Saving Money

Today's economy has called for some significant changes in most American households, ours included. Looking at ways to save money, my husband and I are considering doing the following:

*Dropping our home phone and using just our cell phones (I have heard that we can choose 5 non-Verizon phones to call anytime for free, I need to look into this).

*Dropping our internet and using only the Verizon air card. We currently have wireless at home and the air card for when we are on the road. We never get close to the minutes on our air card and we have come to rely on the ability to get online anywhere so it makes sense to keep the air card over the home internet.

*Let go of our HBO. Before I moved in my husband used to watch a couple of shows on HBO but there is currently nothing that interests us, we find ourselves searching for something on HBO just to use it.

My husband also reminded me that we could use other stores' ads when we shop at WalMart and they will match the price. I double checked at customer service for their policy and am also listing it here for you -
Price matching
Our goal is always to be the low price leader in every community where we operate. Our customers trust us to have every day low prices ... there's no need for "special sales."

Our unbeatable promise:
Store managers make the final decision in always taking care of our customers, but we do have guidelines for matching our competition.
~We do honor "Preferred Shopping Card" advertised prices. Must be like items, be advertised and require a competitor's shopping card, for the discount to apply.
~We do not honor advertisements that require a purchase in order to receive the advertised price or free product.
~We do not honor "Buy One / Get One Free" advertisements.
~We do not honor double or triple coupons or percent off advertisements.
~We do not honor other retailers' "Misprinted" advertised prices.
~We do not honor Internet Pricing.
~We do not honor competitor advertisements from outside of the store's or Club's local trade territory.

I have been price matching for 2 weeks now and cannot believe some of the deals I have received!! This week one of the competitors had 'lean ground beef' on sale for $0.99/lb. so I took it to WalMart and their lean ground beef was the 93/7. This meat normally retailed for $18.86 for a 5.5 pound package and we paid $5.44 for this package!!! I bought two that night and went back today, the last day of the sale, and got two more!!

Another store had eggs at $0.88/dozen. I eat eggs each morning and normally buy 2 flats (5 dozen) at a time. This week I bought them by the individual dozen and saved over $1.00.

We also stocked up on butternut squash that was on sale for $0.88/lb. and normally retailed for $1.56/lb. at WalMart. We bought a couple more today as they will last for a considerable time in the fridge.

My favorite deal of the week was definitely the ground beef!! I typically don't eat beef as it is harder for the body to break down but turkey has been a complete turn-off this pregnancy so we decided to try this, it was so delicious!! Anyways, I divided it into 12 oz. servings (6 oz. for each of us) and froze it to use in the future. I ended up with 30 double-servings of protein for under $22.00 and I know it will go a long way...

My other thought for saving money is to look for free activities in your area. We have a lot of state parks and this time of year is perfect for hiking! They typically do charge about $2 to get in but we bought a yearly park pass and now we don't have to worry about this charge each time. This weekend we are going to a local park and will pick up some geocaches while we are out...

We also have a zoo pass and can get into our local zoo and about 50 others in the United States for free. We have definitely gotten our money out of this pass, I think I have visited 3 different zoos this year!

Also, look for a discount movie theater, we have one here and we pay $2.00 per person to watch a movie. Granted, these are now new releases; they are typically movies that have been in the theaters and are ready to move on. But if you are looking for an enjoyable and inexpensive date night this is the way to go!

These are just some ways that we are saving money, what ideas do you have?