This book is written by Kathy Spencer. I got it from the library and I highly recommend it. It's the first saving money book where I've actually learned something new in a long time. She writes about how to buy groceries for free using coupons, catalina's etc. She says she spends $4/week for food for her family, I think she has 6, but not sure about that number.

She also has really good tips for getting other things for free/cheap. I won't use some of her methods because they aren't my thing, but they are good ideas for people who want to follow thru. Some of the things I learned are:

Catalina promotions are based on the pre-sale price.

If you have more than $2500 in materials for a home project Home Depot will give you a contractor price saving you 10 - 15%.

Check the internet for Black Friday sales prior to the sale date and if the item you want is at a store that offers price protection, buy it the week before the sale. Then take your receipt back and get the lower price. That way you don't have to fight people for the item. Some credit cards offer price protection too, you can just call them and get the lower price.

I went to King Soopers this morning to get some produce and eggs and do the last mega deal. I actually had to spend some money this time. All my prescription money is used up. I spent $4.10 for $23 of groceries. $13 in coupons and almost $6 in RX savings. I got the following for the food pantry.

2 Think Thin bars
4 boxes Quick Cook pasta
4 Reach Toothbrushes

The toothbrushes are a special Catalina deal right now. Buy 4 get $4 back in a coupon on your next order. They are also part of the mega deal

9.16 - 4 toothbrushes @2.29
.73 - taxes
-----
9.89
-2.00 - mega sale
-4.00 - 2 .50 q's doubled, 1 $2/2 q
-----
3.89 - get $4 OYNO coupon

I also went to Walmart and got 3 small bottles of Franks Red Hot sauce for free, that will go to the food pantry. I got a bag of coleslaw too, since King Soopers doesn't carry the kind I like anymore.

I bought another $500 in discounted gift cards to Home Depot from Gift Card Rescue at 8% discount. I need about another $500 and then will have enough for the downstairs carpet.

Coupon total ytd = 281.92
RX total = 119.45
Discounted Gift Cards = 170.87
Total = 572.74

I finished reading my book Daughter of the Blood by Anne Bishop. Sci/Fi - excellent. I'm rereading the whole series right now, since I read Twilight's Dawn last week.

This book was written by Suze Orman and I got it several years ago before I retired. I just reread it and I really liked it. It has a lot of good advice for people who either are retired or will be shortly. I need to give it to my mom and dad to read, since there was a really good chapter on creating trusts.

Yesterday, mom, sister and I drove up to visit my niece and help her do her taxes. I ended up walking her thru them and sending them online. I also fixed her computer so it could print coupons. I send her good deals, but she wasn't able to print the coupons to get them. I took her 3 bags of groceries and some coupons that I thought she could use.

We went to Red Robin for lunch and I spent just under $10. We were only there for 3 hours since she needed to work.

It took 2 hours to drive up, but 3 to drive home. It started snowing pretty heavy about halfway back and the freeway was crawling. We finally got to a point we could turn off and take the back roads. We got around 6 inches, which is the most we've had so far this year. My back yard has 4 foot drifts. A good day to stay home.

I was reading MyMoneyBlog and he posted about a good deal at Lowe's if you need stuff from there.

Lowe’s has an upcoming promotion called their Tax Refund Card. Starting 2/8, if you buy a card with value of $500 to $4,000 – supposedly with your tax refund but they can’t tell and don’t care – then on 3/18 you’ll get an additional 10% of the initial purchase price on the card. Ends 3/14. Not bad if you’re already planning on shopping there. I’ll probably wait until March to see if I really need it, just hope they don’t pull the promotion.

Here is the link for the Tax Refund Card

I really liked this book. I got it from the library. It didn't have any new earthshaking savings tips, but had a lot of funny stories about people who are cheapskates and how they live. It's written by Jeff Yeager who wrote The Ultimate Cheapskate's Road Map to True Riches. It deals with people he met while traveling the country touring for his first book. Lot's of good quotes and lots of good stories.

Walgreen's had canned mushrooms on sale this morning for .39/can. That's a very good price. I'm completely out so I got 3 cans. I paid using a gift card that I bought with RR - so no cost to me.

I went to Walmart and got several items for the food pantry. Safeway has a Thanksgiving coupon book out right now and all the coupons came from it.

6.00 - 6 Sierra Mist Cranberry splash
-6.00 - 6 $1 q's
-----
FREE

6.00 - 6 Swiss Miss Hot Chocolate
-6.00 - 6 $1 q's
------
FREE

4.80 - 8 cans Green Giant green beans
-2.00 - 2 $1/4 q's
------
2.80 - .35/each

4.80 - 8 cans Green Giant corn
-2.00 - 2 $1/4 q's
------
2.80 - .35/each

I spent $5.60 for all of it and my dad is delivering it tomorrow since I can't lift a lot yet.

I got several free things this week

Sample Tide detergent
Sample Gain trash bag
Sample Wisk detergent
Trial Size Dove deodorant
Sample 5 Mega Red pills
3 Suave deodorants
2 Mars Simply Caramel candy bars
6 2 liter bottles Sierra Mist Cranberry Splash
6 boxes Swiss Miss hot chocolate
$5 Walmart gift card from the Monopoly game came in the mail.

I finished reading a library book called Thrify Living the Frugal Life With Style by Marjorie Harris. A huge yawn, boring, nothing new, plain vanilla ideas. However, I did really like one quote from the first page.

"Money is partly the subject of this book. But it's more about what smart people do with it: how they use it wisely and make very little go a long way. It's about finding pleasure in small economies and the large ideas that can come to fruition with attention to details."

Even though I continue to read new financial books as I hear about them, I haven't read a really good one in a long time. In my opinion the best book on saving money for actual ideas and philosophy of saving money is The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn. The best book on thinking about money and work is Your Money or Your Life by Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robins. And the best book about early retirement is Stop Working, Start Living by Diane Nahirny.

I finished reading my book Master of Earth and Water by Diana L. Paxson and Adrienne Martine-Barnes. Sci/Fi - Ok.

I just finished reading the library book Save Big by Elisabeth Leamy. The book focuses on saving money on what she describes as the 5 big items people spend money on - houses, cars, credit, groceries and health care. Her philosophy is "I've always preferred to save a lot of money on a few things rather than a little bit of money on a bunch of things. I like to SAVE BIG. Not small."

She has some good ideas in the various categories, but nothing new for me. I found her style off-putting because of her disdain for saving on little stuff. How often do people buy houses or cars? Yes you can save money in these areas, but usually only a few times a decade, in my opinion you can't just save money on these items and expect to be able to spend freely in the rest of your life.

She speaks in hyperbole claiming "This book contains $1,176,916 worth of savings in all. You would have to deny yourself $294,229 lattes to save that much money."

First of all not all saving ideas will pertain to all people, and second just because you don't spend money on something doesn't mean you've saved money. Most likely it means you never had that money in the first place and if you did, you spent it on something else. I'd be very surprised to find someone who had $1 million saved based on these saving ideas. I could save thousands every day buy not buying a big house or a newer car, doesn't mean I actually have any more money in the bank.

She shows a real disdain for saving money on small items that build up into major savings over time.

"the way to cut those costs is not to install low-flow shower heads, yet that's one fo the most common tips for saving money around the house. If you do it to save the environment, fine. But to save money? Please. That's Small Stuff savings; five dollars a month at most. Peanuts. Pennies. Pathetic."

"The clasic tip for saving money on getting money is to go to your own bank's ATM to avoid fees. I don't like the idea of having to pay a fee to access my own money either, but we're talking Small Stuff Savings with that: an average of $3 per transaction, according to www.Bankrate.com. Utterly underwhelming."

"The usual advice to save on food is to pack you own lunch. Yawn ... Yes, that will save you about $7 a day, but it's a pain. When I pack my lunch and take it to work, my body goes into some sort of freak starvation mode and I inevitably wolf down my sack lunch at 11 A.M. Then I'm famished again at 3 P.M. and end up going out and buying another lunch. I soon get tired of packing a limp lunch and buying a late lunch and I give up. Besides, that's Small Stuff Savings."

Obviously she is a person who makes a pretty good salary and after buying houses, cars, groceries, and health care has enough money left to do all the other things in life she wants to - good for her, (I mean that sincerely), but most people aren't that way. They can't afford unlimited hot showers, $4 lattes, $3 ATM charges and $7 lunches every day. That adds up into big money.

For most people even buying houses and cars they can afford, not having debt and watching health care costs there is not enough money left to do everything. That is where saving on the little stuff comes in play. It's about priorities, do I save on hot water so I can travel. Do I save on ATM charges so I can go out to eat once in a while, etc.

She reminds me of the government. Oh, $5 million is just a small amount in the scheme of things - it's not worth bothering about. We don't want to concern ourselves with such small amounts of money. We need to spend $1 trillion for this program, just because 10% of that is wasted ... it's Small Stuff Savings - why are you bothering us about that? PLBHHHHH.....

As I said her attitude irked me, but the book is worth reading especially if you've never bought a house. There are some good ideas on that and in other chapters.

I also finished reading the library book Silent Sea by Clive Cussler. Adventure - very good.

Walked with mom everyday at WalMart

I plan to retire sooner than 50. Right now the goal is March of next year. It depends on how bad the market does this year.

I made a list of what I wanted to do while I was retired. Mostly it all came down to time.

Time to cook healty, tasty, simple meals
Time to exercise
Time to be organized
Time to keep house cleaned
Time to keep on top of chores
Time to shop for the best deals
Time to study whatever I happen to be interested in
Time to experiment with new skills
Time to garden
Time to do miniatures
Time to do jigsaw puzzles
Time to read
Time to spend time with nieces, family and friends
Time to think
Time to be creative

I finished reading my book Country Comes to Town by Toni L.P. Kellner. Mystery. OK

I finished reading the library book The Venetian Betrayal by Steve Berry. Adventure. Good

I finished reading the library book The Mom's Guide to Earning and Saving Thousands on the Internet by Barb Webb with Maureen Heck. Money. Excellent. I read this last year but wanted to re-read since there were a lot of tips and websites to check out for money saving ideas. Very good book.

walked with mom for 55 min

I saw that the Entertainment books were on sale for $7.99 + 1.00 shipping so went to buy another one for me and one for my parents, but the checkout says $12.99 + 4.99 shipping. Since the main page says $7.99 and click here to buy I was rather frustrated. Sent them an email to find out how to get the $7.99 price. If I buy them thru NestEggz I get an extra 21% rebated back to me. We'll see if they reply.

Walgreens has a sale on the 4.6 oz of Aquafresh this week. .99 cents. My dad said he was going so I gave him two coupons for $1.00 off. One for him and one for me. We he bought the larger size for $1.99 cost of .99 after coupon. It's a learning curve matching prices and sizes and coupons. I made him keep both of the toothpastes though since I have several tubes and I'm not going to pay for more, free is a different story. The boxes had more of those get 3 free music downloads though. So I will use those to get 6 more music downloads.

I also pointed out the Advil free after rebate and $2.00 coupon so he got a raincheck for that since they were out. My mom lost the $5 Nature Made coupon she got after I signed her up for that program. That's a high value coupon to lose. Oh well, live and learn.

Finished reading Rational Simplicity by Tim Covell. Simplicity. OK.

One of the things I liked in this book is a saying I've heard before and is what motivated me to go back to school to get my computer degree.

"Sometimes people complain that waiting 15 years for retirement is too long. They say, "in 15 years I'll be 45!" I reply, "how old will you be in 15 years if you don't save? Wouldn't you rather be 45 and free of work, than 45 and doing the same things you are doing today?"

walked with mom for 55 min

Got her signed up with the Nature Made program. You get a $5 coupon for the first 500 points, but for the second 500 points you get a $7 coupon. She had enough points for $12 in coupons.

Got Nexus shampoo and conditioner samples in the mail.

Watched the library DVD Mr and Mrs Smith. Very good. I thought it was really funny. Gave it to my parents to watch with strick instructions to return it on time for me to give back to the library. My mom wanted to know if I could get other DVDs from the libary and I told her I could so she had me reserve While you were sleeping. An old Sandra Bullock movie. I'm gradually bringing them into the computer age

Finished reading my book The Average Family's Guide To Financial Freedom. Finance. Very good.

walked with mom for 55 min

My niece is spending the night. We watched 3 of my musicals tapes. The Wiz, Robin Hood, Men in Tights and the Unsinkable Mollie Brown. It's amazing how many things we have in common. We both love reading, we both like miniatures, we both like musicals. There's other things too, but I love it and am flattered by it, since I think she likes these things because I do.

She told me she sent a letter to Dr Phil about her mother. Her mother is a control freak and makes everyone's lives miserable. I sympathize but can't do much about the situation. I think she must feel desperate though to write to Dr Phil. For her sake, I hope he doesn't reply. I can't imagine what her mother's reaction would be. Make a bad situation much worse.

We went to the miniature store this afternoon and I spent $11.76. We ordered pizza for dinner. $15. My niece doesn't even weigh 100 pounds and she ate 3 large slices of pizza. I only ate two and was stuffed. Plus she had an afternoon snack about 2 hours earlier. I wish I could eat like that and be skinny

I was looking at the Walgreen's rebate booklet while at my mom's and saw that if she buys a box of Aleve, which my dad uses daily, they can get another $10 GC with the 2 bottles of vitamins they already bought. I'm pretty sure I have a coupon for Aleve, that I'll have to dig out and give to them. Even if they paid full price it would be $6-7 dollars for something they use and get $10 back.

Finished reading the library book All Your Worth by Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi. Financial. OK. It was pretty basic information and nothing that interesting to me. I don't like how they demonize Credit Cards. I know they are a problem for a lot of people, but if you use them right, they can save or even make you money.

Also everyone always gives you the advice of freezing your credit cards, which is stupid, IMHO, because I rarely have my card in front of me when I order stuff on the computer, I just use the last bill and type in the number from that. I've memorized the 3 digit security code. I don't need the card to buy stuff.

walked with mom for 55 min

Besides walking and going to the library, I've been stuck in front of my computer working all day. At least 10 hours.

I have 3 tons of work to do in the next month so probably won't be doing much reading or anything else for a while.

Last night I finished reading The Mom's Guide to Earning and Saving Thousands on the Internet. Make money with mystery shopping, surveys, and point programs by Barb Webb with Maureen Heck. Financial. I thought this was a pretty good book. Especially if you are new to these subjects. Lots of good websites are included in the book too.

walked with mom for 55 min

We faxed our booking form to the Canada people for our trip.

Went to King Soopers and spent $20.35 for groceries. Didn't need much this week. Went to Village Inn for dinner and spent $7. got a free carwash at the Restaurant. It was raining pretty good and my car is cleaner than it's been in a while. Seems like everytime I'm in town around a car wash it's been snowing for a month, so the car was pretty dirty.

Got a rebate returned saying I didn't send all the proofs and I know I did, so I need to reply to that and see if I can get the $30.

It's nice to have a free movie weekend, but it means I don't get much else done. Watched Ray, which was really good. Watched Daffy Duck's Fantastic Island. Love looney toons. Watched part of Catwoman, which was ok, won't watch the whole thing. Plan to watch Resident Evil: Apocalypse later tonight.

Finished reading the library book Working Less, Live More by Bob Clyatt. Finance. Ok, nothing new.

walked with mom for 55 min

We had an all-hands meeting at work today where the main boss told us the news, no raises this year. It seems that the company that bought us gives out their merit increases the first week of Jan. So since they took over the second week, everyone in our company is out of luck till next year. Gee! do you think they planned the timing of that move? PLEBHHHH!!!

But according to our manager we should be happy because next year we'll probably get 10-15% raises. Yeah right. Assuming we all still have jobs by then. Regardless that would be 5% each year and money today is always worth more than money tomorrow.

I had alreay increased my 401K contributions in anticipation of at least a little raise. I was working on my budget and I'm $17 over each month. I don't count extra money that comes in like rebates, etc and I don't count the two months were i get 3 paychecks so I can easily cover the $17, but I wanted to loosen up a little and maybe save/invest even more.

Speaking of 401Ks that was the other kicker. The old company matched 5% and the new company will match 6% with a possibility of 9% depending on how much money they make. But that doesn't kick in until July 1 and when it does kick in all the matching money goes into their stock and you can't sell it. Hasn't anyone learned anything from Enron, etc? It is not a good idea to hold so much company stock. Who knows what the value of that will be in 5 years when I'm hopefully ready to retire?

The old company match went wherever you directed it. All of that money and all of my weekly paycheck contributions still goes where I direct it, but they are talking about changing our investment provider, so who knows what the new options will be?

But we should all be very happy about this. I think that's what ticked me off the most, the manager kept telling us what opportunities there were and how we should all be excited about all of these changes and next years raise, etc. Standing in a pile of cr@p and he can't smell anything. Don't tell me what to think or how to feel about the fact that you're screwing with my money. They are basically telling me that all the work I did last year has no merit, because the company was took over the second week of January.

Then for the last piece of news. The managers finished our reviews, LATE, but HR mandates that they have to deliver them to us and have them signed and returned by next Friday. So of course the managers have no time to talk to everyone, so we're supposed to just go out and read our reviews, sign them and return them and don't bother asking managers to take a lousy hour out of the whole year to actually talk to you about your job. Some people had to write their reviews. What's the point, just skip the whole ordeal, it obviously means nothing, since there is no merit attached to it.

Sorry for the rant, but this has been stewing all day.

Got a free sample of Olay Regenerist in the mail today.

Finished reading the library book Yes, You can still retire comfortably! by Ben Stein and Phil DeMuth. Finance. Good. The book details some scary scenarios about the future for the baby-boomer retires. Mostly about how they won't be able to retire because they spent everything they earned their whole lives and how the government is over-burdened and won't be able to provide for them with Social Security and Medicare. It had some ideas on how to invest for retirement, but they are too conservative for me. The book if very short, 180 pages and worth reading. There's some very funny lines in the book, which I'm sure came from Ben Stein. He has a very dry sense of humor.

walked with mom for 55 min

Every Sunday I always feel like the weekend has just slipped away, with nothing to show for it. On Friday night I feel like I have tons of time ahead of me, but by Sunday afternoon I wonder where it all went and can't believe it's almost time to go back to work.

Went to King Sooper's for groceries this morning. Spent $37.77 saved 36% according to the receipt

Spent much of the morning cooking for the week. Made oatmeal for breakfasts, a big pot of pinto beans in the crock pot for lunches, and potato salad.

I re-read my book Shop, Save and Share by Ellie Kay. Saving Money. This is a very good book, the focus is saving money by using coupons and rebates. It's very funny and easy to read. I have several finance/money saving books and I re-read them periodically to give me motivation and to prompt me to try new things or firm up old commitments to saving.

walked with mom for 35 min

Another stressful day at work, if I could just work on something without being interrupted 20 times with other people's problems, I could get things done. Instead I start on something, get interrupted and have to start over. The reason I have to start over is I get logged out of the website I'm working in because of security reasons, plus I lose track of what I'm doing and have to rething where I'm at. And the things I'm getting interrupted for are stupid things that the people should be able to deal with themselves, they are entry level things for our work that anyone with more than 3 months experience should know. All these people have 5+ years of experience. They're just lazy and don't want to do their own work. I've started telling them to go look it up or do it themselves, but it makes me frustrated. I got hit by 3 people with the same problem this morning and everyone of them should have know how to deal with it on their own. I did finally finish the thing I was working on, but it took me 4 hours and it should have only taken 1-2.

I finally got around to putting $4000 in my 2006 Roth IRA today. I should have done it last week. I missed a good week of stock run-ups. But work has been such a zoo, I just didn't get around to it till this morning. I wrote myself a note and did it first thing.

I also ordered the book Stop Working, Start Living. If anyone owns this book, you have a gold mine. It was listed for 80+ on Barnes and Noble and 50+ on Amazon. I did find someone selling a copy on Barnes and Noble for $18.50 so I ordered it. I figure if I decide to sell in a couple of years I could at least make my money back. I'm going to have to look for this book in used bookstores. Spent $22.39 with shipping. I didn't see Jorge's link before I ordered it, but thanks for the information.

The author of the book lists several of the finance books she grew up reading in her parents house, its funny because I had read most of them also. I think she's close to my age. Most of the books were written in the late 70's, early 80's. My parents had several of the books and I still own How to Live Rich When You Are Not by Rebecca Greer. This basic philosophy of this book is to not waste your money on things you don't care about, but spend it on the things you love, that way you don't feel deprived. For example, instead of eating fast food at Taco Bell everyday, you brown bag and save for a trip to Mexico instead. If that's more important. The point is figuring out what's important to you and then deciding how to get that by giving up things that aren't as important and are more habit that anything else.

Total spent this month = $147.06

I bought a yam last week to try. I know I never liked the sweet potato and marshmallow casseroles we always had at Thanksgiving so I thought I would try a baked version and see if I liked it. The yam/sweet potato is low on the glycemic index and I figured if I did like it, it would be another vegatable. But it was yucky. I just don't like the texture or the taste. Oh well, you don't know till you try. I had it with my leftover steak from yesterday.

Finished reading the library book Every Dead Thing by John Connolly. Mystery. Good. Not great, probably won't read anything else by this author.

walked with mom for 55 min

My 45th birthday is in 2 days so my parents took our whole family to Outback for lunch to celebrate. My sister wasn't there because she's in Las Vegas on a business trip. My parents gave me $100 and my nieces gave me some rubbermaid stainfree food storage containers, a bottle of Lady Stetson perfume. a vanilla scented candle and $10 in Wendy's gift certificates. I brought half my steak home to have tomorrow night.

I now have 5 bottles of Lady Stetson perfume. I told my sister last year that I wasn't using it as fast as they were giving it to me but I got 2 more bottles this year one for xmas and one for my b-day. Maybe I can return one to Longs or Walgreens. I don't know how long perfume is good for. I like the perfume but I only use it once or twice a week when I go to work or go in town so it doesn't get used very quickly.

I ran some errands before meeting everyone for lunch.

King Soopers - $3.14 - 1 dollar for newspaper
Walgreens - $14.87 - will get a $10 rebate, also got 2 14.5 oz cans of salmon for $1 each, excellent price.
Albertsons - $3.22 - bought another newspaper because the coupons were very good today. Also bought 3 bags of Brach's spearmint hard candy that was 75% off after xmas.
Barnes and Noble - $4.63 - had a coupon for 20% off one book, plus 10% off with my membership card and paid for with xmas gift card.
Safeway - $9.19 - 12 giant rolls of Quilted Northern TP for $5 and had two 75 cent off coupons so got 24 rolls total, very good price

Total spent this month = $124.67

Had leftover pasta with tomatoes and grilled some shrimp from my freezer for dinner. Yum!

I finished reading the library book Stop Working, Start Living by Dianne Nahirney. Personal Finance. Excellent book. I highly recommend this book. Thanks robex for recommending it. This is one I would like to own so I'm going to look around tomorrow to buy a copy. This book re-inspired me to strive for early retirement She has a lot of the same philosophies towards money and work that I have.

Drove into work today. Went early and stopped at the Walgreens on the way. Picked up Jif Peanut Butter on sale 2 18 oz jars for $3 and Egg Noodles pasta on sale 3 12oz bags for $1.00. Paid $4.00 total.

Met a friend for lunch at Applebees - $8.50

After work stopped at Longs and got the battery recharger I got the raincheck for on Saturday and bought 1 18 oz jar of Skippy PB for .99 - .60 coupon or .39 cents total. Very good deal. Spent 22.23 total.

Was proud of myself for not stopping at a fast food place on the way home.

I read a book called The Average Family's Guide to Financial Freedom by Bill and Mary Toohey that I got from the library. Very good book. I recommend it. Basically the book is about how they saved almost half their income and still managed to live decently and raise kids. Lot's of good thought provoking ideas.

If you want to read an article about them where they discuss their book and philosophy go to this link:

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com:8100/WileyCDA/Section/id-7902.html