Weekend Deals!

Ok there are some AWESOME deals going on this weekend!

IKEA: If you don't already eat at the IKEA cafe b/c it's a good deal and good food, you should this weeekend! Stop at IKEA in Midtown for their $1 Swedish Meatball plate at IKEA. It's 20 meatballs with mashed potatoes & cream sauce - a good about of food that's usually over $4. You don't need a coupon (deal is good Nov 7-10). Thanks to Cities on the Cheap!

GAP: Woohoo! 25% off entire purchase at GAP with printable coupon! It even includes sales items! (Good only Nov 6-8)

Macy's: It's Veteran's Day Weekend, so on top of 30-60% off sales, be sure to print out your additional 15% off at Macy's with this printable pass. If that link doesn't work for you, go here and look on the left side of the page about 2/3 of the way down. (Good only Nov 5-11)

Stein Mart: Stein Mart is just one of those store I expect to have nothing interesting and they always have great deals and cool stuff. Always. Here are great printable coupons for 20% off any single regular priced or sale item at Stein Mart AND 25% off Red Dot/Clearance! (Good through Nov 11)

I saw a bunch of these deals on Twitter, but thanks to Coupon Dad for the details!

**BONUS: Have you tried Nature Valley Nut Clusters yet? Get your free sample here! We love the Cashew kind and they've been like .30 with $1 off printable coupon at Coupons.com and if you load your Kroger Card, $1 off from Shortcuts.com & $1 off from Cellfire.com. Love it!

Lookin' Fab for $55

I'm not an incredibly hip gal. Frankly, I'm generally so focused on the frugal that I lose a little of the fab. So this past week was an awesome step towards me being more equally balanced as frugal & looking fab! I spent a little over $55 and bought black boots, black heels, tights, non-brown everyday shoes AND a sweater dress! Here's the breakdown of my shopping week:

My fashion coach (AKA my awesome sister-in-law) had told me about this website, AMIClubwear.com. She thought I would like it because they have shoes on sale for quite cheap and send out coupon codes. Everyone is always trying to get me to buy new shoes because somehow I missed out on the female gene of enjoying shoe shopping. I only have a brown pair of boots, so I wanted to get a black pair. I bought these black suede knee high flat boots from AMI Clubwear because I thought they looked cool and they are not at all like my brown boots.

My cool new boots:

Sale Price: $12.99
Coupon code: Save 30%
Shipping/Fees: $11.88
Total: $20.97

**Enter code AMISHIPPED to get free shipping at AMI Clubwear if you spend over $50! Plus, it's worth a quick internet search to see if they have a current 30% off coupon code.


The middle part of my shopping trip is thanks to Oprah and her awesome 2-day 50% off coupon to Payless Shoes. So I went after work on Friday and I've never seen such happy women in the store. Everyone was chatting, handing shoes back and forth to eachother, all excited to be getting 50% off!. I found two pairs of shoes I liked: A brown pair of everyday loafer-like flats and a pair of black patent round toe heels. They have a stilletto heel, but it's not too high. I desperately need black heels (I literally don't have a basic pair of black heels, a truth that baffles my friend Jen) so that was an easy choice. Then I saw that if I bought my brown flats in dark purple, they were half price- so $24 for brown, but $12 for purple (both before my coupon). So I decided since it's still a dark fall color, I should abandon my standby of brown and step out to buy a color. My hubby asked this morning what color they were and I called them eggplant (he seemed impressed by that answer). I also bought a pair of black tights & paid the extra .50 for the ones partially made from bamboo. Now I'll be ready to wear my new boots in the cold. This isn't the best picture of the shoes, but my cat Paisley was being so cute that I had to include her.

My Payless Trip:
Black heels, sale price: $14.99
Dark purple loafer shoes, sale price: $12.00
Zoe & Zac Black tights: $7.99
Oprah Coupon: 50%
Total with tax: $18.22

**Payless has their BOGO half off sale going on now, so there are still good deals to be had!

Ok, so now I have a cool pair of boots, but I have like one appropriate dress to wear with them, so I was in desperate need of a sweater dress. I checked out Target and ended up finding a dress at Ross. Ok, so I love this dress, but it's so out of character for me- it's bright green, very form-fitting & pretty short. And it's a dress. I'm hoping I'll actually convince myself to wear it. I'm working on being a girl who wears dresses and I'm getting there.

Something to Wear with my New Boots:
Sweater Dress at Ross: $14.99
Total w/tax: $16.04

Shopping total: $55.23 So if I had actually set a limit of $50 in advance of my shopping spree, then I would not have made budget. But since I was just buying things that I thought were a good deal (which is generally not the recommend method), I was impressed that I got a pair of boots, 2 pairs of shoes, a pair of tights & a dress for $55. Acutally, I'm just impressed that I managed to buy 3 pairs of shoes- that's a lot for me!

Harvest Midtown THIS SUNDAY!

Thanks to the wonderful people at hipandsavvy.com, there's a GREAT $10 off promo code for this Sunday's Harvest Midtown Festival! Just enter HipAndSavvy to get your tix for $35! I had seen a $5 off code, but $10 is even better!

Ok so it's not uber-frugal at $35, but it's all-inclusive: food, wine & entertainment. PLUS, which is how I can always justify these events, money goes to Camp Twin Lakes, which is an awesome organization that provides camp experiences for kids struggling with illnesses & other challenges. PLUS it's from 1-4, so maybe you can eat enough to not eat lunch or dinner, in which case the $35 is looking better & better!

Also, just got my Free Night of Theater tickets to the Alliance! Woohoo!

Saved by the coupon code!

When I know I need clothes or am running low on shampoo, I can be on the lookout for deals, promotions, coupons, etc... but that's not always the case. There are times when you just need to buy something at the last minute. For me, it's usually buying something online and usually at like midnight... like 36 hours before you need the item in your hands. 

So what am I to do when my frugalness is challenged by my procrastination? Turn to coupon codes! So let's say I just realized it's the day before Mother's Day and neither mom or mom-in-law have gifts yet. This is obviously a hypothetical situation since both of them could be reading this :) but if it was real, I'd be looking to go online and quickly order flowers so they can be delivered ASAP. In one extra step, I can easily save 15-25%... so what's the extra step?

• Go to www.retailmenot.com. You can search for a specific store or in the above completely made up example, you can search flowers and then click on the flowers related coupon category on the right and it'll pull up all the current coupon codes. So right now, there are a bunch of discounts, including a code for 25% off at Teleflora, which means it's an instant $10 off! 
• Do a Google search for "storename coupon code".   This works well when you're getting someone a wedding gift and they have three store options- a quick search can tell you which store you should buy from. And there are a ton of great sites like Retail me not that can pretty instantly save you money or at least get you free shipping!

Once you have the coupon code, you just enter it when you're checking out and you're all set. Mother's Day (or the next special occasion I forget about) is saved by the coupon code!