Well, I've been blogging about couponing and grocery shopping so much lately, I figure it's time for a general update with a little less focus on food! :)
Our first announcement is that I have officially opened my graphic design business, Weslynn Biggers Design! I'll be freelancing on the side from home, something I've done a bit nonchalantly as jobs have arisen over the past few years, but now I'm hoping to kick into full force here in Missouri. I'm excited to finally put a name to my business and become "bona fide." It's been a dream of mine for many years, and something Brannon and I hope will give me the opportunity to stay home with our little one(s) and still generate an income when we one day start a family. So we're super stoked! Please help me pray for God's direction and provision as I work to establish a local client base in the Branson/Springfield area.
Brannon rang in his 30th birthday last week while on the road back from Boston, where he and another staff member picked up our newest student. We now have 18 students and are at full capacity! We've been aiming at full capacity for several months, so it's great to finally be there. God's hand is truly on this center, and it's so amazing to watch Him work in the lives of our boys. We really have a great group of young men.
After Brannon's return from Boston, we celebrated his birthday a couple days late (after he got some much needed rest!) with lots of late-night Guitar Hero (his birthday gift from me, Jade and Oliver) and dinner out with our directors, Jake and Amanda, who treated us to Chester's, an amazing burger joint in Branson. Brannon has been wanting to go there ever since he saw their "Home of the stuffed burgers" sign. Needless to say, we ate way too much (flash fried spinach with garlic, parmesan and lemon, fried pickles with ranch, and burgers, of course), but it was absolutely fabulous. Any friends or family members coming to visit us are guaranteed a meal there! (How's that for bribing people to come visit?)
Well I guess that's about it for this update. Hugs to all of our family and friends!
Friday, May 29, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
My totally rad grocery shopping trip!
I just returned home from doing some grocery shopping at Wal-Mart (and fighting the crazy Memorial Day crowds... whew!), and I must admit that I am so darn proud of myself! I planned out this shopping trip on Sunday of last week, after reading the Wal-Mart flyer and going through my growing inventory of coupons. A few of the things on my list I purchased without coupons or sales because they were things we needed, but the majority of my shop was focused on combining store sales with manufacturer's coupons. I purchased 26 items and used coupons for 15 of them. Here's the skinny on the deals I snagged (and a pic as well):
Total savings (just in coupons, not counting sales): $14.96
My best estimate of what I truly saved, when counting some amazing sales: $25.00 or 50%
The average price I paid per item: $0.99
Tomorrow I'll head to Target to purchase some chicken, cat food, cat litter and a few other random things we need. And I also plan on stopping by my local Country Mart to buy some in-season produce (cabbage, avocadoes, cucumbers, bell peppers) that are super cheap.
I'm learning that couponing pays off the longer you do it. When I first started, I only had a few coupons to work with, so I wasn't getting the best deals possible. Now I have gobs of them saved for when a sale arises, and I'm making it a weekly (sometimes daily) habit to read the store flyers that come in the mail and in my email inbox.
Yay for saving money! :)
- Fresh strawberries: $1.50
- Breyer's coffee ice cream: On sale for $2.25 - $1.00 coupon = $1.25
- Fresh corn: 5 ears for $0.85
- Mama Lupe tortilla chips: $1.58
- Pringles chips (2): $1.50 x 2 - $1.00 coupon = $1.00 each
- White Cloud toilet paper, 4-pk: $2.00 - $1.00 coupon = $1.00
- Haribo gummy bears (a treat for my baby!): $0.97
- Jello gelatin (2) x $0.50 each and pudding (1) x $0.84 - $1.00 coupon = $0.84 for all three
- Large eggs: $1.00
- Triscuit: $2.00 - $1.00 coupon = $1.00
- Wheat thins: $2.00 - $1.00 coupon = $1.00
- Velveeta shells & cheese: $1.50 - $1.00 coupon = $0.50
- Crystal Lite: $2.98 - $1.00 coupon = $1.98
- Whisker Lickin's cat treats (2): $1.26 x 2, B1G1 = $1.26 for both
- Hunt's ketchup: $1.64 - FREE coupon = FREE
- Vegetable oil: $2.28
- Kraft poppy seed salad dressing: $1.58 - $1.50 coupon = $0.08
- Special K with red berries cereal: $2.00 - $1.00 coupon = $1.00
- Raisin Bran Crunch cereal: $2.50 - $1.00 coupon = $1.50
- Reynold's foil: $1.52
- Sara Lee bread: $1.78 - $1.00 coupon = $0.78
- GV hot dog buns (2): $0.69 each x 2 = $1.38
Total savings (just in coupons, not counting sales): $14.96
My best estimate of what I truly saved, when counting some amazing sales: $25.00 or 50%
The average price I paid per item: $0.99
Tomorrow I'll head to Target to purchase some chicken, cat food, cat litter and a few other random things we need. And I also plan on stopping by my local Country Mart to buy some in-season produce (cabbage, avocadoes, cucumbers, bell peppers) that are super cheap.
I'm learning that couponing pays off the longer you do it. When I first started, I only had a few coupons to work with, so I wasn't getting the best deals possible. Now I have gobs of them saved for when a sale arises, and I'm making it a weekly (sometimes daily) habit to read the store flyers that come in the mail and in my email inbox.
Yay for saving money! :)
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Late night cereal run
So in my last post I shared how I've become a huge fan of couponing. Well, I just HAVE to share the details of my late night cereal run yesterday and the deals I snagged with some coupons and good old fashioned bargain hunting!
My original trip to our local Country Mart grocery store was for the purpose of buying a new toothbrush for Brannon. "Babe," he said to me yesterday, "I need a new toothbrush. The cats dragged mine all around the house, and at one point, I found it behind the toilet." So I made a merry little trip to Country Mart last night to grab a new toothbrush, and when I walked through the doors, the "reduced for quick sale" buggy, filled with discounted items, caught my eye. I perused through the pile of dented cereal boxes and other barely damaged items and found two boxes of Kashi cereal, each on sale for $1.00. I also made a trip down the actual cereal aisle to see if anything else good was on sale. There I discovered that Cheerios were on sale for $0.99! I bought the toothbrush, ran home, grabbed some coupons (that I now have apparently memorized) and ran back to the store. Here are the coupons I used:
My original trip to our local Country Mart grocery store was for the purpose of buying a new toothbrush for Brannon. "Babe," he said to me yesterday, "I need a new toothbrush. The cats dragged mine all around the house, and at one point, I found it behind the toilet." So I made a merry little trip to Country Mart last night to grab a new toothbrush, and when I walked through the doors, the "reduced for quick sale" buggy, filled with discounted items, caught my eye. I perused through the pile of dented cereal boxes and other barely damaged items and found two boxes of Kashi cereal, each on sale for $1.00. I also made a trip down the actual cereal aisle to see if anything else good was on sale. There I discovered that Cheerios were on sale for $0.99! I bought the toothbrush, ran home, grabbed some coupons (that I now have apparently memorized) and ran back to the store. Here are the coupons I used:
- $1.50 off coupon, when you purchase two boxes of Kashi cereal
- $0.55 off any Cheerios brand cereal
To sum it all up, I left with three boxes of cereal, having spent $0.25 for each box of Kashi cereal and only $0.44 for the Cheerios (which is big enough to be two boxes of cereal, by the way!). My apologies if I'm stretching out something really simple because of my excitement... but I was so stinkin' excited! I love saving money! (Especially on cereal -- which is its own food group, in my opinion!)
Total spent: $1.10
Total savings: $5.45
Woooo hoooo! :)
Friday, April 24, 2009
What recession?
Last Thursday night Brannon and I attended Dave Ramsey's national "Town Hall for Hope" event that was telecasted live at Branson United Methodist Church, one of the 6,000 hosts of the nationwide event. Dave encouraged the nation to "choose hope" by refusing to be a part of the recession. Fear, he said, (like that has been instilled in our country by Washington and the media regarding the current financial times) is the antithesis of hope. We absolutely loved Dave's message. It was refreshing, inspiring and -- more than anything -- personally motivating. To see what I'm talking about, check out http://www.townhallforhope.com/.
Brannon and I have made several changes in our spending in our quest to become debt-free, as we also refuse to be victims of the so-called recession. So I thought I'd share a few of the things we've learned and principles we've instituted recently:
First of all, I jumped on the coupon bandwagon full force at the beginning of this year. My friend Hillary blogged about this a while back and referred me to http://www.thethriftymama.com/, which is constantly updated with the best deals and coupons across the country. Hillary and her fellow coupon bloggers have educated me -- from a distance -- on the art of couponing. The biggest thing I've learned is that you can pair manufacturer's coupons with store coupons, plus many grocery stores double coupons! I've been amazed at how much money we've saved, and on items we buy regularly anyways. Brannon is pretty impressed, too. At first he wasn't sure about my new obsession (just imagine me looking like Edward Scissorhands, paper flying, cats diving into mountains of paper, coupons scattered everywhere! Ok, I digress...), but several free and nearly-free meals, deals and grocery items later... he was sold!
We've also been blessed to be able to get by with only one car since we've been married. We realize that we won't always be able to share a car so easily (thanks to living on campus and being sans kids), so we're choosing to rely on one car for now. And our family recently blessed us with a new-to-us car (which, by the way, is a little red convertible Miata!), so our plan is to continue on with one car like we have since we got married -- which will keep our gas, insurance, taxes, maintenance and overall car expenses down.
Another major expense cutter for us was our decision to virtually eliminate our eating out expenses. We don't have a specific budget for eating out, so if we want to eat out -- it's gotta be cheap (Hello, coupons! Hola, Taco Bell!) and it comes out of our grocery money.
To sum it up, it's been an adventure learning how to cut back and save money. But the best part of it all is that we do have hope -- hope that freedom from debt is just around the corner. And we've found that there's joy in being able to live off of little, especially when we're learning how to do so together.
Brannon and I have made several changes in our spending in our quest to become debt-free, as we also refuse to be victims of the so-called recession. So I thought I'd share a few of the things we've learned and principles we've instituted recently:
First of all, I jumped on the coupon bandwagon full force at the beginning of this year. My friend Hillary blogged about this a while back and referred me to http://www.thethriftymama.com/, which is constantly updated with the best deals and coupons across the country. Hillary and her fellow coupon bloggers have educated me -- from a distance -- on the art of couponing. The biggest thing I've learned is that you can pair manufacturer's coupons with store coupons, plus many grocery stores double coupons! I've been amazed at how much money we've saved, and on items we buy regularly anyways. Brannon is pretty impressed, too. At first he wasn't sure about my new obsession (just imagine me looking like Edward Scissorhands, paper flying, cats diving into mountains of paper, coupons scattered everywhere! Ok, I digress...), but several free and nearly-free meals, deals and grocery items later... he was sold!
We've also been blessed to be able to get by with only one car since we've been married. We realize that we won't always be able to share a car so easily (thanks to living on campus and being sans kids), so we're choosing to rely on one car for now. And our family recently blessed us with a new-to-us car (which, by the way, is a little red convertible Miata!), so our plan is to continue on with one car like we have since we got married -- which will keep our gas, insurance, taxes, maintenance and overall car expenses down.
Another major expense cutter for us was our decision to virtually eliminate our eating out expenses. We don't have a specific budget for eating out, so if we want to eat out -- it's gotta be cheap (Hello, coupons! Hola, Taco Bell!) and it comes out of our grocery money.
To sum it up, it's been an adventure learning how to cut back and save money. But the best part of it all is that we do have hope -- hope that freedom from debt is just around the corner. And we've found that there's joy in being able to live off of little, especially when we're learning how to do so together.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
What we do
So, for our second blog post, I thought I'd share a little bit about what Brannon and I do here at Teen Challenge. It's exciting times around here, so I can't help but share!
As a sidenote, let me say that we welcomed our new executive directors, Jake and Amanda Lynch, at the beginning of January and they have been such a blessing to the ministry here already, and to Brannon and I personally. God has given Jake a big vision for this center and we're excited to be a part of it!
Brannon is continuing his work as pastoral and intake counselor, and he does an amazing job at both. Due to our staff's prayer and fasting, God's answer to our prayers and Brannon's ability to comfort hurting parents and communicate so well who we are and what we do, we've enrolled 4 new students in the last 2 months. That's amazing!
Tomorrow morning Brannon will begin teaching and leading our staff through the Under Cover curriculum by John Bevere (which, in a nutshell, is about the blessing of authority and the protection of a godly "covering"). This has been on his heart for a while, and we're both excited about it. I watched the first session on DVD with him earlier this week, and it was powerful.
Brannon is also preparing for a trip to Vero Beach, Florida later this week. He'll be going with our director, Jake, to the Teen Challenge boys center that Jake worked at before coming here, and they will be attending the center's graduation ceremony while there. They apparently have an amazing program, so Brannon is looking forward to the trip and seeing what they do. (This will be our first time apart for more than 12 hours since we've been married!)
I'm still working in the kitchen and learning more about the art of feeding hungry teenage boys. I've come to realize that my favorite meal to cook is homemade soup. Pumpkin, vegetable beef, chicken noodle, split pea and lentil, creamy potato... I've borrowed, modified, and created several recipes since I've been here, and I absolutely love soup days. Of course, a bowl of hot goodness alone wouldn't be enough for the boys, so I always have to make sandwiches or some other item on the side. Bottomless pits they are, God love 'em. ;)
I've also been taking on more PR and marketing tasks, which has been wonderful! We sent out our first newsletter in February and I will be finishing up the design of the second one this week. (If you'd like to be added to our mailing list, send me an email and give me your address!) I've also been working on press releases and forming relationships with the local media. I really enjoy the variety of both jobs -- cooking and writing/designing -- since they are two of my favorite things to do!
So that's a little about what's going on here! We both feel blessed and honored to be a part of this ministry, and to witness the transformation in our boys as they come to know Christ and grow into godly young men.
As a sidenote, let me say that we welcomed our new executive directors, Jake and Amanda Lynch, at the beginning of January and they have been such a blessing to the ministry here already, and to Brannon and I personally. God has given Jake a big vision for this center and we're excited to be a part of it!
Brannon is continuing his work as pastoral and intake counselor, and he does an amazing job at both. Due to our staff's prayer and fasting, God's answer to our prayers and Brannon's ability to comfort hurting parents and communicate so well who we are and what we do, we've enrolled 4 new students in the last 2 months. That's amazing!
Tomorrow morning Brannon will begin teaching and leading our staff through the Under Cover curriculum by John Bevere (which, in a nutshell, is about the blessing of authority and the protection of a godly "covering"). This has been on his heart for a while, and we're both excited about it. I watched the first session on DVD with him earlier this week, and it was powerful.
Brannon is also preparing for a trip to Vero Beach, Florida later this week. He'll be going with our director, Jake, to the Teen Challenge boys center that Jake worked at before coming here, and they will be attending the center's graduation ceremony while there. They apparently have an amazing program, so Brannon is looking forward to the trip and seeing what they do. (This will be our first time apart for more than 12 hours since we've been married!)
I'm still working in the kitchen and learning more about the art of feeding hungry teenage boys. I've come to realize that my favorite meal to cook is homemade soup. Pumpkin, vegetable beef, chicken noodle, split pea and lentil, creamy potato... I've borrowed, modified, and created several recipes since I've been here, and I absolutely love soup days. Of course, a bowl of hot goodness alone wouldn't be enough for the boys, so I always have to make sandwiches or some other item on the side. Bottomless pits they are, God love 'em. ;)
I've also been taking on more PR and marketing tasks, which has been wonderful! We sent out our first newsletter in February and I will be finishing up the design of the second one this week. (If you'd like to be added to our mailing list, send me an email and give me your address!) I've also been working on press releases and forming relationships with the local media. I really enjoy the variety of both jobs -- cooking and writing/designing -- since they are two of my favorite things to do!
So that's a little about what's going on here! We both feel blessed and honored to be a part of this ministry, and to witness the transformation in our boys as they come to know Christ and grow into godly young men.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
A year, already?
In a little over a month, Brannon and I will celebrate our one-year anniversary! Man, it's crazy how nearly a year flew by right before our eyes!
Before we married, Brannon and I talked about the two completely different perspectives we heard from our friends and family about the infamous "first year." We either heard, "Oh, bless your souls, get ready for the first year... it's a doozy!" Or we were told, "The first year is just one long honeymoon! Enjoy it!" (Honestly, we heard more of the first than the latter!)
Well, as we hoped, our first year has been a nice balance of both. We've enjoyed the ups, worked through the the downs, and learned to appreciate the value of both in this newlywed phase. In addition to adjusting to married life, we've also learned how to work together every day, while living on campus and a stone's throw away from the Teen Challenge center we both work for. I must say that this year has felt like one big adventure, with lots of changes, adjustments, prayer, laughter, tears, lessons and rewards. And I wouldn't trade or change one bit of it. God has truly blessed us this first year, and my heart is just so overwhelmed with gratitude.
So as I reflect back on our first year, I also look forward to sharing some occasional updates during the ones to come. Much love to our family and friends back home! Check back often!
Before we married, Brannon and I talked about the two completely different perspectives we heard from our friends and family about the infamous "first year." We either heard, "Oh, bless your souls, get ready for the first year... it's a doozy!" Or we were told, "The first year is just one long honeymoon! Enjoy it!" (Honestly, we heard more of the first than the latter!)
Well, as we hoped, our first year has been a nice balance of both. We've enjoyed the ups, worked through the the downs, and learned to appreciate the value of both in this newlywed phase. In addition to adjusting to married life, we've also learned how to work together every day, while living on campus and a stone's throw away from the Teen Challenge center we both work for. I must say that this year has felt like one big adventure, with lots of changes, adjustments, prayer, laughter, tears, lessons and rewards. And I wouldn't trade or change one bit of it. God has truly blessed us this first year, and my heart is just so overwhelmed with gratitude.
So as I reflect back on our first year, I also look forward to sharing some occasional updates during the ones to come. Much love to our family and friends back home! Check back often!
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