Coupon Organization

When you have a collection of an abundant amount of coupons, complete organization is the key to maintaining total control over your savings. An unorganized system can cause you to lose money rather than save it; if you can't find the qp then you can't save the money therefore, a well planned and thought out filing system is crucial. (Especially if you are like me and buy 6 newspapers every week, lol.) There are many ways in which you can customize strategies to your preference in order to file your own qp's. I have tried many yet there is only one way that has worked for me. Yes it may take me quite a while, depending on how many are actually in the newspaper but it is worth it and if I ever fall behind it can take me days to catch up, that is why I TRY my best to stay on top of it.

Starting out I was a Grocery Game newbie and filed my coupon sources in a protective sheet, filed by the date that they were subscribed and just cut the qp's out has I printed off my list. Continuing this way rendered no quick rushes to the grocery store, I would always have to stop, flip through, then cut, flip through, then cut, flip through then cut. Until I figured out a much simpler way, getting all the work out of the way at once rather than repeatedly searching through the same sources over and over again. I was also tired of looking at all the unnecessary advertisements. Therefore the days in which I now receive my qp sources is also the day in which I flip, cut and file them by date.

I keep a binder for each coupon source; Red Plum, Smart Source, P&G, Store qp and a binder for internet qp, that gives me 5 binders all together. In my RP, SS, and P&G binders I use baseball card protectors to file my qp's. I then tab the first page of the collection subscribed to that specified date. For instance I will take my SS magazine that I pulled out of the newspaper that was published on January 17^th, cut each coupon out a place into the baseball card protector slots and then tab the first page of that collection labeled 1/17. Like so….

My store binder is for the qp's that I receive by mail or register receipt from specified stores. I cut them as I receive them, place them in the protectors and file them by store name. This helps, being that certain stores take competitor qp's. Like so….

Then my internet binder is extremely different due to the fact that they are not printed on any certain date nor do they all expire at the same time. I lucked out at Staples one day and caught my protectors at a close out price, they are actually photo protectors. I am able to file these qp's by category and sub category. Meaning that I tab a page protector with a main category, such as frozen, and then I am able to use a sub category such as vegetables to file my Steam Fresh qp's. Like so…

So now when I develop my list I flip through once, pull out all 6 qp's at one time and then I am ready to go. If I need to make a quick run, I can, being that everything is already done a head of time and I if think I have found a good deal on a certain item I can go to ….. to verify if there is a qp for it or not and where to find it.

I know this seems like a lot of work but sadly enough this is my serenity ;-)

Smoke Detector Test

Last night I went through the most horrifying reality checks that I am now so thankful for, being that it could have happened unexpectedly rather than expected. It all started a few days ago, a friend of mine posted on her Facebook that her smoke detectors went off due to steam from her iron. Knowing that it was a little over a year ago that her house was actually on fire, she assumed her children would be horrified by this sound therefore when she finally got the treacherous beeping turned off, she rushed upstairs to assure them that everything was okay and that there was no fire. Yet much to her surprise they did not need her reassurance, not only were they not terrified they were still asleep. Although she was relieved that this incident did not bring on any anxiety she was concerned because they were STILL ASLEEP!!!

What if this was a fire? What if it was real smoke that triggered the smoke alarm and not just steam? What if? What if? After she posted her concern on Facebook a friend of hers commented with a link in which led you to this video posted on You Tube.Now if you have children you MUST watch this video now! There is no reason to wait you can finish reading this post after you watch the video;

Does that not send chills up your back? It did mine and being that my husband is a Fire Fighter he was horrified to know that a properly working smoke detector may not even save the life of a child, let alone ours. So, out of pure curiosity, we decided to run this test ourselves. If any of our children wake up we will follow through with a live fire drill, if none of our children wake up we will be ordering new smoke detectors. Needless to say, we will be ordering new smoke detectors.

NOT ONE of our 3 children woke up. For 3 minutes our smoke detectors beeped screechingly throughout our house (there is 1 in EVERY room) and our children were sound asleep. Our 9 year old did not budge, our 2 year old sat straight up, after 1 minute, looked around and laid back down, and our 3 month old did not even curl his bottom lip. They had no idea that the alarm was even going off. I stood in our hallway and cried, playing the "What If" game in my head.

This morning I Searched Amazon.com for voice smoke detector and found one that I will order and as soon as I get it in we will run another drill in which I pray my children wake up for.