Score!

And the budget stuff continues on with some successes.

We finally got our own store loyalty card for Stop & Shop—I got tired of hoping to get the card discount but not knowing if the cashier would do it or not. So we got our own card probably two months ago. This week I looked at the bottom of my receipt, and to my shock we’d already saved over $50 just by shopping wisely and using that card.

Yesterday I saved even more with it. You accrue points every time you buy stuff there, and those points (which expire in 30 days) reduce the price of gas per gallon. If you have 100 points, you pay 10 cents less per gallon, and so on. I (finally) needed to put gas in the car—first time since Thanksgiving, can you believe it?—so I used my card. You already get a discount for using the card, usually about five cents. I had enough points that instead of paying $2.18/gallon, I paid $1.93/gallon. How cool is that?

But the real score came at Target. Try as I have (and I have tried, believe me), Kent is not interested in giving up soda. He has at least switched from the pricier cans to the 2-liter bottles but he still drinks a fair amount of it. So when I find a good deal on diet Coke products, I stock up. Target had 2-liter Coke products on sale 5/$5.55 which is a good price. But wait, it gets even better. Caffeine-free diet Coke was on sale at our Target for $1/2-liter bottle. So I got five bottles which are sitting in the smelly (and cool) closet just waiting for their turn in the fridge.