Show me the money

First of all, I am fully aware that a good portion of my friends and family are sick of hearing me talk about coupons. If you are one of them, perhaps you should move along now and check back at a later date for a more interesting blog. I will not however go into a detailed tutorial on how to coupon if that's what you're worried about, so if you can bear with...read on. Suffice it to say that I can't imagine I let so much money go to waste before this coupon thing. No, I'm not an extreme couponer. I don't have a bomb shelter with 72 cans of baked beans. I do, however have 14 or so bottles of laundry detergent on hand at any given time. I also have 4 children (2 of whom are babies) and 2 adults to do laundry for on a regular basis. I have 4 kids at home with me for the summer as well and I never run out of lunches for them. I never run out of bread, or frozen pizzas, or french fries, or any of those staple items you need to run an efficient kid-friendly household thanks to the fact that I treat the grocery store like the stock market. I buy low. And I buy lots. It works for me and I enjoy providing for my family in that way. We're very blessed. We have more than we need, for sure. But as a work-at-home Mom, I don't mind a bit doing the extra work to contribute to the household in a way that I didn't before. Plus we donate items, and the kids remember things like that. And not just that, but frankly I don't like having to go to Food Lion. I like Harris Teeter. I like the Starbucks, I like the atmosphere, I even like the staff. And the fact that they double my coupons gives me even more of a reason to shop there exclusively. So yes, I do stock up quite a bit. I probably don't need as much toothpaste as I have stockpiled, and occasionally I do realize that I've got 3 bottles of Lite Raspberry Walnut Vinagrette when I can't recall ever actually eating or wanting Raspberry Walnut Vinagtrette, light or otherwise, but overall we use what we buy. And what we buy is cheap. And we use ALOT in this house. I have more food in my house now than I have at any point in my life. I like that my kids will never know what it's like to be in a household where the cupboards are all but bare. It all just makes me happy, so you'll have to pardon me if I post/talk/blog about it quite a bit (not to mention the random people I stop in stores that I see paying full-price). I can't help it. I want to pass it along. Now I must go, after all it is Sunday paper day;)