What a mixed up world we live in

While our Federal Gov't is busy pushing abortion, California is busy with this rediculous law...
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iygMobQg87-nZ6KW1WB-8rNxllrwD9BQCDA02
When will people wake up?

Lessons learned at the grocery store(i.e. couponing)

I am an on-again off-again couponer. Sometimes I convince myself that it is a waste of time for me and that I end up spending more than I normally budget for groceries by going to all of the places that have great sales. Then I start thinking about what I might be missing out on and end up couponing again. Now some of you may say that it is not a big deal to coupon, you just give the checker your coupons and you are done. But oh no, you would be wrong. There is a whole world out there and lots of blogs dedicated to couponing. Here are a few of them that I visit, mostly for my Northwest readers...
www.pinchingyourpennies.com
www.fabulesslyfrugal.com
www.blog.savewithlouise.com
www.grocerysmarts.com

These are just a few of the numerous ones out there. I am still learning how they work and all of the lingo that goes with it all. For example, DND means do not double(the coupon value) and DNT means do not triple. I didn't even know that they tripled coupons.

This week was a definite lesson in couponing for me and unfortunately I didn't learn it until I was standing in Albertson's this morning. I had gone to Safeway earlier in the week and had good success with my coupons. I purchased 4 boxes of toothpaste, 4 boxes of Kleenex, a 24pack of toilet paper, and 4 cereals for under $10, which was good since the toilet paper alone was $5.99. I used the instore coupons, some coupons I printed off on the computer and the coupon doubler that comes in the weekly add. I actually used two doublers which meant I needed to do this in two transactions. I was definitely excited about couponing after this trip since my toothpaste ended up being free. I also got a catalina(new coupon word for me),which is a paper that the receipt printer spits out at the end, for a free gallon of milk. That is always helpful in a family of 10.
Fastforward to this morning, I decided to try the Albertson's sale. I got onto www.grocerysmarts.com and looked at their list and then printed out the coupons I needed for this trip. I noticed that in one of the columns there were two prices for how much the item should be but didn't know what that meant. So off I went with two babies in tow and one of the older girls to help me. I now know why there were two prices and it didn't come out to be such a good deal for me this time. However I did it anyway. At Albertson's this week they are having a deal where, if you spend $30 on certain items, you get a $15 catalina to use on your next purchase. I did not plan to spend $30 so my items were more than I expected them to be but still cheaper than they could have been. All in all, I spent about $12 but purchased several items.

So this whole, long, blundering post is meant to 1. share some websites where you can go to find good deals and 2. to help you to learn through my mistakes.

Where does the time go?

Boy, it has been awhile since I posted last. So sorry! I just do not know where the days go. I think that as we get older time just seems to fly by. Don't you remember as a child how very slowly time seemed to pass, especially if you were waiting for your birthday or Christmas? Well now when I read a sign as I pass through town that says there are only 50 days till Christmas it causes me to shudder. Of course now it isn't even 50. Oh well, we should just be thankful for each and every day that the Good Lord gives us with our families. Anyway, I digress. I wanted to post a few pictures on here for you of things we have been up to lately.


B#2 got her braces off on the 4th of November. FINALLY!!! She also had an email from our local high school asking if she would be interested in teaching Spinning(fiber spinning that is) to the after school program. We are still waiting to hear about the particulars of it before we commit to it.

Dearest Daddy had a birthday on the same day that B#2 got her braces off. What a busy day that was. Instead of being able to relax with us for the day he had to be working on burying the pipe that carries us our water. Pretty important work there! We are so blessed with a fun and faithful daddy who gets up super early, while we all still snooze, to go to work to provide for us. We are so thankful for him!

B#5 had a birthday on the 31st of October. It is so nice having a child's birthday on that day. It gives us a really great reason to not have to celebrate the secular day of Halloween. He got a huge KNEX set, a headlamp and some much needed rain boots.

For B#5's birthday, we went to a Children's Museum. Here are the girls on "The Big Chair". B#6 wasn't too happy about being up there but once she got to playing at the museum all was fine. She convinced me to go down the huge, swirly slide. Boy was it dark in there.

B#1 generously offered to backpack the baby for me while we were at the Children's Museum. The baby loves the backpack enough to fall asleep while he is in there. Thank goodness for big strong guys in the family(oh and B#3 too) who can pack that little chub around.

Here is Dad inside a bubble.

Isn't he just a cutey? Baby(B#8) has grown so much in the last couple of weeks. He is crawling everywhere, getting in to everything and has started pulling up on furniture already. He is starting to creep along the furniture a little too. I am hoping that he does not follow in Biggest Brother's footsteps and be walking by 10 months but it wouldn't surprise me.

And then there is B#7 who is the ham of all of them. Not a day goes by without him doing something hilarious. As B#2 often says "Having a two year old is such fun".

The Marriage Conference

Dear Hubby and I had a nice treat from an anonymous donor....a weekend away at a marriage conference. Now don't go getting all worried that we are having marital difficulties:) It was actually offered to all of our church's deacons and wives and our two pastors and their wives. The first day got off to a rough start as we hit downtown rush hour traffic. It took us about two hours to go what should have taken about 30 minutes. The Lord is so good though, the baby slept or played quietly in his car seat the whole time. Once we got there and got settled in to our room we were able to join the conference which was already going on. We missed alot the first day but some friends of ours that went got us caught up that night. The next day we were able to be in there the whole time except for little bits out with baby. It was a really good conference and I would love to go to it again to get the whole thing in. It was put on by Noble Call Ministries. Maybe you would like to go to one to strengthen you marriage. Check them out at www.noblecall.org. May the Lord bless each one of your marriages.

Look Who's Two

B#7 turned two a few days ago. He is just getting too big. We are so sad about that. He is talking up a storm all of the sudden. Oh, why can't they stay little???

Fishin' for Chicken

B#7 found his brother's fish net and decided to go catch some chickens with it. Life would be kinda boring without him around:)

First Day of School

Well, Friday was our first day of school. Already I can see that changes need to be made to the daily schedule that I made for us. We started way too late to get it all in so tomorrow we will start earlier. We are trying a different curriculum this year and so far the kids seem to be liking it, at least B#3. She was wanting more geography and history. To end up the day we made "bugs on a log". I thought this version was much yummier than the usual celery, raisin, and peanutbutter. We used pretzel rods, m&ms and peanut butter. B#2 broke out the Nutella and that was even better than peanut butter. If you aren't familiar with Nutella you really should try it. You can find it near the peanut butter at the grocery store.