RedPlum.com reset its printable coupons and a HOT! Target store printable coupon has surfaced– Save $2 on Degree Women Fine Fragrance Collection scents. IF you add this with the Man. coupon:

Degree Women Fine Fragrance Collection product, any $1.25/1 (8-9-09) RP-5/17 = HOT DEAL!

Let’s do numbers…

Last time I was at Target, I recall the scents being around $3.79 (prices may vary) so – $2 Target store printable cpn + $1.25 man. cpn = $ .54/ea Good deal! (and this item is perfect for women’s shelters or such charities, too!)

Here’s the link to the Red Plum Target store $2 off printable.

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The Internet is jam-packed with digital scrapbooking freebies. This is one of the areas in which you truly don’t have to spend a dime if you don’t want to. If you know where to look, you can build a beautiful digital scrapbooking collection for no cost at all. First, though, you need to understand how and when people give away free scrapbooking stuff on the Internet. Tomorrow I’ll give you several links to great digital scrapbooking freebies, but today’s post focuses on teaching you to find and download great scrapbooking freebies on your own in the future.

Most freebies come from designers who post free items on their blogs in order to increase their readership or interest people in the products they sell. You can get leads on these great freebies by visiting the following two blogs:

Digital Scrapbooking Freebie Guides

Scrapping with Ikea Goddess.

Ikea Goddess is not a designer, but almost every night she scours the Internet for free digital scrapbooking materials and posts the ones she likes the best on her blog.

Strengths:

• Because she’s a real human, she can cull through all the freebies and only post those that are really good.
• She doesn’t make a mistake and post that something is free when it’s not, or post that the wrong item is free.

Weaknesses:

• Because she’s a human, she sometimes takes a day or two off, leaving us starving for freebies. *Whimper*
• She’s not comprehensive, and she only posts the things that she thinks are cute. If there’s something out there that you would have liked but she didn’t like it, you won’t get a lead on it from her blog.

DigiFree Blog

This blog is written by an automated program that scans several hundred sites for cues like “free,” “freebie,” and “download,” which usually indicate that the blog contains a digital scrapbooking freebie. It automatically catalogs and links to these post.

Strengths:

• Because it’s a program, it never takes a day off and you can get your freebie fix daily.
• It’s comprehensive. You’ll see almost all freebies on there.

Weaknesses:

• It’s not selective. Rather than culling through the best, it just indexes them all. You have to find the best ones for yourself. Digifree does have a star rating system, but those ratings do not indicate the quality of the available freebie; they merely indicate the popularity of the blog based on a variety of variables which often have nothing to do with the quality of the blog’s freebies
• Sometimes it gets it wrong. The heuristic works most of the time, but sometimes it finds a freebie cue where there actually is no freebie, or pulls the wrong item as a freebie.

Get More Freebies by Knowing How and Why Designers Post Freebies

Once you’ve started following these blogs for freebie leads, you need to understand the contexts in which designers give away freebies so that you know how to best track those leads to even more freebies.

Context 1: A designer posts one section of a freebie kit each day in order to encourage you to revisit or subscribe to their blog. They generally post the papers first, the elements second, alphas third, and any quick pages last.

Current Example: Spring Bouquet by Numb Bumm (She’s actually posting the elements first, so don’t get confused by that.)

How to follow up:

1. Look for tag or category labels at the bottom of the post or on the blog’s sidebar. (Not all blogs have these, but many do.) Clicking one of these tags or labels will automatically pull up any other post with the same label, enabling you to find other freebies from that kit or theme. For instance, if I find a post that has elements from a kit labeled “Freedom Fire,” then clicking the tag or category labeled “Freedom Fire” would pull up all the other posts in which the blogger had shared papers, elements, or alphas from the “Freedom Fire” kit. I could then download those items as well.
2. If the blog doesn’t use tags or categories, you can still do a search on the blog to find any post containing that kit’s name. These posts will likely contain additional downloads from that kit.
3. Look through recent posts for other still-active freebies, either by scrolling through the blog or clicking the tag or category for “freebies” or “free.”
4. Subscribe to the blog or bookmark it for future visits. If a blogger is giving away a freebie, they likely give them away on a regular basis. If you like the blogger’s work, they’re worth keeping tabs on. (If you plan to track more than three or four blogs, subscribing in a feed reader like Bloglines or Google reader is by far the most efficient way to do this.)

Context 2: Two designers collaborate to make a kit (a collab) with the same theme and color scheme. They follow the usual pattern of posting papers first, followed by the elments and alpha, but they each create their own portion of the overall kit.

Current Example: Stars and Stripes. (Remember that this link is to just one of the collaborators on this kit. Be sure to follow her links to the other collaborator’s downloads.)

How to follow up:

1. On the blog of the collab partner you first discover, follow steps one through three above.
2. Go to the design partner’s blog (the first post you find will have a link to the other designer’s blog) and collect the other designer’s half of the free kit.

Context 3: A blogger posts a quick page, alphabet, or mini-kit add-on to a kit that they or one of their creative team members is selling. This is like a free sample that grocery stores give away in order to get you to buy the full-sized product. Since these things are often small and don’t contain a lot of elements, I usually only download them if the product is insanely cute or I see an element that I think I can use with a lot of my other kits.

Current Example: Good-bye Yellow Brick Road Add-On (Scroll to bottom of post to see it.)

How to follow up:
1. If they’ve used the name of the kit as a tag or a category label, click on it to see if they’ve given away any other freebies designed around that kit.
2. Often, several creative team members will each create a quick page based on one of the member’s for-sale kits. If this is the case, each blogger will mention the other bloggers’ give aways in their post. Skim for such mentions and follow the links to download additional add-ons, alphas, or quick pages.

Context 4: Several designers participate in a blog train, wherein each designer creates a few elements revolving around an agreed-upon theme, event, or color scheme. On their own, each blogger offers a small selection but combined they make a massive kit.

Current Example: Those Summer Nights Blog Train

How to follow up:
1. Each post in the train will contain a link to the next blog in the train and possibly a link to the blog train home, which lists all the other participating blogs. Follow these links to collect the entire train.
2. As you travel the train, watch for designers whose work you particularly like, and subscribe to the blog or bookmark it to return to and hunt for more freebies later.

Context 5: A blogger posts a kit (usually a mini kit) in response to a forum-sponsored challenge or contest. There are color challenges, holiday challenges, and design-offs in which dozens of designers compete for spots on a design team. Some of these challenges and contests are simply for designers to stretch themselves or earn a participation award. Others are seriously competitive and designers pull out all the stops to create some insanely beautiful kits.

Current Example: Kim B’s June Color Challenge (Instead of taking you to a blog, this link will take you to a forum where dozens of designers have posted links to their blogs, on which their color-coordinated downloads can be found. You may need to register to see the posts, but registering is well worth it since this challenge is ongoing and you’ll be able to collect a massive kit every month from it.)

How to follow up:
1. If you stumble on a post that mentions that the kit is being given away as part of a challenge or contest, go to the source of the challenge. It’s nice if the blogger has linked to the challenge, but if they haven’t simply google the name of the challenge and the forum to find it. You may need to register to view the forum, but once there you’ll find the challenge thread, which contains links to dozens of other kits or giveaways revolving around the same theme or color scheme. Like trains, these challenges and contests are opportunities to accumulate some extremely large, gorgeous, and varied kits. For free!
2. As usual, make sure you subscribe to or bookmark any bloggers whose work you particularly love.
3. It’s always good etiquette to thank a designer for a giveaway, but it’s particularly important for contests. Sometimes the judging is based partially on the comments and ratings left by forum members.

You should now be well-equipped to begin tracking down your own favorite designers and freebies. The next post will include a lot of links to permanently-available scrapbooking downloads that should have you burning up your bandwidth for a couple of days. To use a metaphor you’re all familiar with, now that I’ve taught you how to fish, tomorrow I’ll give you some fish to keep you fed while you’re learning to plunge the digiscrap downloads depths.

If you’re interested in other aspects of frugal digital scrapbooking, you can read the entire series.

Credit goes to Supermod Deweyville for this awesome (and FUN) freebie!

Barnes & Nobles Kids Summer Reading Club for grades 1-6

Details:

Here’s how it works:

1. Kids read any eight (8) books of their own choosing.

2. Kids use the Summer Reading Journal to tell us their favorite part of each book. A parent/guardian signs the journal when it’s complete. You can also get a Spanish-language Reading Journal.

3. Children bring their completed Reading Journal to a Barnes & Noble store between May 26th & September 7th, 2009.

4. We’ll give them a coupon for a FREE book! They choose from a list of exceptional paperback titles.*

See PYP forum thread for all details and club link.

To make up for the past few missed days, I’m giving you a few good upcomimg deals/promotions for area restaurants, goodies and fast food joints. BTW, HUGE thank you to PYP member Thomsenmom for sharing some of these deals.

Enjoy!

* repost of PYP super mod Jodi’s hot find. Jamba Juice printable buy one get one FREE cpn.

*Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream is offering a buy 1 get 1 FREE Sundae offer every Monday this summer, through 8/31. This page also has store locator. Know that Gateway has a busy location by the Olympic fountain.

*Little Ceasar’s FREE Crazy bread with Pizza Purchase printable cpn. (Note: cpn is from KSL’s website, limited to participating stores in Utah & Colorado)

*FREE Kids meals after 5 PM at Taco Del Mar (only 1 UT location in Clinton, but great idea if you are traveling!)

*Quiznos Printable Cpns, including buy 1 get 1 FREE

*Rubio’s, sign up for the Beach Club, get cpns including one for a FREE Taco!

and my favorite!!!

*Einstein Bros Bagels printable cpn for buy 1 get 1 FREE lunches, bagels or salads. YUM!!! (watch expiration of 7/3)

Did you know that PinchingYourPennies.com has a Diet, Exercise & Healthy Living Forum? Meet & share stories with other members with similar exercise and weight loss goals!

Plus, offers like…

Join Curves Now and Get 50% OFF & 30 DAYS ON US!
Sign Up Now and get your FREE Fitness Plan today @ Curves

Attend a free class in your area!
Sign up now @ Weight Watchers

A couple of days ago I talked about how to reduce the need for extra hardware when you start digital scrapbooking. Today we’re going to talk about saving money on the software involved. I am not going to discuss the merits and drawbacks of individual software programs; instead, I’m going to show you how to try a lot of them for free, and how to save money on the software that you ultimately decide is right for you.

Use Free Trials
You can put off buying software by using free trials. Almost all scrapbooking programs have thirty-day limited use trials. If you stagger one trial at a time, you can have five or six months of free scrapbooking before you actually have to spring for a program. Before you start a free trial, prep by downloading all the kits you like (that post is coming up next) and planning or sketching some pages you want to do. That way when you start your trial, you can focus on actually generating pages, not on gathering material or planning layouts.

Here are some links for free trials:

Adobe CS4
Adobe Photoshop Elements
Paint Shop Pro
Scrapbook Max
Photo Impact
Digital Scrapbook Place has a page with links to free software trials.
Memory Mixer’s website has a free trial coming soon here.

Use Free Software
Additionally, there are a few free layout programs available online. Layout programs have less versatility and fewer options than design programs do, but they’re still a functional way for a beginning scrapper to put some pages together. I haven’t used any of these programs myself, but I’ve seen other scrappers and forums speak of them favorably.

Scrapbook Flair
Photomix
Paint
Scrapblog (Thanks Jill and Stephen) for the tip.

When You Buy, Buy Cheaply
If you decide that you love digital scrapping, you’re going to end up wanting buy one of the major digital scrapbooking programs like PSE, Memory Mixer, or Photoshop.When that time comes, here are some possibilities for saving money.

1. Search Shoplocal.com for local deals on your software. Shoplocal searches your local ads for sales, so if you find a good deal there you can just run to the store and get it. There are real bargains to be had here, too.
2. Search Shopzilla.com for online deals on your software. To support PYP, you can come back and use PYP’s affiliate links to make your actual purchase.
3. Consider buying an older version. Once a new version of a program comes out, you can often buy the old version fairly cheaply. These older versions usually have most of the features that the new ones have at a fraction of the price. For instance, I inherited PSE 4.0 from my grandmother when she upgraded to 6.0. It’s beautifully functional and I’ve never wanted to do something and not been able to do it because I had an older version of PSE. IF I were just starting out, I could buy this perfectly workable version on Ebay for 15 dollars, and I’d be in scrapbooking business! Just make sure that you’re buying the software, and not a software manual.
4. Check your local warehouse stores for deals or coupons. For instance, right now Costco has a coupon for 30 dollars off the new PSE 7.0 software. This makes it 40 percent cheaper than it is on Amazon.com.

Stay tuned! Coming next is a guide to downloading free digital scrapbooking materials. You’re going to love what you learn!

If you’re interested in other aspects of frugal digital scrapbooking, you can read the entire series.

HOT coupon at the great internet printable coupon site, coupons.com. $5 off when you spend $25 at your local Rite Aid. There are some other great coupons to be found there include $ .75 off gallon of milk. Check it out!

Also check out the great shopping list for all the great deals at Rite Aid (made by PYP SuperStar Rebecca!) this week at Pinching Your Pennies forums.

BIG thank you to SuperMod SeaBrz57 for finding this gem online. The Glidden National Paint Giveaway! Starts 6/25 (while supplies last), pick your color and receive a cpn for a FREE quart of paint. Takes 3-4 weeks to receive your cpn via mail. See PYP forums for discussion. Happy Painting!

Lots of people want to try digital scrapbooking, but they’re worried that between the software, the hardware, the digital elements, and the printing and storing of their designs, it’ll end up being just as expensive as traditional scrapbooking was. It’s true that digital scrapbooking can start racking up costs fast, but there are several techniques that can keep costs down. In this series, I’ll explore frugal options for software, hardware, materials, printing, storage and display. Stay tuned, and prepare to get hooked.

Many digital scrappers use external hard drives (EHDs) on which they store their materials and projects. Starting at fifty dollars and going up to 400, EHDs can put a serious dent in an aspiring digital scrapper’s wallet. Fortunately, there are several ways to save space and avoid needing an EHD.

Be selective about the kits you download. Once you find out about the world of free scrapbooking materials (don’t worry, that post is coming soon), you’ll be tempted to go download crazy. Instead, be selective and choose only the kits that you really love. Reserve your precious hard drive space for the best of the kits and for your projects. The truth is that if you download too many, you’ll never use most of them anyway (ask me how I know this).

Choose one or two kits and use them for multiple themed layouts. Instead of collecting a variety of kits to make different-themed pages, use just one or two kits to create an entire series of pages. Not only does this cut way down on your need for kits (and the space to store them), it makes an excellent unified theme to put in a photobook or album.

Use a kit and delete it. If you prefer to use a different theme on every page, another alternative is to use a kit to make the perfect page and then delete it to make room for a fresh one.

Delete your design files. Each digital scrapbook page has two files: the design file in which you made the page and the jpeg you saved it as in order to print it. Once you’ve perfected—and I mean perfected­—your page, delete the space-hogging design file. (But seriously, make sure the page is perfect because once you delete the design file you won’t be able to modify the image anymore; you’ll be stuck with the jpeg you have.)

Using these techniques, you can put off needing the extra space provided by an EHD. If the time comes that you decide you absolutely must have one, here are a few tips for saving money:

1. Check shoplocal.com for deals on external hard drives. Shoplocal searches your local ads for sales, so if you find a good deal there you can just run to the store and get it.
2. Check shopzilla.com for deals on external hard drives. To support PYP, you can come back and use PYP’s affiliate links to make your actual purchase.
3. Newegg.com and Amazon.com have generally lower prices for electronics. If you can’t find a great deal at either of the above sources and you don’t want to wait for one, they’re the best places to buy hard drives.

Join me in a couple of days for frugal talk about scrapbooking software. See you
then!

If you’re interested in other aspects of frugal digital scrapbooking, you can read the entire series.

Create your profile and sign up for the Betty Crocker fan club. You will receive the Betty Crocker® email newsletter, access exclusive member benefits on BettyCrocker.com, and receive your FREE* sample of Yoplait® Whips!® The FREE sample comes as a coupon good for a FREE 6 oz serving. The coupon will be mailed to you in 6 ti 8 weeks. Yeah, it is a LONG time, but FREE is better than paying for it. Enjoy!

Many smart shoppers already know that grocery stores will feature sale items at a great price to get us into their respective store. These are called loss leaders. It is an example of a marketing in the grocery shopping business. And it is not the only one. But where a loss leader can save you money, the ones below will cost you more.

Items displayed on an end cap are NOT necessarily a sale item. This is called a Phantom sale. Manufacturers have a deal with grocery stores to feature their products prominently within the store, even if the items are not at their lowest price points. For example, Chips Ahoy! Cookies 16 oz are about $3.79 everyday price. A phantom price sales price of $2.99 will be featured on an end cap. But a Penny Pincher knows better! Wait a few weeks during the 12 week grocery sale cycle and the cookies will be on sale for $1.88 or $1.67 (3 for $5). How do I know this price point? I have access to a comprehensive pricebook from PYP and so do you! Check it out here.

Higher Priced Items are Placed at Eye Level. This is a general rule. To save money, get in the habit of scanning the tops and bottom rows of shelves. Be sure to use the Unit Price of items to maximize savings. See the shelf price tag- a unit price should be listed here, next to the item’s cost. And watch your kids views, too. Higher priced items that will appeal to them are placed at their eye level.

Higher priced items are found in the middle of the store. Instead, shop the perimeters of the store. The perimeter is where you will find the fresher cuts of meat, bakery and produce. In the center aisles, one will find the processed and convenience packaged food items. Also, don’t pay for the convenience of pre-cut or pre-packaged items. TipHero has a great study where they discovered it costs $43/hr to have someone cut fresh fruit in those convenient bowls based upon $2.67/lb. Check it out! Very enlightening.

Bulk Items are Not Necessarily Money Saving Items, Anymore. Once Upon a Time, buying in bulk equaled savings. But manufacturers and retailers caught onto this and started offering larger sized packaged items at higher prices. Many times it is cheaper to buy the smaller packaged item on sale. To maximize savings, use a coupon.

You Don’t Have to Play the Numbers Game. Grocery Stores will use marketing ploys like “Get 10 for $10” and they sound appealing. However, you don’t have to buy 10 items. Before you do, ask yourself, “How many do I need in my food storage until the next sales cycle has this item at its lowest price point again?”

Using these tips will help you lower your overall grocery bill and pinch those pennies til they scream!

Sign up for Kraft First Taste and be the first to hear about new products, get coupons, samples, etc. This sign up is for a limited time only…don’t miss it!

From the Deseret News…

Mrs. Fields is opening an outlet store June 22 at 1717 S. 4800 West. Those who arrive before 11 a.m. can enter to win one of the grand prizes of Mrs. Fields Cookies for a year.

The press release sounds as if this store is quite a bit different from the familiar Mrs. Fields mall kiosks selling freshly baked cookies.

It says, “Many of your favorite gifts from our catalog and online store are now available to locals at amazing discounts.”

Anyone going in the next day or two? Willing to share your experiences (and prices)?