www.sandraevertson.com
9 years ago
Posted by
Victoria
comments (0)
I am not a coupon girl. I never use coupons. I never sign up for rebates. I never browse the internet looking for deals. I just tell myself that the extra money I pay is a convenience fee for not having to go through all that trouble to clip and organize slips of paper for products I don't use. I really don't get it when I watch Extreme Couponing and see all those people with huge stockpiles of food packed around their garages and closets. Why? The only way they would convince me it was worth it is if they just quit buying groceries for a year or so and lived off their stockpile. A year free of shopping would maybe intice me to get motivated or maybe they could use it to help the less fortunate. Some of those people have enough to feed a small 3rd world country and what do they really need with 50 bottles of deodorant anyway? I could see the point if it was being used to help others.
A few weeks ago I went to a MOPS meeting and the topic of the week was saving money. There was a coupon lady that was our special guest speaker and she began to tell us all of the ways she saves. I have to admit she made it sound good. she wasn't all crazy and extreme, she was just a mom trying to save some money for her family. I listened to her ideas and I found myself thinking it could work. Things always seem better when you are in a group and everyone is building each other up and telling each other how great this sounds. Peer pressure is a powerful thing. I found myself coming home and telling Jason that I was going to give it a go. I was going to buy the Sunday paper and start clipping and saving coupons. Jason wasn't quite as enthusiastic as the MOPS moms had been. He just sort of laughed it off, but I was determined. That first week I went to the gas station on my way home from church to get the paper only to find that it cost 1.75...wow! 2 dollars in quarters? I didn't have that many quarters so we went home paperless. The rest of the week I searched for places in our town that sold the Sun. paper all week, but evidently the people in my town are not so interested because no one had it. The second week I finally got my first paper and I sat on the bed and clipped for almost an hour... My goodness that was a long time, but I took my stack and put them in my folder. I was excited. Four more weeks have now passed and that first stack of coupons are still sitting in my folder. No more have been added. I never have quarters, I never remember to stop at the store, I don't have any interest. I looked at the websites and they may as well be written in Chinese.
My children still pick out all the coupons in the grocery aisles and Jason still just laughs as though to say I told you so. I still watch Extreme Couponing and can't help but think how ridiculous it is and how having a stockpile that is worth 20 grand isn't really worth anything if you don't really need or use it and you're still getting more every week.
If you are one of those coupon people that can save, clip and organize then that is great. I just don't think I am. I did the math and found that I feed our family of four, three meals a day, clean our house and do our laundry on about 100 dollars a week without any coupons. If I shop at Aldi, use my VIP card at Food Lion, and shop smartly. I can cut about 20 dollars off of that which would be 80 dollars for the week or about 12.00 a day. That works out to about 3 per person per day. that includes cleaning supplies and toiletries. I can't feed the dog for that ( there is no coupon for her special RX food) so I consider that money well spent. I think that I will just trust God to supply the need and right now He doesn't think I need 25 jars of spaghetti sauce. I am doing my part by saving trees, saving gas, growing a garden to provide. I am letting those with more time and knowledge handle the coupons and I can use the time I am saving to blog about my lack of couponing skills :)
A few weeks ago I went to a MOPS meeting and the topic of the week was saving money. There was a coupon lady that was our special guest speaker and she began to tell us all of the ways she saves. I have to admit she made it sound good. she wasn't all crazy and extreme, she was just a mom trying to save some money for her family. I listened to her ideas and I found myself thinking it could work. Things always seem better when you are in a group and everyone is building each other up and telling each other how great this sounds. Peer pressure is a powerful thing. I found myself coming home and telling Jason that I was going to give it a go. I was going to buy the Sunday paper and start clipping and saving coupons. Jason wasn't quite as enthusiastic as the MOPS moms had been. He just sort of laughed it off, but I was determined. That first week I went to the gas station on my way home from church to get the paper only to find that it cost 1.75...wow! 2 dollars in quarters? I didn't have that many quarters so we went home paperless. The rest of the week I searched for places in our town that sold the Sun. paper all week, but evidently the people in my town are not so interested because no one had it. The second week I finally got my first paper and I sat on the bed and clipped for almost an hour... My goodness that was a long time, but I took my stack and put them in my folder. I was excited. Four more weeks have now passed and that first stack of coupons are still sitting in my folder. No more have been added. I never have quarters, I never remember to stop at the store, I don't have any interest. I looked at the websites and they may as well be written in Chinese.
My children still pick out all the coupons in the grocery aisles and Jason still just laughs as though to say I told you so. I still watch Extreme Couponing and can't help but think how ridiculous it is and how having a stockpile that is worth 20 grand isn't really worth anything if you don't really need or use it and you're still getting more every week.
If you are one of those coupon people that can save, clip and organize then that is great. I just don't think I am. I did the math and found that I feed our family of four, three meals a day, clean our house and do our laundry on about 100 dollars a week without any coupons. If I shop at Aldi, use my VIP card at Food Lion, and shop smartly. I can cut about 20 dollars off of that which would be 80 dollars for the week or about 12.00 a day. That works out to about 3 per person per day. that includes cleaning supplies and toiletries. I can't feed the dog for that ( there is no coupon for her special RX food) so I consider that money well spent. I think that I will just trust God to supply the need and right now He doesn't think I need 25 jars of spaghetti sauce. I am doing my part by saving trees, saving gas, growing a garden to provide. I am letting those with more time and knowledge handle the coupons and I can use the time I am saving to blog about my lack of couponing skills :)
