Free Sample of Nescafe Memento Coffee

Receive a free sample of Nescafe Memento Coffee! Just fill out your mailing information. Click Here to get yours! You will receive 2 Nescafe Memento stick packs and a $1.00 coupon of you next purchase of Nescafe. Nescafe Memento is available in 3 NEW flavors, Caramel Latte, Cappuccino and Mocha.

Free Sample of V05 Shampoo & Conditioner

Receive 2 full size bottles of V05 Shampoo & Conditioner, FREE, if you are one of the first  200 people to enter at 12pm noon on the V05 Facebook page. 

Last day to enter is August 1st! CLICK HERE!!

Free sample - Emergen-C Vitamin Drink Mix

A free sample of Emergen-C Vitamin Drink Mix is now available from the Emergen-C website. www.EmergenC.com/free-samples Click the link to get your free sample!

Easy Taco Salad Bowls

This is a good idea so you don't have to buy that special gadget from the TV infomercials. Turn your muffin pan upside down, spray with cooking spray, bake tortillas for 10 minutes at 375 degrees.

Save Money on Baby Wipes

I have 2 toddlers at home. I always seemed to be buying more and more wipes every time I was at the store. I end up using wipes for everything. I clean the kids, counter tops, toilets, the laptop and flat screen TV! Each time I would try a different brand. Some were too small, too thin, smelled weird. One day I saw a display by the baby section of Walmart with these Equate Shea Butter refill packs. 240 wipes comparable to Huggies for $4.72! This is even cheaper than their Parents Choice brand (3 pack bundle, 216 wipes). I took the wipes home and I liked them a lot. They are thick and smell pleasant. They also seemed to last longer. However, on my next trip to buy them, the display was no longer there and I could not find them in the baby section. They now stock them in the Health & Beauty section! This is where they stock the anti-bacterial wipes such as Wet Ones. So happy they didn't stop carrying them. That is what usually happens as soon as I find a product at Walmart that I really like, they will discontinue it. The wipes only come in 2 varieties, Shea Butter and Naturally Gentle (Fragrance Free). You really can't beat the price and they are good quality wipes. I hope this tip will save you a dollar... or 3 the next time you are at the checkout.

Free Sample Eco-Me Cleaning Product

Click the link to get you free Eco-Me Cleaning Product sample!

Clear Dye Free Homemade Laundry Detergent

I know a lot of you have seen the recipes for homemade laundry detergent. Recently, I came across one that uses Dawn dish liquid. In this recipe there is no need to shave down the bar soap and melt it on the stove. While talking with my sister, she mentioned that she would like to try to make her own homemade detergent. However, she usually buys the clear detergent at the store. But, on her last visit they had raised the price by a few dollars. So, I came up with this recipe for my sensitive-skinned sister ;) This recipe uses Dawn Pure Essentials Dye Free Hypoallergenic Dish Liquid instead of the Original Blue Dawn.

Recipe: 1/2 cup Borax, 1/2 cup Super Washing Soda, 1/2 cup Dawn Pure Essentials Dye Free Dish Liquid, Water

I just used a large plastic orange juice jug that I had washed out, to make and store this in. (You can use any plastic jug up to 1 gallon size.)
First, fill the jug about 2/3 of the way to the top with warm water. Then, add the Borax and Super Washing powders to the water using a funnel. Close the top of the jug and shake to dissolve the powders. After the powders have dissolved you can add in the Dawn dish liquid and fill the jug the rest of the way to the top leaving a little room to shake and mix in the Dawn. I suggest adding the Dawn at the end. If you try to add everything to the bottle first and then fill with water, the dish soap will foam up and you will have a jug full of bubbles spilling out of the top as you are trying to fill the jug with water. I left this just sit on the counter overnight and then tried it the next morning. In my mind, I thought it would be watery like dish water but to my surprise it was thick and resembled the consistency of liquid laundry detergent you would buy in the store. I threw a cup in the washer and it worked fine.

Free Sample Boss Orange Fragrance

Go here Free Boss Orange Fragrance Sample to get your free sample today!

The only stain remover that worked!

My son is about to turn 4 years old. The other day he was eating a meatball sub with this white shirt on. Boys being boys, he dripped some of the tomato sauce down the front of the shirt and also managed to get some over on the shoulder. I looked online and found endless recipes for homemade stain removers. So, I tried a few on this shirt. I tried vinegar & dish soap; vinegar & baking soda, homemade laundry detergent (fels-naptha) and Mean Green Degreaser. None of them really seemed to make any difference to the stain. Then I remembered that I had some Clorox Bleach Gel in the cabinet. I put a small dot of bleach gel on each stained area and let it sit for about 3 minutes. I rinsed the shirt out and the stains had disappeared! So I guess it's true, nothing works quite like good old fashioned Clorox Bleach. Now obviously you could not do this on a colored shirt. So next time I am going to test out Colorox 2 Color Safe Bleach and see if it has the same effect.

Free Samples from Target

Get a free sample of Shout Color Catcher from Target. Just go to http://samples.target.com/ Also available is a free sample of Starbucks K-cups. You will be asked a couple of questions about each product before you put in your mailing information.

Homemade Laundry Soap

I'm sure a lot of you have seen this homemade laundry detergent recipe on the internet lately. Just in case you haven't, this was my experience making the detergent for the first time.

Basically, the soap is made from 4 household ingredients. Bar Soap, Washing Soda, Borax and Water.

I'll quickly give you a run down of the process.

First, you take a bar of soap and grate it on a box grater. I used a bar of Fels-Naptha laundry soap. (I have also used one called Zote that can sometimes be found in the laundry isle or can be found in a Hispanic store.) However, you can use any bar soap that you like. 

Then, you need to melt down the soap you grated. Put about 4 cups of water in a pot and bring it to a boil. Turn it down to a simmer and add the soap shavings to the water a little at a time. You can stir it around with a spoon to help it along.

Also, you need to get a large container/bucket of some sort with a lid. Fill the large container with 2-3 gallons of hot water.

Pour your melted soap mixture into the hot water along with 1 cup of Super Washing Soda and 1/2 cup of Borax.

Stir with a large spoon until all the powders have dissolved. Then you are supposed to put the lid on your container and let it sit for 24 hours until it gels.

Let me just tell you that washing soda can be hard to find. Many stores do not carry it. I realize that washing soda and baking soda are 2 different things. But, I wanted to make the soap and couldn't find any washing soda. So, I just threw in a cup of the baking soda instead. Because in my mind the soap you use is for it's cleaning properties. The borax is a laundry booster that softens hard water which helps your detergent work better. The baking soda has sanitizing and deodorizing benefits which is the same thing the washing soda does.

I let my detergent sit for 12 hours. I couldn't help myself and took the lid off to see what it looked like. What I found was that the top half of the mixture had formed into a thick gelatinous substance. Under the gel it just seemed to be soapy water. So, I took a spoon and broke up the gel and mixed it all up again. After a few more hours I checked it again and found that the whole container was now gelled at this point. I'm guessing if I would have left it the full 24 hours without messing with it, it probably would have all been gelled.

When it was finished I ended up with a very thick gel. To wash your clothes, just dip out a cup of the gel and add it to your washer like you would with any other laundry detergent. Don't worry about its Jello-like appearance, it will dissolve in the water. This is a low sudsing detergent so don't freak out if you don't see a lot of bubbles in the washer. Also, the color and scent of your detergent will vary depending on which bar soap you use.

From what I have calculated, I could probably make laundry detergent for a year for about $12.00!
I would still suggest pre-treating tough stains before washing.

I liked the fresh smell of this detergent. I have started using this soap to scrub down things all around the house now.

Lightlife Backyard Grill'n Burger Review (Vegetarian)

I just happened upon these Veggie Burgers in the grocery store the other day. I had not seen this brand before. My older daughter and I often like to try different vegetarian meat substitutes. We try to eat a vegetarian meal about once a week. My daughter says that sometimes she likes the taste of meat free products better than the actual meat they are immitating. I liked the fact that you can actually cook these burgers on the grill. We usually just microwave other veggie burgers we've tried. If you go over on the cooking time by 20 seconds they will get hard and dry. So we threw these on the grill right from the freezer. It says to cook them for about 7-9 minutes, turning once. The burgers actually look just like they do on the package. They had a nice grilled taste and a meaty texture. Even though I believe we cooked ours a little longer than it said on the package, they were still soft in the middle and not dried out. My daughter thought they were delicious! Lightlife offers 4 different varieties of burgers. At 190 calories, 20 grams of protein and 0 cholesterol. These are a healthy substitute for greasy beef burgers.The only thing you will miss from a real burger is the grease dripping onto your plate or running down your arm. To find out more information about Lightlife products visit them at Lightlife.com, you can signup for their newsletter to be notified about coupons and special offers. You can also find Lightlife on Facebook.

Let me introduce myself...

Hello, my name is Shannon. I am a 34 year old mother of 3. My children are ages 14, 4 and 2. I am originally from Darlington, Maryland and now I live in Ennice, North Carolina. I find that a lot of people like myself are struggling in these poor economic times. We live paycheck to paycheck here in our house. I need to pinch every penny and save money where ever I can in order to provide for my children. I wanted to start this blog to share with you some of the ways I have found to save money. I will share tips, tricks, recipes and product reviews that I think will help your family save money too.