Health, Tile and Groceries

Well this will be my first attempt at a real blog. If you choose to begin reading it I won't be offended if you don't finish.

I started off this week with food poisoning and after a very brief "well" spell my children have gifted me the cold bug. Although I took a nighttime decongestant I still found myself sleeping with my mouth open. Boy am I glad Derek doesn't sleep with one eye open. I can't imagine how horrible I looked.

Other than my health and that of my family it has been a very busy week. I spent Tuesday watching the plumbers destroy my bathroom again. After all the water damage we had due to our burst pipe they had "fixed" our jacuzzi tub. Only Derek discovered a couple of days after the fix that it wasn't working properly and it was leaking. Not a good sign. So three weeks later they get the part in they needed to fix the leak and hopefully get the motor working correctly again. They came Tuesday to install this new part. Well of course due to the size of our tub and it's exceedingly tight fit in our bathroom they had to remove the tub once again to install the replacement part. One problem, this time they couldn't get the tub out. After hearing quite a lot of loud banging I enter the bathroom to discover two of the back splash tiles around my tub have been smashed to smithereens! I was not a happy camper. We already knew we couldn't get the tile anymore after searching high and low for replacement tiles to go near our back door.

So here I am, supposed to list our house that night and I now have a big hole in my tub back splash. Again, I am not a happy camper. Thankfully the tile man that our Real Estate agent had told us about was supposed to come by later that day. After looking at our new hole he came up with a solution. I was about ready to hug the man I was so happy! He suggested we put in an entirely new back splash and of the old tiles he would clean up three to place in front of our back door.

Of course this takes a few days to complete. He was unable to come back Wednesday to work but did bring the tiles by to show me what the back splash would look like. In the meantime we did sign the papers to list the house. Come Wednesday afternoon around 4:15 I received a phone call from the appointment schedulers for showing the house calls. They want to know if the house can be shown between 5 and 6 that night! Ah! No! I've got biscuit dough on my hands and the kitchen isn't a complete mess but it definitely needed work. I had boxes I was filling on my bed and don't forget the whole in the tub back splash. So of course I tell them Friday would be better since I knew the tile was being laid on Thursday.

A few minutes later our realtor calls and says he has received an e-mail saying we refused a showing. Come to find out the couple was from out of state and leaving the next morning. To make this long story a little shorter I'll leave out all the phone calls and just say that while eating our dinner and getting ready for Bible class, Derek and I ran around picking up the house. They showed up as we were leaving around 6:10. We still haven't gotten feedback but I hope we will.

The tile man laid the tile on Thursday and since he was coming back on Friday to grout it and lay the tile at the back door Lily and I went grocery shopping Thursday night. That day I had truly delved into the grocery game or couponing, whichever term you choose to use. I planned my trips to Target and Publix. My lists included all my coupons, including details, coupons attached to the list with binder clips. Of course my reusable grocery bags were in hand. I wound up saving $15 at Target and came home with a $5 gift card to use next time. At Publix I saved $33 dollars. I was quite happy with my first time out. I hadn't fully grasped all there was to truly playing the "Grocery" Game or couponing at it's best. Friday I did even more research. Thanks to my mom I delved into Southern Savers and My Frugal Adventures. I ordered this: Coupon Organizer . Isn't it so pretty?! I can't wait for it to get here.

Today we went out as a family and at KMart I purchased a zippered three ring binder, 10 plastic pocket dividers and one pack of baseball card holders. It's mostly full of printed coupons right now. I did my research this afternoon and already have one good deal planned for RiteAid. I can't wait to get the paper tomorrow and dig in! I'll let you know how it goes. For now I guess I've rambled on and bored you long enough. If you lasted till the end congratulations!
Let me know you were here.

I love all of you my friends!

~Stacie~