Sorry about the delay in posting the winner to this giveaway I’ve been super busy lately.

The winner of 2 coupons for FREE Dry Idea Deodorant is

Entry #20 Theresa Melix for Liking Living On A Budget on FB

as an added bonus I am giving away one more coupon to the runner up

Entry #18 Lori Edmonds for Sharing the giveaway on FB

Ladies you both have 24 hours to email me at bellemitchell702 @ gmail.com with your mailing address and your coupons will be on there way!!

Just as a not for any future giveaways I do check that you are meeting the requirements to enter so please don’t just click the button and claim that you did something if you did not :(  I had to disqualify 2 winners for that tonight.

As a Purex Insider, I have been given numerous opportunities. This time I was selected to review Dry Idea Advanced Dry Roll-on deodorant. This was a refreshing change from my usual deodorant stick. I have been using a stick for years. First, a Roll-on is just different. I had previously thought that a Roll-on wouldn't keep me as dry but I found that this wasn't the case for me. I actually like that my roll-on is unscented and hypo-allergenic. The best part about my new antiperspirant and deodorant roll-on, it works!

The new AdvancedDry Formula is available in roll-on (Unscented, Powder Fresh, & Cotton Dry), Clear Gel (Unscented & Powder Fresh), and Invisible Solid ( Unscented, Powder Fresh, & cool Burst w/Air Conditioning Effect). The roll-on & gel will give you 24 hours of protection & the solid will give you 48 hours of protection!

I have been able to give this deodorant a pretty good test, it’s been worn during workouts and while I’ve been at a craft market on a pool deck that checked in at over 100. I was a bit concerned (don’t want to stink while selling stuff) and brought my regular deodorant with me that day and was pleasantly surprised to find that I didn’t need it. The roll on is different that part is the only thing holding me back from buying more and more of this deodorant, it does dry very fast after you put it on but it’s still just strange to me.

So if you are sold on giving Dry Idea a shot keep reading!

 I will be mailing One winner 2 coupons for free DRY IDEA deodorant! The coupon is good for ANY DRY IDEA advanced dry formula 3.25 oz or smaller maximum value of $5.50 I've been so busy lately that I am really late getting this giveaway up so please share with your friends as this is a short giveaway.

 a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

Today was another great day as far as savings.  The only spending done was me driving to the gas station to get a soda.  Since they were on sale I picked up 2 so that I didn’t need to stop tomorrow on my way to a market.

The soda was bought to try and fend off the headache I’ve acquired today between the storm that’s been slowly moving through all day, my allergies and my inability to break my caffeine dependency I had a horrible headache and making coffee was not an option so we made a quick trip to the gas station which is literally around the corner and came home.

Otherwise today we’ve kept the lights off almost all day, the TV has been off for a good portion of the day (and that overheating cable box has been unplugged) and all dishes were done by hand today so no electric to run the dishwasher.  All meals were cooked at home today using items from either the pantry or freezer.

Tonight DH and I plan to exercise using our videos and then I’ll either work on some more jewelry for my markets this weekend or I’ll start checking out the grocery ad preview and see what I’m going to be picking up this week.  I am fortunate to have a well stocked freezer and pantry but with the cost of everything always going up I want to make sure they stay well stocked so I will be hitting the best sales hard to keep my family well feed on very little.

How have you been doing on your quest to save??  Check back this weekend as I’ll be giving away a couple of coupons for free items and posting my reviews on those items!  I hope to have the post up by Friday but with markets I get too busy and forget sometimes the giveaway will run for several days though so you will have an opportunity to sign up!

Sunday and Monday were both bad spending days.  There was alot of running around for my TMDesigns business and then Dave wanted to play hockey on Monday.  There isn’t a rink close by so we had to be out for a good chunk of the day and lump other errands into the trip to make the most for our gas.  We did end up eating out but we ate at Ikea where you can get meatballs, mashed potatoes, salad and drink for $5.99 so we left full and the 3 of us ate for less then $16.  Because we were out running we stopped at Toys R Us to take advantage of the sale on bookbags, every year we buy Shawn a new character bookbag and lunchbox it helps get him excited to go back to school but I still search for the best sale.  TRU always runs a sale where you purchase a bookbag and receive a free lunchbox so we went out and got both for $14.99.  We have last years book bag and lunch box put away (scrubbed at the end of the year) so that if anything happens to either of them we have backups.  I recommend if you don’t have an extra put away pick up a generic one on sale (or clearance) and put them away, mid year there are no sales on book bags/lunchboxes and the only ones you can even find are the higher priced ones and that is exactly when they rip/tear or get lost.

Thankfully today is back to normal living.  We have been running around so much, you can just tell by looking at my house everything is a mess so I’ve taken today to clean up.  I’m also trying to take it easy as I had 4 markets in 4 days over the weekend and I need a bit of a break before this Thurs when I start my 3 in 4 days stretch again.  The best part of taking a break is no spending.  I had to run to the store this morning when I realized we were out of bread and I picked up a few items we needed that there are no sales on and spent about $16.  For the rest of the day we are eating out of the stockpile, kept the A/C at 78 while I’m relaxing and 76 while cleaning, the lights have been off all day and we are keeping up with our exercise videos to stay healthy and save money over a gym membership.  As I was relaxing today the cable started acting up again and that pushed me to make the phone call I’ve been putting off since I’ve been so busy.  Dave and I have talked and agreed to cancel the cable because of the lack luster service, the ever increasing bill and the fact that there is nothing on TV anymore so I called today and figured out how much it was going to cost to keep just the internet and then proceeded to listen to her sales pitches on different ways to save and finally let her talk me into a basic cable plan with the internet.  We are going to purchase an antennae and see how well it works, if it works great I’ll call and cancel the basic cable if it doesn’t work well we’ll return it and keep the cable for now.

So today I spent $16 and saved over $50/month on the cable.  I have been clicking on all my “paid” emails, searching through Swagbucks, using Superpoints, and any other chance I can to add to our funds.   How have you been doing?  I’d love to hear how your quest to save is going.

I did mention I would do my best to make this a daily thing didn’t I.  One day in and I’m already behind oh well that’s life.

Yesterday we stayed home and did a whole lot of nothing.  A few days ago I had picked up about 5 pounds of boneless skinless chicken breast on sale for $1.29 a pound and so I threw that all in the crockpot with a bit of water and let it cook all day.  The result is shredded chicken just from stirring it in the crockpot so I warmed up some of that with BBQ sauce for dinner last night.  The only money spent all day was for a soda and a juice when Shawn and I headed to the local farmer’s market to set up my tent.  We had a good time and I made a little money in my business fund.

Today I attended another vendor show and made contacts with some people for this fall when the snow birds come back.  The shoppers weren’t there today but the contacts were more then worth my time and effort.  After the market I came home and DH and I worked out to a video we already own (no wasted money on gym memberships) and then set off on my quest to find shells.  I’ve been doing some markets with alot of tourists and I feel that a few items with shells would sell really well.  We headed to one of my favorite cheap places for findings and found no shells but $5 in other stuff for my crafting business, while we were out we had dinner at the A&W that had reopened since I’m a sucker for their fresh rootbeer.  Our continued search somehow brought us to a comic book store where we spent about $10 on books for Shawn, to Target where I spent $7 for pasta salad making supplies and to JoAnn’s where I finally found some shells.

So today wasn’t a great savings day but it wasn’t too shabby in the grand scheme of things since alot of today’s spending came out of my TMDesigns money.  In addition we’ve been keeping the shades closed and curtains drawn to help keep the sun out and using the fans as much as possible to supplement the A/C.  I’ve also been using the microwave and crockpot more and more to help keep the heat out of the house.  Plus using the crockpot means turning cheap cuts of meat into delicious tender dinners that require very little work from me, and with 3-4 markets a week right now the less work I have to do the better.

In an effort to save more and grow my bottom line I’m going to start posting how we’ve spent and what I’ve done to earn hopefully daily.  There will be days when I can’t but I’m going to do my best to stick to it.  You can check out my inspiration for these posts by heading for to Frugal Makes Cents a fantastic blog written by Precious.  I want to be her when I grow up and am going to do what I can to at least get close.

Last night we drove just a few miles up the road to a new park and walked up to the soccer fields and where treated to several fireworks shows.  We were able to see fireworks from 3 different towns plus 2 different theme parks we weren’t real close but still enjoyed the show and spent very little on gas to get there.

Today Shawn and I stayed home and ate leftovers for lunch, breakfast was poptarts for him and oatmeal for me both bought on sale with coupons.  I stuck 3 bottles of water in the fridge to take with me for my evening market.  On the way to the market I stopped and picked up a package of apple slices and a soda to eat while I was there.  I’d planned on taking some fruit with me but we ate it all yesterday and I know myself well enough to know taking sandwiches with me wouldn’t have worked.  On the way home from the market I stopped and picked up 2 bottles of juice for DH and I to make cocktails tonight.

All in all it was a basically frugal day.  The apple slices and soda come out of my TMDesigns money as does the gas to get to my event and back so really all that was bought today was 2 bottles of juice and of course gas for Dave’s car to and from work.

Today wasn’t the best day for earning, days that I have markets never are because I am focused on them.  All the earnings I will be talking about will be the little things I do to make extra never Dave’s job or my market money (rarely will I include any spending for that either).  I did however use Swagbucks to do my searches this morning and evening, if you aren’t using swagbucks you should start by clicking my link who couldn’t use free money/giftcards?  I also clicked through my Superpoints account (leave a comment if you would like an invite) to earn points for more free money!!  DH and I both used a workout video that we own today to help stay in shape and not waste money on a gym membership and all the lights were kept off during the day to keep the electric bill lower.

Please feel free to leave a comment and tell us what you’ve done to save or earn or leave a link to your own blogpost on the subject.

I hope you all have a fantastic holiday!!  Stay safe and please remember your pets today, most pets are frightened by the loud noises of fireworks and firecrackers going off.  Keep your pet inside today and try and give them a safe haven to hang out in away from the chaos.

Starting tomorrow I’ll be joining Precious in her money saving challenge with a daily (hopefully) recap of what was spent every day and what was down to save/earn money.  Be sure to check it out!!