Geocaching



I'm all about some cheap, fun entertainment that doesn't include sitting in front of a TV so when I came across a website about geocaching I knew it was perfect for us. I signed up for the premium membership which was $10 for three months which is perfect for summer and isn't a long term commitment in case we don't love it. I also downloaded the mobile app on my iphone so that we could search "on the fly". So here's the deal in a nutshell...

People around the world have hidden different things, often times little plastic containers so that they hold up in the elements and wild animals. They plot the coordinates on the website and give it a clever name and maybe a hint. So today I decided to go on my first hunt alone. I wanted to be sure there was something to find before lugging all three kids to find something that didn't exist. The mobile app took me right to it! It was a tiny little film canister (remember those?) hidden at the tennis courts of a local public park. We visit this park all the time. Had no clue there was hidden treasure. I wrote our geocaching name on the little slip of paper and tucked it back into it's hiding place. In case you need more explanation here's a little geocaching 101. So cool! I was confident the kids would love it too.



See that little silver thing above Kenly's head? That is what we searched the woods for!



Later on I got all the kids and their friend and headed out to find more. The football field where the boys play had one that was a little more hard to find. I think it was supposed to be hanging from a branch but it was on the ground in a little patch of woods by the field. It didn't matter, the kids were hooked! Taylor was begging to go find more. I am really shocked at how many there are in our little town alone.

Next was the Boy Scout hut. This was super cool because the boy scouts had put a little plastic box in the woods by their scout hut. They had taped camouflauge tape on the box and had put little treasures in the box. The note said if you take something from the box to leave something of equal or greater value. We weren't prepared to leave anything so we put it back the way we found it.



There was only one out of five that we couldn't find. They didn't feel ripped off at that one either though since there was a deer skull on the ground. Kenly and I were a little grossed out but the boys thought it was cool.



Now we are all excited about going tomorrow!




And here's a little collection of our adventure...

Even Little Ms. Priss liked looking for hidden treasure



I promise were having more fun than this picture says




Looking...



Treasure!!!

EEEEWWWWW!!! but he thought it was cool.

This one was tricky to find because we looked all over the ground. Didn't think to look up!

This beats sitting inside any day!!



Late Night Grocery Shopping (Mis)Adventure

I love to grocery shop late at night. I got off work last night and headed to Harris Teeter. It was pouring rain so I ran from my car to the door with my beloved binder under my rain coat. I'll make the sacrifice of my hair getting wet and looking like a drowned rat but not willing to get my precious collection all soggy! I grabbed a few things in produce and down the aisles I went. I met a young mom on the condiments aisle that had a large stack of coupons in her hand and we talked for about 15 minutes about couponing strategies, places to get more coupons and how addicting this whole thing is. She had just ordered a bunch on coupon inserts off the internet and I can't for the life of me remember the name of the site. I'm going to search for it and post about it again if I find it. After my grocery shopping bonding time with my new coupon friend I went about my shopping. I reached for the worsteshire sauce that were lined up all neatly on the very top shelf and my rain coat sleeve got hooked on a bottle of something underneath it. Like a stack of dominoes those bottles fell with a crash! There I was all alone standing in a puddle of steak marinade! If I moved I tracked sauce to the clean spots on the floor so I just stood there until a VERY nice lady came to my rescue with a broom and some paper towels. I offered to mop it up and she insisted it was fine and cleaned up my great big mess. I walked away red in the face and tracking steak sauce. Someone walked by and said "man, that smell makes me want to grill out!" Geez!!! I removed my rain coat and took my time the rest of the time I was there.

My next misadventure was when I got to the check out line. There was only one guy working at this point because it was almost midnight. He called for help when he saw me coming! (Geez times a thousand). I asked him to do two check out orders because I went a little crazy and had more than 20 coupons, which is all Harris Teeter will allow. Well, i gave him my first batch of coupons before I was finished giving him the stuff and his system locked up. He had to void that order, take everything out of the bags and rescan everything! See, I had just told a friend earlier in the day that I had never had any issues at Harris Teeter so go figure!

All of that was completely worth it when I was time to pay. Here are the final figures....

Total before coupons and VIC = $234.83
Coupon and VIC savings = $178.88
Final total due = $55.95

I didn't take a picture of everything this time (my 7 year olf thinks I'm crazy for doing that anyway) but it was about 12:30am when I finally got home and I was ready to crash. Here's a little idea of what I got...
5 - 12 pack cans of coke products
6 - 2 liter Diet Rite (tyron's favorite)
3 - boxes Jello
2 - bags of Tortilla chips (for super bowl)
2 - boxes Triscuits
2 - boxes Wheat thins
4 - can evaporated milk
bananas
avocado
1 - gallon milk
Alot of yogurt
1 - 64oz. Juicy Juice
2 - frozen pizza
3 - jars Prego
1 - Ranch seasoning mix
2 - Jars Hot wing sauce
2 - Honey mustard dipping sauce
2 - Sweet Chili sauce
2 - worsteshire sauce
3 - tubes of toothpaste
1 - box pancake mix
1 - cookie dough mix
1 - Dish Liquid
2 - Snuggle Fabric Softener
2 - bags of rice (one white and one brown)
2 - 4 packs of quick rice
1 - Cocoa Puffs

Ok, I think that sums it up. I hear that they are going to be tripling again next week then they are going back to super doubles! Yay Harris Teeter!!

71% savings at Harris Teeter

Made a quick trip to Harris Teeter today to take advantage of their Triple coupon week. I had 45 short minutes to go all the way through. I didn't have a plan, just my notebook full of coupons. I started in the produce section and got some regular priced bananas and carrots. They had a little cart set up with reduced produce so I grabbed a bag of 7 bananas for .64! My other favorite steal-of-a-deal was the Yoplait yogurt for $2.50. I made my way all the way through the store in record time, used 20 coupons and spent $35.96! My original total was $122.90 which means a savings of $86.94!!! woo hoo!!!

$17 shopping trip

All of this for $17 at Harris Teeter!!