Thursdays picture perfect deal...

The picture...

The Hubby brought me fishing up north, it was a fantastic day, I even saw two moose which was very exciting because in all my years living up north I had never seen one.  As the day progressed the wind picked up and when we turned the canoe my had blew off into the water making a for a fun picture that has turned into one of my favorite pictures.

The deal....

OK so today I actually have two deals.  The holidays are over and its time to put everything away, unfortunately what usually ends up happening to me is I have more to put away then I took out to put up.  That combined with the gifts I received usually results in purchasing at least one storage item every year.  This year it was a drawer system for my Scrap booking paper (I seem to have an issue with thinking I never have enough, and its all so pretty).  I found two places having great sales right now, the first is at Rubbermaid on line, if you order direct from their line of products you can enter coupon code NY15 for 15% off of any order of $125.00 or more, or if you order between $40.00 and the $125.00 you can use coupon code NY10 for 10% off your entire order.  They also recently lowered their shipping charges, plus while you are at their site you can sign to become a preferred Rubbermaid Club member, then you will receive special offers by email and mail.

Second is The Container Store, I have shopped with them in the past and they are very nice to deal with and your order arrives quickly and packages nicely.  They are having their annual Elfa sale with 30% off their closet organization system.  I have a closet organizer in my master bedroom and the amount of additional storage is amazing, it increased what we could store in there by over 60%!  They offer design tools so you can organize a store room, craft area, home office, master bedroom closet or child's play area.  You can chose your design right down to the little details of drawer organizers, its wonderful. 

Remember to use your reward sites to shop through, if you shop at The Container store and are a member of MyPoints you will earn 2 points per dollar spent, or if you go through eBates you will earn a 4% rebates on your purchase and at Quickrewards you will earn 4.10% cash back.  Quickrewards also offers 2.50% cash back at Rubbermaid, the other two sites do not have an offer for Rubbermaid at all.

Have a great day everyone!

C.Q.

Sunday's media madness...

This holiday season why not let your iPod and Smart Phones make your shopping a little easier?  There are some really great cool apps available that can help get your shopping done in short order so you have more time to relax and bake those cookies for the office cookie exchange.

First lets start with know how much you can spend, you can use Mint to help you with a budget, its available for free download to both the Android and iPhone, if you don't want that information on your portable device they are also available on Yahoo.com.  When you have your budget set you can stretch it using application such as Coupon Shurpa, it offers coupons to over 5,000 stores from your home computer, or download the free app and it will send coupons to over a hundred stores directly to your iPhone or iPod Touch.

Need directions or store information?  One of the best apps available is YPMoble, this is not the Yellow Pages of your childhood, now it is super charged with a search feature, driving directions, web links, reviews and a way to save your contacts or favorites lists. YPMoble is free and available for your iPad, iPod touch, iPhone, Android, Palm and Blackberry.  Now that you have made it to the mall and parked in the sea of cars, will you ever find your car again?  You will if you download Carr Matey, this app is available for the Android and will help you find a place to park, let you enter parking garage information,and remind you when your meter is set to expire.

Well you made it, look out shoppers your off to the races!  But which direction do you need to go?  With Mall Maps Mobile you can find your way around almost any mall with ease, its great for finding new places that have just opened or when you are traveling and shopping an area you are unfamiliar with. This free download is available in the iTunes store for the iPod, iPad, and iPhone.  Now that you have found your favorite store are you getting the best deal on your purchase? Used to be you had to run all over town to find out, now you can just use an app like Shop Savvy 4 by using the camera on your iPhone or Android camera to scan the bar code and compare prices with other stores and on line.

Ahhhh, almost done but where did you put all those reward membership cards?  With an application like CardStar you can keep all that information together in one spot.  With an ever growing list of merchants that are supported as well as the ability to add your own this is one of the easiest and most beneficial apps available, epically since its free and available for the iPhone, iPod, iPad, Android, Blackberry and Windows phone.  All you do is find the card info and show your phone to the cashier, no more extra plastic cards to carry around.

I hope you all have a rewarding shopping experience this holiday season!

C.Q.

Friday's freebie...

Its never too early to start your organization for next year with a new calender.  You can pick up a really nice new calender from Betty Crocker that is full of wonderful recipes just for signing up for one of their news letters.  The Betty Crocker news letter is full of cooking tips and reader suggestions, the Dinner Made Easy news letter has recipe ideas that you can have done in 30 minutes or less and the Bisquick news letter is full of recipes made with Bisquick, everything from appetizers to desert.

Hope you all have had a great week so far!

C.Q.

Old money...

Every fall when I start to get geared up to put out the seasonal decorations I also take a look in the closets to switch up my clothes from summer to winter. Every year I find things I didn't wear for one reason or another that we take into the Goodwill or Salvation Army. We also have some great second hand stores in the area that will either buy things outright to re-sell or put things on consignment. This is a great way to get a little extra cash to use on your holiday planning. Just this week I also got a wonderful e-mail from a place called BBOS that will purchase your gently used designer handbags. Most women usually get tired of looking at these bags long before they ever wear out, so this is a great way to get some cash for them. I have a Coach purse that belonged to my Grandmother that looks like it was just purchased yesterday, despite the fact that both my Grandmother and mother used it before it was passed on to me.

Another thing I had sitting in drawers around here were old cell phones, we finally broke down and sent them off to the Cell Phones for Soldiers program. If you don't want to donate them to the Soldiers you can also check for a local women's shelter, they can always use them as well. If you would like to make a little money off your old phone Pace Buttler will buy back quite a few but some are hardly worth the time it takes to package them up so be sure to check the price list first. Always remember to deactivate your old cell phones before you donate or sell them.

Cleaning out your jewelry box? Many of you have probably seen a million commercials on TV for places to sell your old or broken jewelry and wondered about the pricing. I recently used The Gold Guys in the Twin Cities (JUST before they opened a place closer to where I live), and they were fantastic to deal with. We got the current, up to the minute market price for gold, this is important because gold is like selling stock, it goes up and down and you want to be able to sell when its high, if you mail it in you don't know what the price will be when it arrives at it destination.

Finally, if you have decided to trim down your DVD, Game or CD collection take a look at Second Spin. They will pay a set price for each item which makes it easy to know in advance what you can get. Just click on what you would like to sell at the top of the page and then type in the title or UPC to see what you can get, it may not be a lot but if you have a few things it adds up quick. 

Have a great weekend and happy hunting.

C.Q.

Abundantly free apps...

Last week a close friend got an iPod Touch for her birthday, my husband, knowing how badly I had been wanting one finally gave the OK to use all the Ones I had saved all year to go get one. I opted for the 64G iPod Touch because I love all the applications that are out there and wanted to be able to make my grocery list and play any game I want if I get stuck waiting in the car or a waiting room. I knew there were a lot of apps but really, I was ill prepared for the actual vastness of how many there are!

In doing some research I found a wonderful site called TouchMyApps that has been so very helpful! I went though their lists of free apps and was stunned at the great offerings. One of my all time favorites is CardStar. I had mentioned this in a prior blog, you can put in all your reward card info and not have to carry all the cards around with you anymore, I was so excited that this was the first app I downloaded. My 2nd recommendation would be YPmobil, you can set the Yellow pages to your area and there is so much more in this app than just name, address and phone number! Along with all that you get local events with detailed information, browsing by category, a white board for your up coming plans and notes as well as being able to save your favorite places, there are even review of places that you select and an email function to send the info to a friend.

For shopping information both Walmart and Target have apps available. I downloaded Targets app which shows their weekly ad, clearance and registries. There is also a built in gift finder, store locater and a search feature. The thing I really enjoy about this app is being able to go into the weekly ad categories and narrow it down to all the items that are offering a gift card with purchase.

If you love games there are a lot of free games as well. There are the card games Uno and Black Jack as well as a multi level game called Dungeon Quest.

Today I am going to be looking at my TV apps, there is one for Direct TV which I have as well as one for TV Guide. I also found one for the Internet Movie Database, a site I use all the time.

Hope this gives you some ideas on what is available and actually useful for free apps and inspires you to spend some time looking at the fun stuff that is out there, the iPods and iPhones cost enough, you shouldn't have to shell out the big bucks for the apps too.

Have a great week everyone!!

C.Q.

Its that time of year again....

Happy New Year to everyone!! Its time for your new years resolution again. Most people give up their resolutions by March so keep your goals in the realm of something you can accomplish, don't set out to take on the world.

The top goals for new years for most people are to stop smoking, loose weight, get more organized and reconnect with old friends. Maybe these little gems will help you stay on track......at least until April.

If your going to quit smoking that's wonderful!! It can be hard but the savings are tremendous, I not only saved on what I spent for cigarettes when I quit 2 years ago, but also saved about 1/2 of my health insurance premium as well, the there were also less trips to the Dr. for bronchial related problems. I have saved an estimate of $4350.70 in just 2 years, that's a vacation!! I quit using Chantex that my Dr. prescribed, if this is something you would like to try there's a $30 coupon to bring to the pharmacist on the lower section of their web page. If you would like to try without a trip to your Doctor then give Nicorette a try, they have a $5.00 coupon available as well as information about their quit rewards. There is also the Nicoderm CQ patch, they have a $7.00 coupon as well as a free sample available by mail on the front page of their web site and they also have a rewards program.

If you want to start loosing weight for 2010 there are some places that are offering discounts for their programs, such as Weight Watchers, who are waiving their registration fee through March (the offer is near the bottom of the page), Nutrisystem, which will give you two weeks free when you sign up and Jenny Craig, who is running a special of loose 20 pounds for $20 plus food. Of course to be true to myself I am including the totally free site of Diet.com where you can find great recipes and information as well as exercise information, all without the cost of the name brand plans.

Looking to get organized in the new year? Two of the best tools for organization is a good set of shelves and a garbage can. If your cleaning out your attic, basement or store room and find something you haven't used in two years set it aside to give to a friend or donate, if its not in good shape throw it away. I have a ton of things I put in the store room vowing to repair then never do, they take up way too much valuable space so I try to throw them away or fix them immediately when I find them in there. Right now The Container Store is having their annual sale, 30% off all their Elfa shelf systems for you closets and storage areas, there is also a coupon code of WR4809 that will save you 20% off any non sale items.

Have you lost contact with your friend from high school or college and want to reconnect? Why not make it really mean something special by doing it with a beautiful card. Now days it can be so easy to send an email or make a phone call or even a text; but its so much more personal to send a card with a note from your heart. You can find some amazing cards and stationary at Lemon Tree Cards, Shelley has every card you can think of and if she doesn't, she will make it for you. If you need a return address stamp or just a stamp to make your envelopes stand out in the bunch, you can contact Bernie at The US Rubber Stamp Shop and she will get you what your looking for, if you are looking for something that you can't find on the site be sure to call the shop.

Hope this gets everyone on the right path for your new years resolution. Thanks for your readership in 2009, be sure to spread the word in 2010.

C.Q.