Happy Birthday to Brad's Dad

here is a slide-show movie i made for brad's dad on his birthday. Thanks to the help of Windows Movie maker, http://www.picnik.com/ (thanks jamie for the link), brad's friend jeremy for getting it burned to a dvd format so father in law can watch it on his dvd player, and of course to Valley, for coming up with the idea first for our dad, I never would've thought of it, had you not done one first. It took me a week straight of bedtime no earlier than 2:30 am but I got 'er done. I think brad's dad really appreicated it, so it was worth the time. I also made one of the boys, it follows below...thanks for watching!

Stocking up the deep freeze and Latest pics of our happenings

So here is my latest...stocking up the pantry and freezer. We have been saving up food storage money for quite some time, of course i used mostly grocery money, but for all the meats, cheese, tomoatoe soup and condiments, I used food storage money. All of the snacky items were just too hard to resist. I know, i know, i am terrible. They are right though, this is addicting. We are officially stocked up on snack items, cereal, and sauces for the next 8 months probably. So, no more buying of those. Now just items for REAL food storage, and weekly meals. (hee hee, we will see).

Anyway, not everything is pictured here, because one, it wouldn't fit and two, it was a lot of meat. Brad did not get a deer or an elk this year, so i am having to restock the meat supply for our freezer.

Total for shopping trip, $496.46.....................................I got it for $223.56!
Total SAVINGS - $272.90

Things not pictured but also included with the price are: 30 lbs boneless skinless ckn breast, 24-pk bottled water, 8 lbs breaded chicken breasts, hot sauce, 2lb baby carrots, 1 lb deli lunch meat and 1 lb deli cheese slices.

My best "deals" in my opinion are: nabisco crackers .67/each, bbq sauce .25/each, 2lb block cheese 4.99/each, groung pork sausage 1.20/lb, boneless skinless ckn breast 1.77/lb, puffs tissue with lotion 80ct .64/each, kraft salad dressings .50/each and then daisy sour cream pint .50/each.

So, there you have it. My totally awesome savings to stock up the deep freeze and pantry!


We had such a nice day last week, i think monday, that the boys wanted to picnic on the front lawn for lunch. IT was fun and felt soooooo good to be out in the sun. The kids actually asked to take their hoodies off cause they said it was hot.



We don't even have a tree in our yard, but our neighbors tree DUMPS on our lawn. He was kind enough to let us use this awesome leaf sucker upper/mulcher machine. It was awesome. Coleman loved playing in it.

he would start at the other end of the drive way and run to jump in the pile, it was really cute.

Coleman'd work of art...Dalton's pic (below) was quite impressive, so he came to us with this so that we could "oooo and aaaahhhh" over him too. It was funny.

Here is dalton's temple with trees and flowers and bushes. Also to the left right next to temple, there is a Brad (spikey hair) ;) and then a tree and then dalton on the far left. He did a really good job, we thought for a five year old.

The proud artist and his masterpiece!

Jeric also had his birthday acouple weeks ago, so i will get a slide show done of that and post soon. He turned 1, I just can't believe it!

Saving Money is Fun

So, shopping again. I promise i won't post these all the time. I am just doing it so that i can keep track this first month, to see my total monthly savings. I would've gotten more last night, things like tomatoe soup and canned soups, for food storage, but i left half my coupons home. It's been a long few days.

Brad has been home sick with flu, coleman hasn't been able to make it to the bathroom in time, so i finally started putting pull ups on him since i can't handle cleaning up that kind of stuff. After four times, it gets kind of old. And then yesterday i started feeling yucky. and today, worse. My ears are throbbing like crazy. Me, it is mostly the ears are just killing me.

so, my totals on this trip: Price before sales/coupons $112.83
Price after sales/coupons $ 32.71!!!!!

pretty exciting stuff. Once i start getting the hang of when the sales switch over and a good organization I think the time i spend preparing to go shopping will cut back a lot. Anyway, it is fun and i hope there are some sales on more food storage items instead of cereal. We have enough cereal to last us a year probably! anyway, but when it's .25-.50 a box, how can you resist? If the world ends, we will have cereal to live on!

Let me know your sweet coupon buys too! Or any tricks you may have along the way. When the best time to hit the stores are, etc.

Coupons are totally awesome!

The above items added up to 94.31 and i got it for ................$14.31.
6 bxs cereal, 2 orville popcorn 3pk, 6 cans diced tomatoes, 2 egg beaters, 2 spritzer dressing, 2 other dressings, 2 healthy choice cafe steamers dinners, 4 bags quaker mini rice cake snacks, and 2 bottles pam spray. Of course the original amount is high because albertsons is always pricier than walmart, but the sale prices i got them for are way cheaper than what i could've got in the walmart brand. So, i am happy.

these sales weren't as good, because the kids were fussy n i didn't read the coupons right on all of them, and some of the items weren't on sale, but the ocupon was expiring this week and they were things i wanted, so i got them. anyway, this all added up to 35.24 and i got it for ........$20.24. The yogurt and rice side dish packets were the best deals, 50% off.

so, i got in total, $129 worth of groceries for ......................drum roll.......................$34.31!

Our New Years Eve

For new's years eve we were all kind of sick, not too bad, but enough to feel like just layin' around. We watched re-runs of Magnum p.i. for the night. my kids love that show. It was really funny. Dalton was humming the theme song at the beginning of each episode.

The Yummiest drink

The Yuckiest drink

The prettiest drink

The ugliest drink

In my family, every new year's eve, my mom would buy different pops, koolaids, juices, etc and we would have a koolaid mixing contest. She would have themes like ugliest color, prettiest color, yummiest, yuckiest, most creative, and there were more, but i can't remember them all. So, we had the first annual Wilson Koolaid Mixing Contest! The kids just loved it and asked if we could do it again the next day. it was really fun to see them so excited. Anyway, kind of a fun tradition that i hope my kids will keep enjoying.

First Coupon Adventure

I got the following items, which rang up to $167.64 ................... minus my coupons and the promotion, for $58.99.

7 bxs cereal, 4 bx fiber one granola bars, 4 bx fruit snacks, 7 bx fruit roll ups, 10 cans progresso soup, 8 bx Always infinity pads, 2 bx bisquick, and 2 bx cheesy potatoes.

I was excited to get the soup for .50 can and the bisquick for .25 a box. The other items are stock up for brad's lunches and kids.

I know i probably could have saved a lot more, but trying to go with three kids on my first time. I did not have a lot of time to think it all out. But I am happy with the results and hope to get better the next time around. Not too bad. I didn't realize until i got home that i was way over charged on the kix cereal. $4.79 instead of $1.99, so i have to take it back in and get some money back. Also, since it was the last day of the sale, i didn't find everything i wanted, which would have given me more discounts with coupons. But, i was happy that they had this much left.

I will admit though, it is kind of embarrassing standing in line waiting for them to scan everything. I got some ornery, looks, but hey, i have a family to feed! So, i just didn't look behind me to see anymore of "the looks". The savings is worth the nasty looks sometimes.

Thanks to all those awesome couponers out there...for being my inspiration! I FINALLY did it!

Yeah! we have the internet again!!!

I am so excited to annouce that my interenet was reconnected today!!! I just couldn't take it anymore, brad either. So, we have it again and it is lovely! We had to get the slower speed as it is agrees with our budget more, but hey, I have it again and I don't care the speed! It's actually not so bad. You just don't realize how much you actually use it until it's gone and believe me, I appreciate it sooooo much more this time around. I have signed up for the paper now too, we couponing world here I come!!!

Anyway, just wanted to let everyone know we will be posting a lot more often but not ALL THE TIme, as i need to set limits for myself. but again, I am SO EXCITED to have it!

I was working on a slide show of our christmas, but, jeric pushed something and walah, just like that, it was gone. So i will have to work on it later after piano lessons and bedtime. So, until tomorrow folks... yeah!

our latest pics

brad's bday. I got him an expensive mini air compressor,inverter,emergency light,jump starter thing. i don't know the official term for it, but he liked it and was surprised.

a new reversible belt, what he has always wanted! also, the boys wanted to get him a byu tie and they get mad at him if he doesn't wear it every sunday!

jeric learning to drive, not really...it's parked in the driveway

oh, out of order here, sorry. brad birthday dinner of pizza n salad

snow fort the kids were building, yes it snowed here. a lot more pics for another post.

brad took me to zion's for our anniversary. i had never been before. we bought an annual pass and are excited to go a lot this spring and summer.

the boys absolutely love their jeep, still. brad repainted it and wired it with headlights n breaklights so they can drive it at night.

our anniversary, man i miss my skinny days. blah! i lost those sunglasses to when we were hiking. they were my favorite.

brad brought home a bobcat to level our yard...well, instead he made a driving track for the boys with hills n bumps in it to drive their jeep on. We will bring home a bobcat later to level it, when we can actually afford to do what we are wanting to do with the yard. for now, the boys don't want anything but dirt!

I ran something out to brad in the shed and when i came back in i found jeric asleep like this. it was sad but cute.