And Thus It Begins.....

Yes, the new year means we are at $0 satisfying our High Deductible Health Insurance Plan's deductible before benefits/co-pays kick in.
Sigh.

I needed to refill some rxs earlier this week.  Only one was REALLY costly..................

Once our bennies kick in I co-pay between $45 and $50 for this script.
So I am out of pocket $335.39 for 1 prescription.
ouch.
Well, really our HSA is out the money.

I now have a pattern for drug refills since having to go onto this health insurance plan with a high deductible......beginning of the year, when I have to pay full freight, I transfer everything over to Walmart that's on their $4 refill list.  Once the deductible is satisfied for the year, I transfer every drug back to Rite-Aid that will have a $5 co-pay there.  I am paying $1 more per refill but the convenience of having these filled in town is worth that much.

Thankfully 2 of my other rxs are of the generic $4 variety and need to be transferred to Walmart and filled next week.
But I do have 1 more rx that won't need filling until the end of Feb. but this cost may top $470.  There are no generics for this one sadly.
8-(

Hopefully by the time that one needs refilling I'll have enough new deposits into the HSA to cover it.

Sluggy

 

Weis Shopping This Week

There were some deals this week at Weis(PMITA)Markets that I wanted to get in on so I went out this morning before the snow flew to shop.
If you shop at Weis you may want to get in on some of these offers.

I hadn't planned on buying paper products/cleaners but this Buy $30/Get $10 Deal paired with coupons I had was too good to resist.........

 

 

This all came to $30.72(sale prices-I never try to run off the reg. shelf price on Kimberley-Clark stuff at Weis anymore because last time the Catalina didn't generate when I did).
Subtract the $5 of Qs and I spent $25.72(plus tax).

Between the $6 I already have spent on Huggies wipes on  a trip to Rite-Aid, and the items here that qualify for the SavingStar "Buy $30/Get $5 Kimberley-Clark" rebate, I have enough to have earned that $5 reward into my SavingStar account.
$25.72, subtract the SavingStar $5 Refund, and I am at $20.72 OOP.

Add in the Catalina that the machine spit out............

And this lot of products "cost" me $10.72.
Good deals for TP, towels and dishwashing liquid.

Then I did the Customer Appreciation Sale Deal(buy 8 select items and pay .88¢ ea.).  Some of the select items are on sale $1 this week if you don't buy 8 at a time, some are regularly priced at $1.29 or more.
Here is what I got..........

4 whole grain variety Barilla pastas
2 Spaghettios w/meatballs(for College Boy)
2 Weis facial tissues
Total with sale........$7.04
I used 2 x .75¢/2 Barilla Qs(coupons dotcom)which double to $1/2 so paid $5.04 OOP, making each item .63¢

I goofed up on this.
I should have gotten 3 Spaghettios and 1 facial tissue instead.  This would have kicked in a SavingStar Q for .40/3 Spaghettios and my per item price would have dropped to .58¢ each.
I may go back with 2 more Barilla Qs later this week and do this deal again utilizing the SavingStar Q too.

I also bought this stuff.......

The hot cocoa mix is to replace the less fresh box in the Giveaway box.  I have a Q for .40¢/1 which doubled to .80¢ off the cocoa plus it was on sale.
That's how we roll around here............ ;-)

The Oreos are for College Boy.
On sale for $1.97 this week and I had .50/1 IPQs that doubled to $1 off each, so Oreos for .97¢ a bag.

Weis had Furmano's tomato products(the big cans)as part of the Customer Appreciation Sale for .88¢ each, however there was a blinkie box hanging off the shelf, with $1/3 Qs for Tuttorosso tomato products AND the Tuttorosso's were on sale for $1 a can.  After the Q was applied the Tuttorosso's were only .66¢ a can making them a better deal than the Furmano's at .88¢ a can.

If I hadn't had my trusty calculator with me to do the math I might have bought the less good deal.

The halal chicken was $5.24 after $2 instant meat discount Q on it, making it just over $1 a lb.
Both OM Deli meat trays had $2 instant meat discount Qs on them so I splurge on a lb. of deli meat for $6.98.  Much cheaper than the deli counter meats which were $10 or so a lb.

This applesauce was also a good deal this week.
On sale for $1.37 each, limit of 4(I am lucky to see applesauce in cups for $2 a package here).

I had 4x .75¢/2 Musselman's ManQs from the 1/4 inserts(thanks to my sister in-law not wanting them!).  I used 2 Qs and will go back later this week to use the other 2.
So each package, after the Qs doubled to $1, cost me .87¢.
Sweet!
Hubs likes to take these in his lunch.

I had 2 x $1/2 Hanover frozen Veggies Qs and they were on sale $2 each so the veggies cost me $1.50 a bag.  These are the "premium" gold and silver line of veggies.

The Helluva Good cheese was BOGO and I had a .55¢ ManQ that doubled up to $1, making each block of cheese $1.09 and a half($2.19 for both).

Then I bought this treat because it's my birthday and it was on sale.......

$5.99

And here is the only thing I bought at Weis that was FULL PRICE.........

A bag of Coleslaw shreds for $2.49
Yah, I could have bought a head of cabbage and cut it down myself but being frugal with other items let's me be a spendthrift with a bag of coleslaw and not have to worry about it. lolz

This bag will see us through 2 meals......with fish and then again with bbq sandwiches.

My savings rate over regular retail was 45%, I earned 20 gas points and that $10 OYN order Catalina Q.

Sluggy
 

Looking at Making Some Financial Moves

Since I had pulled up financial accounts to see what the interest earned in 2014 was, I noticed that in my Capital One 360 accounts I have spilled over the $250,00 FDIC insured amount.  Not wanting to have a portion of my ASSets hanging out there in the wind and not covered(see what I did there? lolz)I need to move some money into a new savings instrument/institution.

Neither of my local financial institution with brick & mortar locations have rates that would induce me to put more funds into them.
Not even close!
In fact, I swept the credit union savings account and made a large deposit into Cap One 360 last year, which is what put me over the insured limit.

So I am shopping for the best CD rate I can find to move some funds into.  Funds numbering as much $ as I feel won't need to be accessed in the next year or two before Hubs retires. This isn't our nest egg by any measure.  It's just extra money I've tucked away that last 5 years that needs to earn as much as it can without being gambled.

All of the college money needs to stay liquid in Cap One but all the rest is up for review on where it should be sitting and growing.
Cap One 360 gives me .75% with a lot of liquidity(2 day turn around) so the college money stays put.  It's the best rate with almost total liquidity out there I've found.  8-)

But I'll like to find some place I can earn more on the $ that doesn't need to stay liquid-ish.

Bankrate is showing 1.15% for a 1 year rate through 2 banks & 1 credit union.  Both banks are online entities(1 well known, 1 I've never come across before)and the nearest location of the credit union is in NJ(it also has an online presence which I could use).

I think Hubs can make some "catch-up" deposits into his retirement account as we didn't fully fund it early on when the kids were babies and money was tight.
I'll check into that this week and talk to Hubs to see if he wants to put some of this money there too.

Does anyone out there have any recommendations for what institution to put this money into?
I am not interested in putting this $ into the stock market, just a CD or something. Got enough $ in the market already, this pile is being kept in "safe" ventures since we are so close to retirement.

Thoughts?

Sluggy

1st Giveaway of 2015!

It's time for my first Sluggy's Boring Blog Box Giveaway of 2015.

As suggested by various readers in 2014 this Giveaway box will be chocked full of "Items that Come in Handy During the Winter Time" stuff.
Check it out..........

Contac flu & cold medicine
Yogi Throat Coat tea
Vaseline lotion
Box of facial tissues
Box of hot chocolate
Hall's cough drops
Excedrin migraine pills
Alba tropical fruit lip balm
And then two items to help you FEEL better--
Mary Kay body smoothing scrub
Flipz dark chocolate covered pretzels

*I'll replace the box of hot cocoa pictured with a new box before I mail it out.  The box I pulled from the stockpile is past it's "freshness" date so it will be replaced. 8-)

I'll leave this giveaway open until January 28th, Wednesday, at 11:59pm.  The next day I'll put all the valid entries into a container and draw out a name and that person wins.

There is a limit of ONE ENTRY per Day by leaving a comment on this blog post.

To get a BONUS entry, you can do this once---

Post about my Giveaway on your own Blog or on Facebook with a link to this post.  This will earn you 2 additional entries for each action.  Please leave 2 additional comments on this blog post for each additional Bonus entry. 


 Disclaimer--This giveaway is open to those with mailing addresses within the US or Canada only.
If you are in Canada, you will receive a smaller box of goodies, as the shipping rates internationally are ridiculous and I am not taking out a mortgage on my house to pay to ship this stuff.  ;-)

**
If you need this shipped to Canada, I'll have to change the box and it's contents a bit.  I can ship a plain box weighing up to 4lbs. via 1st class mail, which, while more than the flat rate Priority to US addys, is still affordable.  These prize boxes usually weigh 7 or more lbs. when full, so if the winner is in Canada, I'll let them pick and choose which of the items they prefer sent in their box, until the box weighs 4lbs.  I hate to have to do this(not ship ALL prizes to them)but I would hate it even more to exclude them totally from entering the giveaway.

***NOTE***
Please make sure there is a way for me to contact you in your comment.  If you're not a registered Blog User with your contact information on your User page, please put your email or email me your email addy privately when you leave a comment or something so I can get ahold of you if you win. If I can't contact you then you can't win.  Thanks!

So let's get this started!

 

Sluggy

 

Well I Got Something Done!

I paid the bills and mailed them Saturday.....and then a new bill came in.
Besides that one, I am still waiting on a phone bill and the electric bill and then all Jan.'s bills are in the books, as they say.

My Daughter also made her loan payment to us 4 days early this month.
I like to see promptness like that.  8-)

College Boy left to go back to school on Sunday.
Of course he promptly forgot to call me when they got there and the weather got bad and sleety so I was worried.
So I called him and he called back and said everything was "cool".
Kids..........

And now I can walk around the house nekkid again if I wanna.
I know, TMI....... ;-)

All the Christmas paraphenlia got put away as well on Sunday.

Today I've been working on tax stuff.  (Cover your eyes if you don't want to see anything having to do with taxes yet.)

I've been working on my income from online sales and blogging revenue this afternoon.
I am due another check from Google for blogging so I'm waiting to see if they put this bit under 2014 or 2015.  It should be under 2014 but waiting to see how they mark it down in their books to see how/when I report this.

I have all the eBay(1 item), Etsy(105 fabrics)and Amazon(1 book)Sales figures finished.
All these online sales netted me a profit of $626.73 after all fees and costs of goods sold were figured in.

So far the Blogging Revenue is at $209.68 for the year.
At the end of December I had another $118.94 earned that hasn't been paid out yet so the blogging money could be $328.62 when all is said and done for 2014.
Heck that means I almost broke $1K in side income last year.
I will TRY not to spend it all in one place..........lolz

Well I am off to water my magnolia bush and go put my feet up and think about the year ahead and what I need/want to get done in 2015.

Sluggy