I have never seen snow in my hometown like this. I was like a kid in a candy store, glued to my window to watch the best white stuff I’ve seen south of the Red River.
I actually got excited when the outside looked like this. It was snowing! And sticking to the dirt.
The kids enjoyed watching too [one of my fave pics I've taken.]
BUT THEN.
I think the final count was 2 inches. That’s pretty unheard of where I live. And when you consider that 2 days ago it was 75 degrees. [Then 2 days after it was 60 degrees.]
My kids built a snowman and then jumped on the trampoline with Kim. Pics on Kevin’s camera coming hopefully soon.
February 23rd, 2010
by Jenna
Guess how much I paid for this? $1.84 At Walgreens.
It should have been free, but I’m still learning the ropes and my girls decided to scream like banshees and Kennedy was jumping in the cart and the checkout guy was a mistaken commentator [you know the type - the one when I present the coupons says, "Oh, let's see, Excedrin? Do you have any Excedrin? Okay, Menstrual Complete, yes you do!" *groan*] I’m glad I wasn’t buying anything any more, ahem, personal. And, I’ll be visiting a different Walgreens location from now on.
February 22nd, 2010
by Jenna
…A-Kennedy in a basket.
February 21st, 2010
by Jenna
Colby played in his first career soccer game. Here’s the warm-up.
Part of the yelling section [er, "cheering"]
And, the paparazzi.
February 20th, 2010
by Jenna
Ok I took a bit of a hiatus… but instead of giving up, I’m going to jump back in. I’ve got some backlogged pictures, but I’ll catch up on those later.
This is my “Soccer Man”. This is Colby’s first year to play soccer, and today was his first game. This is him on the way to making his first goal. It was great, so exciting, I’m proud of my little dude. Not that I was keeping score or anything, but I think his team won something like 8 to 1. Whoop!
February 20th, 2010
by Kevin
The Hoovers came over for dinner tonight. Chris & Christine, Landon & Colton [Madison was at a tennis tournament.] A great way to end a very busy week.
February 19th, 2010
by Jenna
AlphaBits cereal rocks! [Colby did this and took the picture, with permission.]
February 18th, 2010
by Jenna
Kiddo swap was at our house tonight. This was by our back door, on the way out to the trampoline.
And, it was also Colby’s first soccer practice today. Check out Those shoes.
February 17th, 2010
by Jenna
Remember Kim who made snow? Today she was a buffalo. Apparently it’s catching.
I love Carlee’s face and eyes in this one.
February 16th, 2010
by Jenna
I had a lot of people ask me about my couponing success (and past failures). I wanted to take a break from the photo blogging for a day and give some clarifications on what I do personally and what others do. You can call this the 7 Habits of Highly Effective Shopping. Just kidding.
1. I am not an expert. There are literally hundreds of blogs that people have started (most of them stay-at-home moms) to find the best sales and the best coupons and match them together to make the best deals. I would consider them experts. On these blogs, there’s quite the terminology you have to learn in order to decipher these couponing techniques. I am still learning.
2. These blogs give out all the deals for the week. It might list something like “buy 5 sticks of deodorant for $5 and get $20 back” (which would be awesome if you ever snag that deal, let me know!). YOU DON’T HAVE TO BUY EVERY SINGLE DEAL. Like my friend Melissa, I don’t need 5 sticks of deodorant. These couponing bloggers say that you can save the extras for donating, but I see that as a waste for someone who really needs deodorant to be able to get it, if you’ve already taken it off the shelf from them.
3. Also, my family has a lot of allergies. We are allergic to some forms of: milk, diapers, bath soaps, laundry detergent, shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, deodorant, shaving cream, lotion, some snacks… So you can bet that there are coupons for the things we are allergic to but we can’t use them. We don’t want to try and buy those things just to get the discount – again, wasting products. We do buy organics and there’s not a lot of coupons out there but we do use them.
4. The couponing blogs give out deals for all kinds of stores. The ones we have in bcs are Kroger’s, Target, Wal-Mart, CVS, and Walgreen’s. (There might be others.) The ones closest to me are Kroger’s, Target, Wal-Mart, and Walgreen’s. Do I visit them all in one week? No way, Jose. I don’t have time and I use the time that Colby is in school to do all my shopping – with my 2 girls in tow. I can spend all week shopping or I can spend an hour or two with prepared coupons and get a few great deals.
5. The time spent to coupon is actually not as much as you might think. Just as when you learn a new skill or task, it does take a little more time and effort at first, but eventually you get used to it. And, you can do as much or as little as you want. If you’ve ever heard of The Grocery Game, I did that before [read: past failure] and eventually got tired of paying for a service that wasn’t worth it to me. I ended up trying products that either I was allergic to or I felt like I had to buy but didn’t like. But I do know a lot of people who have had much success with it. I think one of my problems was needing more than one store to look at – I only looked at Kroger’s. Here’s an article with some helpful info I found about The Grocery Game.
6. I might have already said this in some form, but it’s worth repeating. You don’t have to hit every sale or buy every single thing with a coupon. It’s nice to save money and it feels great to know that you have made some really great deals. But sometimes those couponing blogs seem a little cult-like, with the way they follow sales and obsess over the next time something will go on sale. Life will go on, whether you use coupons or not.
7. If all else fails, I use Wal-Mart for my go-to. Everything is usually cheapest at Wal-Mart, unless you find those good deals.
8. (Okay, 8 habits) – Kroger doubles and triples some coupons. That is why I shop there sometimes. Otherwise their prices are definitely much higher. But sometimes you can get items for free at Kroger’s just because of one 35cent coupon from the newspaper. BUT keep in mind that if you print coupons (usually from coupons.com) there are capital letters up at the top that say “DO NOT DOUBLE OR TRIPLE.” Keep that in mind when you want to print out a 40cent coupon and it really is worth only 40cents, not 80 like you originally thought.
My friend Tiffany blogs about couponing. She sent me to a website called Southern Savers. I also found Coupon Geek. The last 2 blogs do a great job of linking to other couponing blogs with the best deals for that week, the coupons you can print out, the freebies you can grab, etc.
February 15th, 2010
by Jenna
I went to see Dear John with some friends tonight. When I came back, I found this on my couch!
Colby didn’t look too worried. [And Kevin said his head got cold.]
February 15th, 2010
by Jenna
Tonight at my house we had an invasion of the Tim-and-Kelsey-nator. You’re getting a rare peek at its lightning speed! My kids had so much fun being chased.
February 14th, 2010
by Jenna
These are the yummy whole wheat cinnamon rolls Kevin and I made for the kids’ valentines breakfast today. This is the recipe.
And later in the afternoon I took Colby to a birthday party at Powersports. He didn’t stop moving the whole time and was upset when we had to leave. He definitely can’t wait to go back. I couldn’t get any pictures of him doing forward or backward rolls.
February 13th, 2010
by Jenna
My friend Le invited some gals over for a little Valentine’s get-together with the kids. We spent most of our time talking and I ended up having so much fun I was 10 minutes late to pick up Colby from school! Oops.
Here’s the Getting the Coats On pic.
Here’s Geralyn and baby Nora with cute matching headbands.
And here’s 4 of the girls sitting pretty on Grayton’s bed. I promise I didn’t pose them, but when I pulled out the camera, Kennedy put on her best Zoolander face.
Next time we all get together I’ll have to take a picture of Carlee chasing down little Oliver… and then hitting him. He took her dinky once and she hasn’t forgotten about it. All I can say is, watch out, little dude – she’s coming after you with a vengeance. (Poor Ollie!)
February 12th, 2010
by Jenna
My MOPS group had a Girls’ Night Out last night. We got together at Amanda K’s house to make a gift for our hubbys and eat dessert. This is Amanda. In a red shirt.
Here’s what we made – a tile message board to put in the bathroom. This is my design.
The biggest talk of the night was the SNOW we got! Not much, but still newsworthy. This is what accumulated on my car in about 20 minutes, then I got to drive home in the snow – the first time in my life I’ve had to do that.
Kennedy made me promise that the next time it snowed that we would play in it. I agreed.
February 11th, 2010
by Jenna
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