budget buster

I cringed the other day when my sister said, "I am so sick of listening to people talk about penny pinching!"

Really? Cause I am a penny pinching maniac!

Ok, granted, I do splurge and buy WAY too many clothes, but I really enjoy saving money! Check out some of the AWESUM ways I've saved lately:

• Gift Cards! The end of the school year is a great time to teach. I racked in gift cards for Panera, McD's, Starbucks, and Carrabba's. Yesterday's lunch only cost me 68 cents!
• Coupons! I subscribe to CouponMom.com (does being Pucker's mama count?) and get updates about great deals. For example, go to restaurant.com and enter the coupon code "Present" to save 80% on gift certficates. Kat and I dined like kings at Carribea Key for only $6 each!
• Mail! The crappy economy seems to bring me even more junk mail, but I don't mind when it includes awesome coupons. I saved $5 on razor blades and MLL and I got awesome buy-one-get-one coupons for Tijuana Flats.
  
• Free Money! I'm the queen of finding free money. For example, I used my $50 rebate visa card from T-Mobile to buy $50 worth of "health items" and then got my insurance company to reimburse me from my flex spending. Ok, yes, taking flex spending means I don't take that money in my paycheck, but it feels great to get that money back in my account.

I hope I can keep up these saving tactics when I go down under. This WG is still working hard to eliminate her credit card debt and wants to buy a new car soon!