A few deals to say “happy new year!”

We are only one day away from our move now.  Josh and I are both feeling excited but also sad to leave our pleasant home in the Beach. We are also pretty scared about all the changes that lay ahead.

However, I thought I’d post a few good deals and tips that have been assimilating in my mind during my relative hiatus from blogging:

- If you got a Starbucks gift card this holiday, be sure to hang on to it, even after you use it up.  Use the number on the card to get two hours of free wi-fi every day at Starbucks.

- Price Chopper had Ristorante and Casa di Mama frozen pizzas on for $2.77 this week; if you saved your $1.50/2 coupons from previous boxes, this works out to just $2.02 a pizza.  They also had some other great deals on, such as 1 litre containers of coffee cream for $1.99

- Loblaws had a sale this week on Entertaining Ritz crackers at 2 for $4 - but we had two coupons for $1 off each, making them only 99 cents!

- West Jet has sales on from Toronto to Orlando this month - from as low as $19 a trip.  I can’t wait to take a closer look at these, since my sister and I are planning a trip to DisneyWorld soon.

- I am excited to announce that Proctor and Gamble will be having it’s brandsaver coupons (over $90 in value) ready for order on January 17th. I can’t wait to request these coupons - they are the best!  Head to brandsaver.ca to order yours.

- Save.ca has some new coupons up, including $1 off Catelli whole grain pasta - this is a great one because they are often on sale for as low as $1.39, which means you can get this delicious and very healthy pasta at only 39 cents a box; there are also coupons for cereal, including $1.50 off All-Bran, $1 off Pampers wipes and Buy one Get one Free Olay Facial Cleanser. It’s a great time to stock up on new coupons - most of my coupons expired on December 31.

Hope you enjoy these deals!  Happy New Year everyone!

Boxing day update

Josh and I have been busy packing and getting ready for our move  but we have also managed to nearly complete our Boxing Day shopping.  Here’s how we’ve made out so far:

Over budget

Mattress and Bed: Over budget by $43

Coffee Table: Over budget by $60

Winter boots: Over budget by $30

Winter coat: Over budget by $138

Men’s shirts: Over budget by $10

Total amount over budget: $281

Under budget

Dresser: Under budget by $230

TV: Under budget by $80

Bras: Under budget by $15

Total amount under budget: $325

Unplanned spending

Antique Tea Trolley: $254

4-pack Undershirts $27

Total unplanned spending $281

In total, we were under budget by $44.  However, our unplanned spending brought us over our budget by $237. Apart from the antique tea trolley I bought, we pretty much kept right on track.  The best thing we did was encourage each other to keep focused and by-passed any stores that we didn’t really need to go into.  Otherwise this “unplanned spending” number could have grown considerably!

Wal-Mart rebate offers

Normally I don’t post deals that can be found at Red Flag Deals, but I thought I ought to mention these great offers at Wal-Mart because I don’t want anyone to miss out on them.  Until the end of the month, you can get in on these two excellent rebate offers:

Buy $25 of Scott, Cottonelle and Kleenex products at Wal-Mart, get a $10 gift card.

Buy $50 worth of P&G products at Wal-Mart and get a $20 gift card. 

Use your coupons, buy the goods on sale, and you’ll end up with a great bargain.  The amount you spend is cumulative, so you don’t need to spend $50 in one trip.  But remember to keep those receipts! Attach them with the forms above and you’re all set.

My only caveat is sometimes it takes a long time to actually get your gift card.  I did this with Zellers once and it took me months to get my HBC gift card in the mail.

Use eBay and Craiglist to your advantage this Christmas

Thinking of shopping online to get Christmas gifts at a discount?  Craigslist and eBay offer exciting deals.  We bought a Kitchenaid mixer at 1/3rd the cost - literally saving us at least a couple of hundred dollars.  We have also made money by buying stuff on eBay.  About 6 years ago, Josh bought a Fender Rhodes keyboard and then resold it recently at a $600 profit.  How? The keyboard was underpriced because the brand name was misspelled.  Buyers didn’t recognize it as what they were looking for and didn’t bid on it.  You can learn from our strategy: misspell the brand name you’re looking for - you just might find a brand name product drastically underpriced.