Tightening the Belt

We are all very aware that the economy is not what it use to be. If you are not one of the fortunate employees of AIG that just got a great big bonus, then you are probably looking for ways to save a few bucks. I have a few tricks that I have been using with some success and thought they would be worthwhile to share. Please feel free to comment below and pass along some of your favorite penny pincher's too!
1. www.thegrocerygame.com - Shout out to Shayla for this great website find! You can sign up free for 8 weeks and customize the grocery stores that you want specials from. Every week, you get "the list" of the coming week's specials, it tells you what coupon to use to save even more, and when the price is so low that you need to stock up. You will have to build a coupon base by spending about 10 minutes a week pulling out the coupons from the Sunday paper. Consider this the perfect excuse to get your husband to keep the kids out of your hair, after all, you are saving money and he loves that! I save about 20% a week, but I sort of half ass it. My friend saves about 40% a week on average.
2. Frozen Juice-for those of you with little ones, you probably buy somewhere in the neighborhood of a gazillion juice boxes a year. My trick is to get the concentrated frozen juice, add much more water then it calls for to deplete the sugar, and keep it in a pitcher in the fridge. It is much cheaper than the alternative and makes me feel like I'm not creating a sugar guzzling monster since there is more water than juice.
3. Rotisserie Chicken-Walmart sells these babies in the deli. They make them all day, so you can usually find one that came out in the last hour. They are around $5 or so. This doubles as a time and money saver for me. I get home and pull all the meat off. I put half in one container to freeze for the next time I want to make chicken enchiladas or chicken soup and use half for some sort of pasta. I have two dinners done for $5! What a bargain! Now, occasionally I could find a chicken on special that might be less, but then I have to roast it myself. I'm waiting for the soup lines to start before I go to that extreme.
4. Diapers-Lord help you if you have 2 or more kids in diapers in this economy. With Luke, I just blindly paid $27 a box for the brand names. Now, I know better. Consumer Reports did an issue on diapers last year and compared Pampers, Huggies, White Cloud (Walmart's store brand) and Target's store brand. They found them all to be the same!!!! The only thing that isn't the same is the price...store brands are cheaper by about $13 a box. I love the Target brand. It works great and we have almost no blowouts. When you stop and think about what happens in these things, you realize to pay more for a brand is crazy.
5. End of Season Sales-Clothes are dirt cheap at the end of the season, so it's a good time to score some major deals. Buy only what you think might still look good next time that season rolls around (Put down the bubble dress, sister. It will be a distant memory next year.). For kids, you can really, really rake in some cute clothes on the cheap. I always buy a size or two up at the end of season for the next year. Let's say you get a whole summer wardrobe and junior had a growth spurt and now his new clothes are way small. Leave the tags on!!!!!! Some stores will give you store credit if you return, but you might actually make money by putting them on Craig's list. If the tags are on, people will pay more for them. Scratch off the $1.99 sticker and they feel really good about paying $4 for something that they think you paid $8 for. Online shoppers, don't forget about http://www.retailmenot.com/! You can always find some sort of coupon to save you even more dinero on the sale stuff!
6.Library-Huh? Let me say that again...lib-rar-y. I read everything that I can get my hands on, so this one might be self-indulgent, but if I would have gotten a library card in my twenties, I would be a wealthy women right now. Well, maybe not right now with the way the market is performing, but you get my drift. I have spent thousands of dollars on books in my life. The library has every one of them for free. I love to get the kids books there to, of course. Mix in free dvd and cd rentals and you can cut out some of your entertainment budget. Most libraries let you reserve new releases, which makes it great for movie night.
This is my two cents on how to save two cents. Again, if you have any tips, please add them below in the comment area. It takes a village to save some money. I'm glad my village is filled with smart ladies like you. Momma happy.