CVS gift card = 0 OOP, got back 5 ECBs for the meter and $7.98 for the Santa hats!

Transaction #2:
2 Nexxus shampoo $5.29 each
1 Nexxus conditioner $9.99
Emergen-C $3.99
Total = $24.56

Coupons: $5/$25 Rite Aid coupon (they rounded up for me!)
$5 off Nexxus Rite Aid coupon
Total = $14.56

used $12.98 ECB and paid $2.27 (including tax) out of pocket. Got back 10 ECB for the Nexxus and 3.99 ECB for the Emergen-C!

I was pretty pumped! I absolutely LOVE the Nexxus hair products!

Hope you all did great couponing this week! To see how everyone else did, check out Super Savings Saturday at Money Saving Mom and Shopping Superstars at the Thrifty Mama!

But never fear. Hungry for more deals, I went to Rite Aid and Walgreens and my “regular” CVS on Friday. Here’s what I got!

The best score of the day was at Rite Aid. I got 2 Schick men’s razors, 3 Schick Intuition razors, and 3 packs of Schick disposables all FREE plus a penny. I also got the Scope, toothbrush, tampons, shampoo, & shave gel. I ended up spending $7.21 and will get over $8 back in rebates plus a $5 Rite Aid gift card! Yee-ha!!! Now that’s what I call shopping!!

Then I moved on to Walgreens for free deodorant, shave gel, and body wash, 99 cent crayons (64 pack Crayola! with sharpener!) and of course a gallon of milk. Because we needed milk!

Finally, back to CVS to get a couple women’s razors that they didn’t have at the other store on Thursday (I graciously let Luanne have the one they did have in stock. ‘Cause I am big-hearted like that!)

It was a great drugstore freebie shopping weekend! And NO ONE was at the drugstores on Friday, so I didn’t risk traffic or being trampled to death. Woohoo!

Hope you got some great bargains this weekend. To see what everyone else got, check out Super Savings Saturday at Money Saving Mom!

So, anyhoo, here’s what I got at CVS!

Tide Stain Release $3.99
Bounce Dryer Bar $3.99
Two Skippy $6
Glade Soy Candle $6.99
Mountain Dew $1.49
Total = $22.46

Coupons used:
$4/$20 CVS email coupon (way expired but my CVS takes them for 30 days after)
FREE Tide Stain Release coupon from BlogHer swag bag!!
$2.50 off Bounce Dryer Bar coupon from Vocalpoint mailer
$2 printable Glade manu q
total= $9.97

I paid with 5.88 ECB, paid $4.85 in cash and got back 11.99 ECB! 1 each for the Tide & Bounce, 1 for the Mountain Dew (you had to buy 2, I had bought one previously), 6.99 for the Glade Candle and 2 for the Skippy.

I was pretty pumped getting all these products I love & use for such a great deal!

To see what great bargains everyone else got this week, check out Super Savings Saturday at Money Saving Mom.

I got all of this for 70 cents out-of-pocket! I used about 15 ECBs and got back about 21 ECBs! I used a $5/$25 Rite Aid coupon (my CVS takes competitor q’s) and one $2 and two $1 manufacturer q’s for the Tylenol – plus I had a CVS CRT for $2 off any Tylenol and another one for $2.50 off a $10 pain reliever purchase! The Tylenol wa $3.99 with 3 ECB back, so I “made” a few bucks on it! All the school supplies were free after ECB so it was a GREAT shopping week! Here’s hoping they keep bringing on the deals, I had a great time getting my coupon on this week!

For more great couponing adventures, check out Money Saving Mom! and the Thrifty Mama!

Heck yes we would! Who could turn that down? Both of us immediately knew what cause we would choose to raise $$ for – the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. Emily’s husband Andy has lived with type 1 diabetes since he was 16, and I’m not exaggerating when I say this disease effects just about every moment of their lives. It doesn’t define them as a family but it factors heavily into how they function – and they look forward to a day when this disease will be eradicated! Research has made great progress in the last couple of decades – a perfect example is the insulin pump Andy has worn every day for the past 8 years that has greatly improved his health and quality of life.

So, anyways, get together with some of our closest friends, have lots of great food, raise money for a great cause and raffle off some incredible prizes? Yes, please!

Johnson’s Body Care sponsored the party by giving us money for the food and starting us off with $100 for JDRF!! And they provided these gorgeous swag-bags with full-sized Johnson’s Body care products inside! And travel sizes too!

Here’s Katie modeling her swag bag:

Thanks to Johnson’s support, we were able to treat our guests to some super-yummy food: a taco bar from Qdoba!

IT. WAS. SOOOO. GOOD!!

Emily also made our guests her famous Weight Watchers-recipe Margaritas. Here she is enjoying her creation:

Funny story: I have never bought alcohol in my life, and at age 31 Emily ruined me by calling me on the way to the party and asking me to buy “a cheap-@$$ bottle of Tequila”. So I obliged her and I am now a marked woman. We took a picture to commemorate my descent into debauchery (don’t worry Mom I didn’t DRINK any. I’m just pretending!!)

Ok, on to the PRIZES!!! We were able to get some amazing sponsors to donate prizes, which we raffled off to our greedy generous friends to raise money. Here are some of the AWESOME prizes we raffled off:

THREE KABOOST booster seats from Target

A Bug View, Bug Loupe, and zOrb from Carson Optical:

A cleaning product prize pack from Seventh Generation

A Clarisonic PLUS skin care brush (these things are amaaaazing!)

Fabulous SPF 15 skin care from Palmer‘s Cocoa Butter (love this stuff!) and my favorite organic lip balm set from EcoLips

A to-DIE-for prize pack of Eufora Hair Care products – my FAVORITE!!

Serif Digital Scrapbook artist and free CVS Photo Book!!

Great package of eco-friendly household products from EcoStore USA – another one of my faves!

Awesome Sun Care set from our friends at CVS!

This super-cutie apron by Taygalook modeled by Tricia of Once a Month Mom (who won it!) Isn’t she just GLOWING? Head over to her blog to find out why!

And here are some prizes that couldn’t be there in person but will be shipped to the winners!

Lee Colorwash Khakis (love!!)

A MyPublisher book – I LOVE these great photobooks!

A Sleep Number Pet Bed from Select Comfort:

A Yummie Tummie Lacie (I won this!! SCORE!!)

and our GRAND PRIZE…two Adirondack Chairs in the winner’s color choice from Lands’ End!

The lucky winner of this great prize was Andrea from MommySnacks!!

After all this great RAFFLIN’, we raised…..(drumroll please)….

$420 for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation!!!!!!!!!

THANK YOU to all our prize sponsors, guests, and especially Johnson’s Body Care!!

(the cousins who blog and party together…)

Here’s some more eye candy – pics of our fabulous guests:

Thanks everyone for an AMAZING NIGHT!! We love you all!!

3 boxes of Kellogg’s cereal $10
Zantrex 3 $4.99
Colgate $2.99
Adidas $3.99
Total = 21.97

coupons: CVS $4/$20 email q (expired but my CVS takes for up to 30 days)
$1 Coldate manu q
Two $1 off Kellogg’s q’s
Total = $15.97
Paid with 12 ECBs and put the rest on my CVS gift card and got back 14.99 ECB

Then I bought this! WE needed Coke products to drink at our Mom’s Nite Out party!

4 Coke 12-packs $4 each
3 Vitamin waters 3/$4
Total $20
Coupons: CVS $4/$20
$1 coke coupon from My Coke Rewards points
Total = $15
paid with my $14.99 ECB from previous transaction. My total was one cent, but neither hubby or I had any change, so the manager gave it to me for free. What a guy! I got back 10 ECB for purchasing the Coke products!

That’s all the CVsin’ I did this week. Hope you all did great! To see how everyone else did, head over to CVS Superstars at the Centsible Sawyer, Shopping Superstars at the Thrifty Mama and Super Savings Saturday at Money Saving Mom!

We had a great discussion after breakfast about traveling to Disney with families, and I learned a lot from the expert Cast Members who were there to answer all of our questions. I was also thrilled to hear their recommendation of the Caribbean Beach Resort as their favorite moderate hotel, as that’s where we’re staying in August! Disney has three tiers of resorts – Value, Moderate, and Deluxe. We stayed at Pop Century, a Value resort, when we were there two years ago, and it was great. It was fun, completely suited our needs, and the price couldn’t be beat. But, since Disney was running such great specials this spring, we decided to stay in a Moderate this year. I had never stayed on Disney property until our trip to Pop, and now I can’t imagine doing it any other way. There are just so many benefits, including the Magical Express, as I mentioned before, and the Disney Dining Plan, of which I’m a big fan. We had a great conversation, and I was able to offer up my best Disney tip, which I’ll also pass on to you – Garden Grocer. You can go online and order groceries, which will be delivered to your room whenever you schedule it. We’ve used this service twice, and had great experiences both times. We’ve ordered breakfast and snack items, pop, and bottled water – all of which you can take into the parks with you… which means BIG savings. (And here‘s my other best tip.)

After that, we got a tour of the family suites at the All Star Resort, one of the Values, which sleeps up to six people. We all thought it was pretty great (and it was) until we made our next stop, at the newest tower at the Contemporary Resort. I can’t even describe how amazing this resort is. The “regular” rooms are bigger than some houses, and the suite… well, part of me wishes I didn’t know such things existed! It was two stories, and was just stunning. The front of the entire suite was a huge window that spanned both floors, and offered a spectacular view of the Polynesian, the Grand Floridian, and the Magic Kingdom.

They pretty much had to pull all of us out of there, because we never wanted to leave.

They wouldn’t let us take pictures inside because it’s that big of a secret, but here we are after our tour. (P.S. Thanks, girls, for telling me my hard hat was on crooked and I looked like a moron. Good looking out.)

Our next tour was of the Baby Care Center at the Magic Kingdom. I had heard of this place but had never been inside, but I’m sooo glad to know of the benefits before we bring the kids back this summer! They have everything you’d need for a little down-time during a park visit – a quiet, dark nursing room with rockers, a room with a TV and cartoons for older children who need a break, changing tables that are immediately sanitized after each use, and a little store that has everything from baby food and formula to extra onesies and pacifiers. It’s a great resource for families with small children!

We had some free time at the Magic Kingdom after that, so we had another Dole Whip and were off to ride some rides. I was excited that we hit Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, one of my childhood favorites. Such fun. After that we had lunch at the Wave, a new restaurant at the Contemporary that serves fresh, whole foods, grown in and around the Florida area. While others were having salmon and anti-oxidant cocktails, yours truly was chowing down on a cheeseburger and margarita. But it had a whole-grain bun, so it was all good, right? Right.

After lunch we went back to the hotel briefly to get ready for dinner. As I sat down to send a couple tweets, someone knocked on my door. It was room service, delivering cookies and milk! SO cute.

We headed out to Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
(Photo taken by Lisa)

We got a backstage tour of the new American Idol Experience.
(Photo taken by Beth)
Each day, they let park guests go through the same audition process that people go through for the show (except in the first round, they always give positive feedback even if they’re telling you no! So if I tried out, they might be like “Well, Emily, you can’t carry a tune in a bucket and you dance like Elaine Benes, but we really like your Croc flip flops!”), and then three people compete against each other every couple hours, and the winners of each round get to come back for the finale show. The winner of each day’s finale show gets a “golden ticket” (I think that’s what it’s called, but maybe I’m getting it confused with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) and they can go straight to the front of the line at the tryouts for the real Idol. Pretty cool!

After our tour, we got to see one of the competitions. Here’s Lisa, Grayson, me and Leanne before the show.

The stage looks exactly like the real deal.
(Photo taken by Lisa)

The show was super fun, and after it was over, we went to dinner at the Brown Derby. I have heard about how good this restaurant is, so I was excited to try it out. It was as good as I had hoped, and the company was better. We had so much fun eating, drinking, laughing, drinking, talking, and drinking. Here’s Beth and me.

After that, we headed back to the resort, and a few of us went to JellyRolls, a piano bar on the Boardwalk. The Boardwalk is amazing. I just love it.

Finally, we headed back to the hotel. Again, I completely crashed, but fortunately I woke up on time the next morning! We had one last breakfast together… and we were joined by a couple special guests.
(Photo taken by Beth)

We took a bunch of pictures, and said goodbye to our new friends. Here’s me and Andrea, even though we wouldn’t say goodbye until we absolutely had to get to our individual gates at the airport!
(Photo taken by Beth)

Those of us with later flights still had a few precious hours before leaving, so Beth, Andrea, Christine and I went back to the Magic Kingdom to do a little shopping for our kids. (And ourselves… we bought some kickin’ Mickey shirts!) We had lunch at the hotel, and then said our goodbyes. As Andrea and I waited for our Magical Express, I was so sad to leave. I was so anxious to see my family, but I wished they could get on a plane and come to me rather than the other way around!

Andrea and I managed to make even the wait at the airport extremely entertaining, and we were cracking ourselves up as we talked and Twittered. She introduced herself to the pilot of my flight, whom we happened to sit down next to, and proceeded to get his entire life story and romantic history. I was very disturbed to discover he was younger than me. But he told me not to worry, that he’d been flying since his senior year of high school. Which must have been, you know, three years ago. (What’s that you say? That even though he’s younger than me, that doesn’t mean he’s fresh off the varsity football team? I refuse to believe it.) In any case, he proved to be a very capable pilot and we had a safe flight home.

As I walked toward the baggage claim at the Dayton International Airport, I spotted Andy and the kids staring up at the arrivals/departures board. As I started walking over to them, I caught Kate’s eye, and she ran so fast that she was halfway to me before Andy looked up and noticed she was gone.

That may have been the best part of the trip.

******
So I know I’ve rambled on and on about what all “we” did on this amazing trip, but I just have to say more about the women who comprised this outstanding group. They were all so sweet, so fun, and so smart, and I feel very lucky to have spent the weekend with them. Again, they are:
Lisa from Crazy Adventures in Parenting, Christine from From Dates to Diapers, Megan from Velveteen Mind, Amanda from Oh Amanda, Marsha from Sweatpants Mom, Lindsay from Surburban Turmoil, Beth from I Should Be Folding Laundry and Andrea from Mommy Snacks. Check them out… you will be glad you did!

I also want to thank Maria Bailey from BSM Media, and Leanne Jakubowski and Laura Spencer from Disney. They are amazing hosts, and even more amazing women. I was absolutely inspired by each of them.