Give Away Your Clutter Challenge: Books and more books

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  So far this year, here's how I've challenged myself:

• I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores
• I challenged myself with the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  
• I tried to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time 
• I used up all the mangoes from my tree during the Mango Months.
• I did the You Link, I Comment Challenge, where I tried to check all the links from my three weekly linkups. 
• And for November and December, I will Give Away My Clutter, collecting items that are cluttering my house to donate and to deduct them from my 2011 taxes next year.

This week, I looked through my bookshelves to see which books I could pass on to someone else.  I love having lots books, but they are overwhelming my shelves.  I used a method I learned from The Dave Ramsey Show to decide which items to keep, which I'll describe tomorrow in my weekly tips post. (And no, it isn't "Get rid so much that your children will think they're next.")

These are the kinds of books I decided to keep:

• Reference works - even with the Internet, I still refer to a paper dictionary, thesaurus, atlas, and other works.
• Certain religious books
• Cookbooks that I use regularly
• Humor books - still funny after many readings
• Books that have some personal meaning to me
• Books relating to my hobbies
• Books about saving money

And these kinds of books I got rid of:

• Fiction books - these are available in the library if I want to read them again
• Older historical books = they're really out of date
• Other religious books which I will donate to my synagogue's library
• Other books that I simply haven't opened in years.

Where should you donate books?  Many would think that the public library would be a good place, because you could just check out your book if you missed it.  However, I've found that my local library does not add donated books to their collection.  Instead, they sell it in their book sale room.  Just keep that in mind!

Hospitals and senior centers can use your books.  I've been to libraries at both places and usually they have very few volumes.

If you have children's books to give away (I'll tackle those this week), a school or an afterschool program would be an excellent place to donate your books. Women's shelters would also be a good place - the books can entertain the children living there.

And of course, thrift shops will be happy to take your books as well.

Would you like to join me in my new monthly challenge?  Leave a comment below!

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Give Away Your Clutter Challenge: The 5-Minute Dash

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  So far this year, here's how I've challenged myself:

• I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores
• I challenged myself with the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  
• I tried to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time 
• I used up all the mangoes from my tree during the Mango Months.
• I did the You Link, I Comment Challenge, where I tried to check all the links from my three weekly linkups. 
• And for November and December, I will Give Away My Clutter, collecting items that are cluttering my house to donate and to deduct them from my 2011 taxes next year.

This week, I tried using the 5-Minute Dash to collect clutter.

I set my kitchen timer for 5 minutes and dashed.  I grabbed as much unneeded stuff as I could.  No time to stop and think, "Maybe I really need this?"  I got as much clutter as I could and put it in the center of my living room.

Once the time was up, I took a photo of my items and entered them into ItsDeductible.  Then I bagged up everything and put the items in the trunk of my car.

I did the 5-Minute Dash a few times this week, and then this morning, I dropped off everything at my local Goodwill store and got a receipt for my donation.  According to ItsDeductible, the items I donated have a value of $298.50.  This means that if I am in the 25% tax bracket, I will pay almost $75 less on my taxes next year... just for a few minutes of running around!

I'll be doing a few more dashes in the coming days!

Would you like to join me in my new monthly challenge?  Leave a comment below!

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Monthly challenge: Give Away Your Clutter

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  So far this year, here's how I've challenged myself:

• I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores
• I challenged myself with the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  
• I tried to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time 
• I used up all the mangoes from my tree during the Mango Months.
• I did the You Link, I Comment Challenge, where I tried to check all the links from my three weekly linkups.

For November and December, I plan to do another giving back challenge, but this one will help me as much as it will help the recipients.

I'm planning to do the Give Away Your Clutter challenge.  In this challenge, I will collect as much clutter in my house that we're no longer using but might be useful to others.  I'll then donate these items to charities. 

This will help the charities, of course, but it will also help me because I can take these donated items off my taxes.  I will be itemizing my taxes for tax year 2011; due to having a low amount of deductions, I alternate years of itemizing with years of taking the standard deduction.  See this post for my tax strategy.

Tomorrow, for my weekly frugal tip post, I'll post about how I get the maximum amount of deductions for my donations.

So I'm off to start decluttering!  Would you like to join me in my new monthly challenge?  Leave a comment below!

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August Challenge: You link, I (try to) comment!

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  In February, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.  And May and June were Mango Months.

I took off July, but I'm back doing the You Link, I Comment Challenge, where I will click on each of the links in Fortune Follies Tuesday,  Wednesday Weekly Shopping , and Frugal Food Thursday.  I'll leave comments for my shopping and cooking linkups, and I'll enter each of the contests at least once.

So how am I doing?  So far, I've only checked out a couple of the recipes, I'm afraid.  I've checked out and commented on about a third of the shopping posts.  I turned out to be much busier this week than I expected; next week my kids will be back in school and I'll have more time.  In fact, I plan to schedule some time each week for this task, beyond the end of this challenge.

As for the contests, I've clicked on all of them that had end dates through today.  Some contests I couldn't enter because the contest had already closed despite the end date not having passed yet.  Perhaps those blogs are running on Greenwich Mean Time?  I don't know.  Others, I didn't enter because they required you to follow someone on Facebook or subscribe to an email list.  I choose not to do either when I enter contests.  (I will follow on Twitter or Google Friend Connect, and I'll check out a website and report back something about the site.)

But I did enter a whole lotta contests.  So far I haven't won any, but you never know!

Gotta get back to checking out those shopping and cooking posts!

What are you challenging yourself with this month?  Leave a comment below!

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August Challenge: You link, I comment!

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.  And May and June were Mango Months.

I took off July, but now I'm back with an all-new challenge for myself - this one isn't about frugality, but about blogging.

As you may know, I run three blogger linkups each week.  Fortune Follies Tuesday is for links to blog giveaways.  Wednesday Weekly Shopping is for links to great shopping trips you've had or deals you've gotten, and Frugal Food Thursday is for frugal recipes.

I am blessed to have many bloggers link up at each of these each week.  When I first started Wednesday Weekly Shopping, I made sure to visit each blog, read the post, and leave a comment.  But lately I haven't been finding the time to do that, and I'm sure I'm missing out on some great posts.  And I've rarely checked out a great recipe or entered a contest.

So my challenge for myself this month is to visit every blog that links up to one of the three linkups.  For Wednesday Weekly Shopping and Frugal Food Thursday, I'll leave a comment.  And for Fortune Follies Tuesday, I will enter the giveaway at least once, provided that I am eligible to win.  (If not, I'll leave a comment elsewhere in the blog.)

Hopefully this challenge will lead to better and friendlier blogging habits for me!

What are you challenging yourself with this month?  Leave a comment below!

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May Is Mango Month: The end of mangoes?

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

May (and now June) is Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

Well, the Mango Months have pretty much come to an end.  Yesterday I cut down a few mangoes that simply had not ripened on the tree, and that was it.  No more.

In the last week, many ripe ones fell off the tree due to heavy rain, and they were attacked by bugs before I was able to get to them.  So those were lost.  And I let a few ripe ones in the house get too ripe, so in the trash they went as well.

But the good news is that I was able to save quite a bit of the harvest this year!  The list of what I was able to save and make is:

• 14 half-pints of mango jam
• 15 pints of mango jam
• 9 half-pints of mango chile sauce
• 4 pints of mango chile sauce
• 11 half-pints mango butter

So we'll be enjoying mangoes for some time to come!

I'll be skipping my frugal challenges in July - summer is challenging enough.  But stay tuned as I'll have lots of great monthly challenges in the coming months.  If you have an idea for a frugal challenge for me and the Frugal Follies readers, leave a comment below!

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8 Canning Tips I Learned the Hard Way

As you know from my May June is Mango Month posts, I've been canning mango jam, mango salsa, mango chile sauce, and mango butter all month, to use up the mangoes that grow on the tree in the backyard.  Just when I think I've caught up, a storm comes through and knocks a whole bunch more fruit off the tree.  (Such a problem, eh?)

I had not done much canning before this, although I had the equipment, bought when I thought I'd be growing and preserving all my food.  The growing hasn't happened yet (though you never know next year!).  But I've learned a lot about canning by all the mistakes I've made.  Here are a few things I've learned:

• Make sure you use a good manual and a tested recipe.  I made green mango salsa using a recipe I found online.  At one point it mentioned using half-pint jars; in the next sentence, it had changed to pint jars.  Confusing.
• Read and reread all the directions before you start.  When I was making chile sauce, the recipe called for you to put all the ingredients in except for sugar and salt, cook for an hour, then add the sugar and salt.  I thought everything was supposed to go in at once.  Oops. 
• Make sure you have all the equipment you need with you.  I was about to start the canning process the firsr time when I realized I couldn't find the funnel used to fill the jars.  Luckily I found it with just a minute's search, but it would have been much more difficult to fill the jars without it.
• Start boiling the water in the canner long before you need it.  Do you know how long it takes for a few gallons of water to boil?  Believe me, it takes a long time.
• Don't double recipes!  Sometimes it seems that the recipes make a small amount, and it's tempting to try to make a double batch.  But don't - the size limitations are there for a reason.  I tried to double a jam recipe, and when the jam came to a boil, it almost overflowed the pot!  And when I tried to double a mango butter recipe, the mixture spurted and scalded me a couple of times.  Not good.
• Measure everything exactly.  Wanting to get rid of some of the mangoes, I put a little more fruit into a jam recipe than it called for.  Result: jam that didn't set.  (I'll share how to fix this problem next week.)
• Prepare more jars and lids than you need.  Sometimes a sauce just doesn't cook down as much as you might expect.  If you don't have a jar ready for it, you'll lose the ability to can it.  (Of course, it will do fine in the refrigerator.)
• Label the jars once they've cooled.  For me, it's hard to tell some of my creations apart just by looking.  After all, everything is orange!

Hope this helps you not make the same mistakes I did!

For more frugal tips, please check out the bloggers listed on the left sidebar under Frugal Tips Linkups. There are lots of great ideas on each blog and I'm sure you'll find lots of wonderful tips!

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May Is Mango Month: Mangoes keep falling on my head

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

May (and now June) is Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

So far, I've harvested two four full milk crates full of mangoes.  We've had some bad storms in the last few days, and all of the ripe mangoes at the top of the tree fell down after each storm.  Some were sacrificed to the bugs, but I was able to collect a lot of them off the ground after the rain stopped falling.

The canning list is:

• 14 half-pints of mango jam
• 8 pints of mango jam
• 9 half-pints of mango chile sauce
• 4 pints of mango chile sauce
• 11 half-pints mango butter

I also have 1 gallon-sized bag of chopped mangoes in the fridge.  I'm not sure what I'll be making with that.

I'm almost ready to put out a box of mangoes at the end of the driveway with a sign saying "FREE MANGOES."  Almost.  But not quite yet.

Got any other good ideas of things to make with mangoes?  Let me know!

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May is Mango Month: Two crates full

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

May (and now June) is Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard, full of fruit about to ripen.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

So far, I've harvested two full milk crates full of mangoes.  I have several left in the milk crate, and each day, several fall from way high up in the tree where I can't pull them down.  (I need a cherry picker!)  So far, I've made:

• 14 half-pints of mango jam
• 8 pints of mango jam
• 9 half-pints of mango chile sauce
• 4 pints of mango chile sauce

Some have been eaten raw, as well.  And 6 of the half-pints of jam and chile sauce were given as end of the year gifts for my daughters' teachers and bus drivers.

Next on the agenda: mango butter!  (Like apple butter, but with mangoes).  I'll have the recipe up later this week!

Got any other good ideas of things to make with mangoes?  Let me know!

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May is Mango Month: I can can!

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

May (and now June) is Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard, full of fruit about to ripen.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

Last week, I did quite a bit of canning, and was able to make 14 half-pint jars of mango jam and 10 jars of mango chile sauce. (I'll share the recipe for mango jam this week on Frugal Food Thursday.) I gave some away to middle daughter's teachers; more will be on its way to my youngest's teachers and to the bus drivers.

I have another 20 or so greenish-purple mangoes inside ripening. And fully-ripe mangoes are falling from the highest branches of the tree, which I can't reach even with a ladder and a pruning saw on a 10-foot pole. Yes, the tree is that big. Generally I get rid of the ones that hit the ground, since the bugs usually get to them first.

I'll be doing a little more canning later on in the week. And there are still plenty of green mangoes on the tree that are within my range, so I'll be getting more later on this week. And then that will be it for mangoes this year...

Got any other good ideas of things to make with mangoes?  Let me know!

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May is Mango Month: Can I have an extension?

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

May is Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard, full of fruit about to ripen.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

Last week, I cut 37 mangoes from the tree, and there are plenty of others ripening on the tree.  I'm going to need an extension - Mango Month will be going into June!

We've eaten a few fresh ones, but most of them are being turned into yummy jams and condiments for future use.  Here's what I made today:

On the left are 5 half-pint jars of Mango Chili Sauce, and on the right are 7 jars of Mango Jam.  I'll have the recipes for them this week and next week in Frugal Food Thursday.  Together, they used up 15 mangoes (and 10 tomatoes for the chili sauce.)  It's a lot of work for not a lot of product, but they were delicious!  Plus they were cheap - the mangoes were free, the other produce was bought at my produce store, and the sugar was bought on sale with coupons from either Publix or Walgreens.

I'll be giving a jar of each to my daughters' teachers as an end-of-the-year gift.  I've done this before, and the homemade gifts were much appreciated!

Got any other good ideas of things to make with mangoes?  Let me know!

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How to Cut a Mango

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

May is Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard, full of fruit about to ripen.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

But today I harvested 37 mangoes from my tree!  In the coming days I'll be cutting them up to make jams, sauces, and many more yummy items.  So I thought I'd show you how to cut a mango.

A mango has a very large, flat pit inside it.  Here's the best way to get the mango flesh out of the mango without running into the pit, or without wasting much mango flesh.  After that, I'll give you my faster, but slightly more wasteful, way to cut a mango.

You'll need a knife, a spoon, a cutting board, and a mango.

1.  Hold the mango on its narrow side. (That's my six-year-old doing the holding.) Mangoes aren't perfectly round; two sides are flat and long, and the other two sides are narrow. The seed faces the flat side. You'll need to hold it, or it will roll over onto the longer, flatter side.

2.  Make a cut through the middle of the narrow side. Cut until you hit the pit. Then continue that cut in a circle around the mango.

3.  Put the spoon in the cut that you've made, and wiggle it around until the two sides have separated a bit. Then use the spoon to separate one side of the mango from the pit.

4.  With the spoon, remove the pit from the other side of the mango.

5.  Cut a checkerboard pattern into the mango flesh without cutting through the skin. (You might cut through the edges of the skin; this is okay. Just don't cut all the way through.)

6.  Flatten the mango half out. Cutting from the side, cut between the mango flesh and the skin so that the cubes are removed.  Now you have mango cubes to use in any recipe (like my yummy mango and pineapple salsa).

Now for my quicker way:
1.  Hold the mango on the narrow end, as in step 1.
2.  Slice off the right side of the mango at the point where the flesh meets the pit.  If you hit the pit, move a little more to the right and try again.
3.  Slice off the left side of the mango at the point where the flesh meets the pit.  Again, move to the left if you hit the pit.
4.  Turn the mango over onto a cut side and do the left and right sides again.  You'll end up with two circular pieces and two rectangular-shaped pieces.
5. Cut the checkerboard into the four mango pieces as in step 5 above.
6.  Remove the mango cubes from the skin as in step 6 above.

This method leaves more mango pulp on the pit.  But with 37 mangoes, and more to come, I think I can waste a little bit of mango here and there.

Got any favorite tips involving mangoes?  Please leave a comment!

For more frugal tips, please check out the bloggers listed on the left sidebar under Frugal Tips Linkups. There are lots of great ideas on each blog and I'm sure you'll find lots of wonderful tips!

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May is Mango Month: A beautiful sight

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

May is Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard, full of fruit about to ripen.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

And speaking on that... here's what I found outside today:

The first tree-ripened mango of the year!  (I had brought a few green ones inside to make green mango salsa and sour mango coleslaw, and a few ripened early - I made mango and pineapple salsa with one.)  Which means that very very very soon, the bulk of the harvest will be ready!

I'll be shopping for some canning jars and other canning necessities in the coming days, getting up on the highest rung of the ladder to cut them down from the tree, and turning many of these mangoes into mango jam and other treats!  I'll keep you updated on my progress.

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May Is Mango Month!

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I challenged myself to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

And this month... did you guess from the picture I posted last week?

It's Mango Month here at Frugal Follies!  You see, I have two large mango trees in my backyard, full of fruit about to ripen.  Too many years, I've wasted this great resource by just using a few and letting the rest fall on the ground.

So this month, I'll be challenging myself to use this bounty.  Besides eating and cooking with them fresh, I'll be canning mango jam and mango salsa, cutting and storing them in the freezer, dehydrating some, and giving fruits to friends and family.  And, I'll try to see if I can donate fruit to the local food bank or other places.

I know, such a hard challenge... I'm sure most of you wish you had the problem of too many mangoes.

This week, the mangoes are still green, with some having just a hint of purple to them.  The main task right now is to find the ones that have fallen off the tree and hit the ground, so that I can get rid of them.  (Once they're on the ground, the insects and birds start devouring them quickly).  It's kind of like having an Easter egg hunt - every day for a month.

I also picked eight green mangoes that I was able to reach without a ladder.  This week, I'll try making green mango salsa.

Check back each Monday and help celebrate Mango Month!

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Giving Back: More donations

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I'm planning to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

This week, I cleaned out my stockpile of health and beauty aids.  Although I generally only buy those items when they are free or moneymakers, I had managed to create quite a stockpile of them.  I had collected nine tubes of Colgate toothpaste - and I don't even like Colgate!  I had also gotten several bottles of men's body wash as moneymakers - but I found sixteen bottles of body wash in my collection.  Even with all the baths and showers my three daughters take, I didn't need such a large stash.

So, I went through my not-so-extreme health and beauty aids stockpile (which I'll feature tomorrow in my tips post) and collected some items to donate to a local woman's shelter.  I took a picture - usually my pics are to show what I got, but this time it's to show what I'm donating!

Included in the picture are:

• 9 tubes of toothpaste
• 6 bottles of body wash
• 2 bottles of baby wash
• 2 bottles of baby shampoo
• 1 tube of baby ointment
• 2 deodorants
• 2 bars of soap
• 3 packages of panty shields
• 1 razor

How have you helped others with coupons or other frugal practices recently?  Leave a comment below!

Next month, I'll be on to a new frugal challenge.  Here's a clue below - can you guess what my new challenge will be?

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Giving Back: Unshopping

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March and April, I'm planning to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

This week, I did what Jenny over at Southern Savers calls "unshopping."  I went through my stockpile of food bought cheaply - or gotten for free! - with coupons, and gave away anything I didn't need, or that I thought I had too much of.

I was able to donate many cans of soup, and many boxes of pasta, rice mix, and gelatin.  I also gave away a 20-lb bag of white rice I had bought when my husband was laid off from his job and I started panicking - what if he didn't get a job for months?  What would we eat?  (Due to lots of job hunting prior to the layoff, and a little luck, he landed another job within a month of the layoff - so the panic turned out to be unnecessary.)  I donated these items to my synagogue, which is holding a food drive right now.

By the way, you've probably seen the gigantic stockpiles on "Extreme Couponing."  Tomorrow, I'll share my not-so-extreme couponing stockpile, along with some tips on building a stockpile without letting it take over your house and your life.

How have you helped others with coupons or other frugal practices recently?  Leave a comment below!

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Giving Back: Overseas Coupon Program

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.  In March, I planned to Give Back...One Coupon at a Time.

But I got a little lax on this challenge, so I'm continuing it for the month of April as well!

This week, I decided to send expired coupons to an overseas military base via the Overseas Coupon Program. When coupons expire, they're just trash for us - but not for members of the U.S. military stationed in other countries!  There, they can use coupons past their expiration date - up to 2 months past the date.  So sending your unused coupons overseas is an easy way to help our troops purchase the items they need.

To participate, go to the website and choose a base to send to.  You can "adopt" a base, or just send each month to any bases that need coupons.   Then separate your coupons into food and nonfood piles.

I decided to send the coupons from the 2/27 Procter & Gamble inserts to the troops.  One thing that is great about the P&G inserts is that all of the coupons have the same expiration date - in this case, they all expired on 3/31.  So I pulled out all of my inserts (I get them from a free weekly newspaper in my area) from my coupon file (I don't cut them up, but file by date), separated the individual pages out, and put each type of page into a pile.  And then I started cutting.

It took a while, longer than I expected.  But when I was done, I had hundreds of coupons to send out tomorrow.  I'm glad I'm able to help in this small way!

How have you helped others with coupons or other frugal practices recently?  Leave a comment below!

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Donate to Japan's relief efforts

In place of my usual Giving Back... One Coupon at a Time post, I'd like to encourage all of you to give to efforts to help Japan after their devastating earthquake and tsunami.  The events are still unfolding and the damage is just simply unbelieveable.

Here are some places where you can donate:

• The American Red Cross: You can make a donation on line.  Or, you can text REDCROSS to 90999 and donate $10 to the Japanese relief efforts.
• The Salvation Army: You can also donate on-line here as well.  You can also text JAPAN or QUAKE to 80888 and make an instant donation.
• Heart to Heart International: Only 2% of all donations are kept to cover overhead.  That means 98% of what you send to them will actually make it to the quake ravaged areas.
• The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee is raising funds to assist the stricken areas, just as they did during Haiti's earthquake and the Indian Ocean tsunami.  Read about how Jewish and Israeli groups are helping Japan.

I encourage all of you to give to any of these charities.

Thanks to Frugal Coupon Living for inspiring this post!

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Giving Back... One Coupon at a Time

Each month this year, I plan to give myself some sort of challenge, to try to improve how I'm doing in that particular area.  In January, I did the Clean Out the Cupboards Challenge to use up the excess food in my pantry and spend as little as possible at the stores.  Last month, I did the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge to build up my Extra Care Bucks from CVS and my Register Rewards from Walgreens.

This month, it's time for me to give back... one coupon at a time!

My challenge for this month (and yours, too, if you'd like to join me) is to find a way to give back to others using coupons or other frugal strategies.  How?  I'll leave that up to you.  But here are some ideas that I had:

• Purchase pantry items cheaply and donate them to a food bank or to a friend, relative, or neighbor in need.
• Donate items already in your pantry that you don't plan to use.
• Donate/buy personal care items to a shelter or other charity in your area.
• Donate unused household items to a thrift store or charity.
• Purchase used children's books at a library sale or thrift shop and donate them to a school.
• Teach a friend, relative, or neighbor some of your money-saving secrets.
• Take unused but unexpired coupons and leave them at the grocery store near the item, so that someone else can use them (you should probably check with your grocery store manager before doing this).
• Donate expired coupons to military bases overseas.  Click here to learn how.

I'm sure there are lots and lots of other ways you can give back to your community - leave a comment if you have another idea and I'll add it to the list!

This week, I purchased 20 cans of tomato sauce at Publix.  They cost 8¢ each after coupons, plus I got two free loaves of bread with the purchase as well.  So I'm donating these cans of sauce, as well as a few other pantry items, to a March for the Hungry food drive in my area.  If you live in my area, I urge you to donate as well!

How are you giving back this week?  Leave a comment below!

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Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge: Wrapup

I'm doing the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge (join me!), where I'm trying to build up my collection of Register Rewards from Walgreens and Extra Care Bucks from CVS.

This was the last week of the challenge - how did you end up doing?

I'm pretty happy with my results.  Although I ended up spending more out of pocket than I had hoped, it was still pretty small compared to how much I was able to get.  Plus, I have $20 in Register Rewards and $13.28 in Extra Care Bucks - again less than I had hoped but more than enough to get most free and moneymaker items without having to go deeply into my pocket.

So what challenge is next for me?  In January, it was about using up what I had.  In February, it was about replenishing.  And in March, it's about giving back.  Stay tuned for my March Challenge announcement!

Here's my latest stats for the month of February:

Walgreens:

Total cash paid: $23.70
Total tax paid: $3.68
RRs started with: $0
RRs on hand: $20

Products purchased:
2 Natrol melatonin
4 Vicks Sinex
4 Butterfinger Snackerz
5 Royal gelatin
1 Arnicare gel
1 Blink Tears
5 Gain dish liquid
4 Skippy peanut butter
2 Ragu pasta sauce
3 Lipton tea
1 Veripur hand sanitizer
2 Crest Pro-Health toothpaste
2 Reach Total Care toothbrushes
1 Lysol Healthy Touch No-Touch soap system
3 greeting cards
2 RepHresh Brilliance tampons
4 Dove deodorant
3 Kleenex facial tissue
2 Applied Nutrition Anti-Aging Total Body Defense
3 Walgreens low-dose aspirin

CVS:
Total cash paid: $18.99
Total tax paid: $2.86
ECBs started with: $4.99
ECBs on hand: $13.58

Total items purchased:
6 Herbal Essences shampoo
3 Rice Chex cereal
2 Quaker instant oatmeal
2 Speed stick deodorant
1 Tums
2 Colgate Total toothpaste
1 Schick Hydro 3 razor
1 Purex laundry detergent
2 Kellogg's Raisin Bran
1 Gold Emblem jelly beans
2 Kellogg's Smart Start cereal
1 Crest Pro-Health toothpaste
1 Softsoap body wash
1 Revitalens multi-purpose solution

How are you doing on the Drugstore Bootstrap Challenge?  Leave a comment below!

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