restaurant.com

I just HAD to share this awesome deal...

If any of you Dallas peeps love eating at Rafain Brazilian Steakhouse, restaurant.com is offering 80% off of their $25 gift certificates now through Valentine's Day. In fact, they have tons of restaurants to choose from, Rafain just happens to be one of our favs and we rarely go!!!

All you have to do is click HERE and before you checkout, enter the promo code: LOVE and you will get a $25 gift certificate for $2!!!!! AWESOME!!!

HAPPY DINING!!!

Sprout's lovers...

I made a Sprout's run today and thought I would share some of their specials in case you might need a few items. They have a TON of items that if you mix/match and if you buy 10 or more, they will take off 20%! This "Pre-Thanksgiving sale" only lasts until November 11th.

I stocked up on:

~ some all natural beef and chicken broth  2 for $5 {a little more expensive than the great value brand, but with the 20% off they become only $2 each. they also have veggie and soup's in a carton that are included} ~Near East brand couscous in different flavors- 2 for $3, making them $1.20 each after 20%off {much cheaper than wal-mart!}
~Chai Tea boxes of 20 bags 2 for $4 making them only $3.20 per box $.08 per tea bag!
~frozen veggies 2 for $3-- got my green beans to make for thanksgiving and some edamame

There are a ton of other items to choose from, I just didn't want to go crazy!

This isn't included in their pre-thanks sale, but bell peppers are also cheap! 3 for $1!! I love me some bell peppers!! Looks like stuffed peppers will be made for dinner one night this week

Happy Shopping! :)

A picture is worth a thousand words...

One of my favorite things about Christmas time is receiving Christmas cards with our friend's pictures and perhaps even a little newsletter with details on their lives. We proudly display them on ribbons across our entry mirror and the collage of photo pics warmly welcomes anyone who may stop in. Pictures are great reminders to me of memories, stories and friends and family for whom we are thankful for!

As we are nearing the Christmas season {and other holidays for that matter} I am starting to look on Shutterfly at Christmas Card options. There are so many to choose from, these are just a few of my favorites styles:

Christmas Letter Photo Card- You can send your picture and a brief update on your family all together! I love reading the happenings in my friend's lives and what a great way to cut back your paper usage!

A collage card if you can't decide on just 1 picture! That's the hardest part for me!With a style like this, you can have your 3 favorites!! I also love this simple, clean look; traditional Christmas color wording with black and white pictures! Such a classy look!!

 a simple, single picture card. This is the style I tend to lean towards. Love that this design is a square instead of the standard rectangle card.  An elegant look with my favorite color scheme: red, black and white!

  

I also love the  traditional, folded card! The saying on the front is one of my favorites! It has a warm, quaint ring to it "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" You can add another picture inside and create a special message for your family and friends.

 Shutterfly  has so many options AND an opportunity to get 50 FREE photo cards!! Who doesn't love getting FREE STUFF?!!? Especially during a season where maybe a little too much money is spent!

Click here to get your 50 FREE Holiday cards!

Hope you find your perfect Holiday cards! Don't forget to check out their cards for Thanksgiving, birth announcements and photo books {they make the perfect gifts!}

FREE reads?!

I found this thru Fantabulously Frugal! She is a 20-something who posts about deals, steals and giveaways. If you haven't checked out her site, you definitely should. She has posted about some awesome deals!

Random House is giving away a few new books, while supplies last, as a "read it forward" effort. They are hoping that you would request a copy of a book, read it, then pass it along to someone else to read. You can only have one entry per email address. I just signed Ricardo and I up and hopefully our books will be here soon. I don't think he will read them, but I sure will!

How neat is that?!

Click here for your FREE book!

sweet celebration...

My wonderful husband took me to dinner to celebrate my raise last night. We tried out this new little Italian place by our house. If you live around the Keller area, please go there! They are new and like everyone else, are struggling. We printed off a coupon for buy one get one half off! It's also BYOB but they offer a free glass of wine with the meal. The Food was EXCELLENT and we got bread, salads, 2 glasses of wine, 2 entrees and left overs for $26 {including tax and tip!} Actually, you could eat for even cheaper with different entrees!

After dinner I had a yearning to go to Target and saw several pair of shoes that I love. Ricardo told me to pick one out and we would get them as a congratulations pair!! Now money for us is tight right now with lots of money owed on doctor bills, so it was a really sweet surprise! I usually wear a lot of flats and flip flops to work since I stand on my feet all day, but I decided to go with the fun pair that I would wear out and NOT to work! Now we need to go out so I can wear them, darn!

**quality of pictures aren't that great, they came from my phone!

We even got him a pair of shoes that happened to be clearanced out for $6.47!! They only had 2 pairs left and one was just his size!

We actually spent an hour and a half in Target looking at books, shoes, home decor { I found a rug that I want when we re-do the guest bath} and it was a very relaxing evening!

Thank you hubby, for a wonderful "Raise" celebration!!

Off to the Doctor, lunch with mom, house hunting and shopping to replace some of her stolen goods. Happy Friday!

lovely...

"Indie acoustic melodies and lyrics that sound like lullabies and feel like sunshine."

This sweet girl happens to be the sister of one of my best friends and her music is as sweet at she is. If you're in Waco, you have probably heard her sing at the goodness that is CG's.



It's availble on CDbaby for $5.99! She has 8 original songs you can buy and CDbaby allows you to preview them first!



If you want to hear full songs, go to her myspace: myspace.com/jillianedwardsmusic.


Jillian is opening for Sleeperstar at House of Blues here in Dallas on May 1. If you're in town...GO! Support a local artist. :-)

Colors of Compassion

I posted a little while ago about our little boy that we sponsor thru Compassion International. We just got our newsletter/magazine from them and inside was a sample greeting card. Dayspring has line of greeting cards where the proceeds go to help Compassion provide medical care for children in need. The cards are really cute and help out precious children. What better way to tell someone you love or are thinking about them?! We will definitely start buying these sweet cards!! You should too!!! They come in packages of 6 and are the same price as if you bought the cards individually.

elfa-ed out!

SO... We finally Elfa-ed our pantry. It's been something I have wanted to do since we got married, but just haven't wanted to spend the money on it. It can get pretty pricey with all the components. In fact, I still want to get 2 more racks I think. My reason for doing it now...The 30% off sale ended on Monday. We went for it! I feel much better when looking at my pantry and can actually see what we have. I did find that I bought multiples of a few things...oops!


I feel so much better about my lovely pantry :-)

Deal of the week...

As times are getting tougher, I am trying to find little ways to save $. I have seen several interviews with people on TV who "Coupon" and get about $100 worth or groceries for about $25. I have decided to become one of "those people". I am taking on the challenge and we bought our first paper today. We did go to the grocery store today and they are running the double/triple coupon days. Albertson's is actually having a pretty good sale right now. I didn't come out on the $100 worth for $25 end, but still got some great deals!

We bought a TON of fruit for juicing. By a ton I mean: 4 apples, 5 pears, 12 oranges, 4 kiwi , carton of blueberries, big bag of limes and a 5 lb bag of carrots. All of those, except the carrots, were 10lbs for $10...$1/pound! Pretty great deal! Lots of Fruit and we only paid $18 for it!! Other grocery items I save d$5.00 with my cut out coupons. We didn't buy a ton nor did we save an extravagant amount, but $5 is $5. We actually saved $43 total, but there was a store coupon for the final and BEST DEAL OF THE WEEK item... drum roll please...

They had buy one get two free coupon on steaks. They are pre-marinated and we got $45 worth of steaks for $15!! It will feed both Ricardo and I eight times! Pretty amazing right?! I think so!

Hopefully I will get better at "couponing" and save us a little moolah every trip. I think I did pretty good tonight!