Frugal Friday......the March 27th Edition

Another week of "not normal" so let's try to bring some normality to our lives by doing a Frugal Friday.  In this time of pandemic it's hard to remain frugal(except if you stay home and stay away from online shopping when home-guilty as charged lol).

*  Hubs filed and we received our Federal Tax Return and it arrived via direct deposit into our account this week.  We don't get a very large refund which is good since it means we don't 'loan' the Federal Government our money for a year. ;-)
Of course a piece of that refund will go into the state's coffers since we ALWAYS owe them something. 8-(

* I had to go to Aldi on Tuesday for mushrooms so I picked up some other things there that are cheaper than anywhere else(butter, tortilla chips, cream cheese, almond milk for Hubs, etc.).
I also went to this town's Weis(PMITA)Markets looking for my Stress Relief tea.  I also bought some comfort foods while at Weis--2 bags of potato chips(haven't bought those in months!)and 2 containers of tapioca pudding(which wasn't on sale!).  I Love me some tapioca pudding so I happily paid full retail for that.  8-O

* We got pizza take-out from Domino's last Friday which cost me nothing OOP due to gift cards.  For some reason I have a metric shit ton of gift cards for Domino's(I went a little crazy last R-A Black Friday deal time when I already had some Domino's cards).  For 2020 this is considered free pizza since I paid for all those last year(or in 2018 in some cases).  I think we'll be plowing through this gift card stockpile for the foreseeable future what with our town finally getting it's own Domino's franchise and well, PIZZA!!  ;-)

* Speak of Weis(was I?), they have cancelled Freebies and Fantastic Friday Deals until further notice and there is NO weekly sales ad that should have started today which will cut down on me getting any deals there since I won't be shopping there(much).

* While I was near Aldi since it was "Cheap Bagel Tuesday" I got a Baker's Dozen of bagels at Panera across the street at their drive-thru window.  I used a free gift card to pay that I got with c/c points.

*  I did go to Rite-Aid once this week since I had to get an Rx anyway and I found this stuff.......

1 x Love/Beauty/Planet Conditioner 75% off=$2.24
2 x Baby Ruth candy bars on sale .77¢=$1.54
SubTotal...$3.78

Coupons Used
1 x $1.50/1 Love/Beauty/Planet item IPQ=$1.50
1 x BOGOFree Baby Ruth ManuQ=.77¢
Coupon Total.....$2.27
$3.78-$1.51+.05 tax=$1.56 paid for with Bonus Cash.

*  As mentioned in my opening I succumbed to some online clothes shopping on Sunday.  I was going to get 2 Summer dresses anyway(as I do each year)but then the store was having a 50% off everything, including clearance items so I bought a bit more.  I went through ShopAtHome and got 3.5% back in rebates on what I spent AND I found a Free Shipping code(which saved me another $19.99).  I'll pay all this from my accumulated WAM.

*  I found money!  On the one day I had to go out I found change, first at Aldi........

First I got a free quarter when the lady wouldn't take my quarter for her cart.  I guess a lot of folks are not wanting their quarters back now.

Then I found 2 pennies in the check-out line near the end by the register/cashier.  I used a Lysol wipe to pick them up.....do you know how hard it is to use a wipe to do that? lol
When a lady handed me her quarter for my cart I had her drop it into the wipe in my hand, so I didn't touch it before cleaning it off.

And at Rite-Aid later that afternoon I found another penny........

This coin was found by the register.  The floor mats in front of the registers are brown like an old penny so it's a good place to find those at Rite-Aid. lol

Again, I used a Lysol wipe to pick it up and all change was thoroughly cleaned once I got it home.

Found Money This Week...... .28¢
Found Money This Year so far....$44.55

*  I earned $1.60 in Ibotta rebates this past week.

*  I made myself a mask for when I have to go out in public again.............

I used sewing supplies I already had, which made this frugal.  While it's no N95 mask it makes me feel a  bit safer among the unwashed masses out there.  I don't go many places but the drugstore and grocery stores anyway but those are the places everyone is in nowadays because they can't go anywhere else. lol

I think our county will become a "shelter in place" county soon.  The infection is spreading here from NYC and Philly and the main county entry point from those cities where cases are exploding went into "shelter in place" status this week.  Our county is a couple dozen cases below them now so it's going to be any day for us. The local bus service to NYC and Philly has suspended service until further notice.
Then word got out that NYC has bussed in convicts from Brookly  into one of our local prisons.  I can see the villagers with pitchforks and torches storming Castle Frankenstein any time now............




That's about it for this week.

Any frugal stuff in your world?
Stay Frugal, Stay Safe and Wash Your Hands!



Sluggy

Not Much To Say

Imagine that?!
Me with nothing much to say. lolz

I haven't been shopping this week yet.
I usually go out on Wednesday but this happened on Wednesday.......

Woke up to a coating and then about 10 am the skies opened up again.

Not much going on here except........

* We got the taxes done. Go us!  We owe PA and LA states(as usual)so we wait to file those until April but it's all ready to go.  Federal is done and the refund popped into our account today....Rah!
I've got to do the math and deduct what we owe states from what the feds gave us back to see how much we have left of "our" money. I thought we'd owe the feds in 2017 but I guess because our income dropped so much when Hubs retired that they actually took more out while he was working  to offset the little that gets taken out of the annuity payment.  Anyway, we are happy to get so much back. 8-)
Now to figure out where to direct the refund.

*  We have sold the house in LA.....tentatively.  We countered an offer on Monday and they accepted the counter offer.  If all goes as planned we'll no longer own the house before April is over.  Please cross your collective fingers that the financing for these buyers doesn't fall through....please, please, please!!!

*  More snow here.  We are so over it this Winter.  The first full day of Spring and we have gotten 4+ inches so far(forecaster says we may get a little more overnight....sigh).
At least the puppies are enjoying it..........

* Daughter is due to return from a conference in New Orleans tomorrow.  I facebook-ed her that she might want to rethink returning right now but her doggy is enjoying herself.....

This dog LOVES snow....well she's half Husky so there is that! lolz
I put her out tonight and she wasn't back at the door pawing to get back in about a half hour later so I went outside to check on her.  She was at the end of her tie-out lead just laying in the snow staring off into space. lolz  She'd probably still be out there if I didn't call her in.  8-)))

*  I've paid all the bills, except for the electric bill on the LA house which hasn't shown up yet.  I also paid 3 medical bills using the HSA so that didn't come out of the regular income this month.  We also received two quarterly stock dividends and need to deposit those into the bank but are still waiting on the RMSA reimbursement for the healthcare premium.  The finances are looking good so far this month.

*  I still don't feel 100% but I am getting better.  I noticed I developed a bruise on my chest last night when I went to get dressed for bed.  It doesn't hurt but it's darn ugly. lolz

I may try to go out tomorrow.  Hubs is low on milk for his coffee and almost out of coffee filters which is a crisis around here(but not for me except it means I'll have to listen to him whine).


Sluggy