Queen Mother Blog

I am honored to present my first guest post, written by Debbie Schaeffer of Mrs. G TV & Appliances.  I am a part of the Mrs. G's VIB program and have already learned so much just after attending one event (if you missed my post on the first event be sure to click here and check it out!)  Now I've learned that the government is rolling out a "cash for clunkers" program to help you replace your inefficient home appliances. Here is Debbie to explain it for us:


Many customers ask about “Cash for Clunker Appliances” or “Cash for Appliances” rebates ever since Secretary Chu announced a $300 million rebate program, part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act created early summer 2009 to encourage purchases of energy efficient appliances. This program is actually called ARRA Energy Efficient Appliance Program. It is easier to say Cash for Appliances – and easier to remember what the program is designed to do!

Most customers are expecting a significant dollar rebate, a la the huge rebates offered during Cash for Clunker Cars. Because Mrs. G TV & Appliances is committed to helping our customers, we wanted to help explain the program and get everyone up to speed.

First, a little background on the program: Nearly $300 million of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 has been set aside for state run rebate programs for consumer purchases of new innovative ENERGY STAR® qualified home appliances. Each state picks their own time frame and designs their own promotion, within certain DOE guidelines.

First let’s look at New Jersey. If you visit the government’s Energy Savers site, click through to New Jersey and you will see that our state rebates for energy star refrigerators, clothes washers, and dishwashers are anticipated in April 2010 (and are subject to availability). Rebates will end when funds are depleted, so your best bet is to shop early. Right now Pennsylvania is not offering rebates for home appliances (i.e. refrigerators, washers, dishwashers), but if this changes, we will be sure to pass along the information!

Another website full of information for New Jersey energy efficient appliance rebates is New Jersey Clean Energy. If you take a look at rebates and promotions as of December 29, 2009 the ARRA funding of NJ’s $8.33 million for incentives are tentatively scheduled for April 2010. For now, it’s a sure bet these rebates will happen in April.

This plan highlights home appliances rebates as follows: clothes washers will receive a $35.00 rebate, dishwashers will receive $25 to $75 rebates and refrigerators will receive $75 to $100. Do not be discouraged by the low amount. Don’t be surprised to see added incentives from the manufactures and exclusive rebates from Mrs. G’s!

New Jersey currently offering two rebates for home appliances. A $50 rebate to recycle your old energy guzzling refrigerator that is still working. The refrigerator early retirement incentive will dovetail with the ARRA Energy Efficient Appliance Program. New Jersey also continues the $75 rebate on Select Tier 3 Energy Star Qualified Clothes Washers and a $25 rebate on the purchase of dehumidifiers that have earned the Energy Star label. These rebates will continue through December 31, 2010.

So, if you want to wait till April to take advantage of aggressive rebates to stimulate the economy and do your part to make your life more energy efficient, be sure to stop by Mrs. G’s and talk to one of our knowledgeable sales staff and they can help you pick out the best appliance for you.

We understand not everyone can wait until April to purchase new appliances for their home. Until the rebates are finalized, Mrs. G’s will give you the best guaranteed lowest price possible with outstanding customer service. No one can beat that! We have 75 years of experience and very satisfied customers on our side!

In the meantime read up on the rebate programs and stop by our showroom to find a great selection of ENERGY STAR® qualified home appliances!

Thanks Debbie!  Want to know more about Mrs. G TV & Appliances?  Click here to visit the website.  For more information on Debbie click here.

I stopped in Toys R Us last night and found this deal, which I thought was definitely worth sharing! From 1/1-1/3 Earth's Best Chlorine Free Diapers are on sale for $5 a pack (Jumbo).  There is a limit of 3 per person.

Thought this was a great deal, but also a good way to try diapers that are a bit more sustainable ;o)

Have you ever heard of Save-a-Lot?  I didn't think I had, until I realized that there was actually one very close to me.  I haven't been there yet (be looking for a review post from me in the very near future as I check it out) but it looks very similar to an Aldi store, which you know I've reviewed in the past.  One step better , though, is that Save-a-Lot has printable coupons available on their site to save you even more.

Well recently someone from Save-a-Lot emailed me to let me know about their holiday dinner for four people for under $15 promotion and I wanted to pass it on to you.

For under $15 a family of four can eat a full holiday meal including a Sugardale ham, fresh sweet potatoes, Fresh Express salad, a Mrs. Smith's pie and a lot more!  Click here to check out the deal on Save-a-Lot's website.  Even if you aren't interested in the family meal deal, be sure to check out the $5 off a $20 purchase coupon on that same page!

This would be a great low-cost way to give a meal to a family in need, too!

I know that I've mentioned Ebates before in the past, but I just thought I'd point it out to any new readers.

If you are going to make *any* online purchases, I highly recommend going through Ebates.  You will get a % of your purchase back in cash (a check is mailed every few months).  This is like free money!  The best part is you can still use your coupon codes.  Just scope out a coupon code you want to use (or if you don't have any, Ebates will suggest some), sign up or login to your Ebates account, click the link to the store you want to shop in and then proceed as usual!  Ebates will give you credit for the purchase just by clicking through their link.

If you click here and sign up, we both get $5 (thanks!) & last year when I signed up Ebates also sent me a bonus $5 gift card to Target out of nowhere in the regular mail as a thank you for signing up.  I don't know if they still do that, but I was just so amazed how easy & rewarding it has been for me to use Ebates.

Also, don't forget to check out Retail Me Not for any coupon codes that might help you in your online shopping!

This week at Staples HP Multipurpose paper is $4.99 with a $3.99 rebate, making the final price $1 a ream! This offer is limit 2. I use up a bunch of paper printing coupons ;) so I was just about out of paper when I saw this in the circular. I went yesterday and picked up 2 reams and the rebate process is very easy. "Easy" is their motto after all! The rebate receipt will print with instructions on how to submit online (like RiteAid) and it only takes a few seconds.

Click here to check out the Staples weekly ad.

CVS is carrying Mom's Best Naturals oatmeal (it is in the canister) for $1 in a special value section of the store, near the seasonal items. You can print two $0.75 off any Mom's Best product coupons here (use the back button to print the coupon twice) to get 2 canisters of oatmeal for only a quarter each!

I was able to do this at my local store and for some reason I was really excited about it. I score great deals all the time, but something about taking home a nice big container for a quarter made me pretty happy! :p

I found this deal on the Money Saving Mom blog. Click here to check out the other CVS deals she has posted for this week!

It was like I got paid $14.62 to take home the groceries you see in the picture!

First, if you are new to working deals at Acme, please read the background info on this post. This will explain how the coupons double & how to print two copies of the printable coupons.

First, if you are new to working deals at Acme, please read the background info on this post. This will explain how the coupons double & how to print two copies of the printable coupons.

Wow! I actually have an Acme post this week :D And can you believe that I'm actually not complaining about the deals this week? It seems like there's going to be some great sales on the horizon for back to school, which makes me very happy!

First, I caught on Moms Need to Know this post about a really great deal that Kraft is doing in conjunction with Acme (pretty much $25 of free groceries!), so check the list of participating items here and try to hold off on buying those until this deal starts on Friday.

Ok--here's the best deal scenario of them all, and the best thing is that you can do this really well with just printable coupons. So send this post to your non-coupon-clipping friends and they can do it too!

There's a Catalina promo for Unilever and General Mills products where you buy $30 of participating products and you will get a $15 Catalina (register) coupon for your next shopping order. Take note that you can only earn one of these $15 Catalinas per transaction, so if you are interested in doing this deal more than once you will need to do more than one transaction. Also, the best part about these deals is that the $30 you need to spend is before coupons, so you will really spend much less and still get the $15 coupon! :)

Check the pullout page for the complete list of participating products, but tons of these items have both circular coupons and printable coupons available on Coupons.com and Smartsource.com right now. Here is one example scenario for you with coupons all currently available on Coupons.com:

• Buy one bag of regular Chex mix and one bag of chocolate Chex mix at $1.66 each. Use one of each $0.50 off printable - there is one for regular and one for chocolate ($0.50 off will double to $1 off). Total credit toward $30 = $3.32 - Total price after coupons = $1.32
• Buy three boxes of Hamburger, Tuna or Asian helper at $1.50 each. Use one of the $0.75 off 3 boxes printable (coupon will double to $1.50 off). Total credit toward $30 = $4.50 - Total price after coupons = $3
• Buy one Macaroni Grill dinner kit. Use the $1.10 off one printable. Total credit = $3.99 - Total price after coupon = $2.89
• Buy two Nature Valley Granola Nut Clusters. Use the $1 off coupon. Total credit = $2.50 - Total price after coupon = $1.50
• Buy two boxes of Kix cereal and print two of the $0.75 off one coupons ($0.75 coupon will double to $1.50 off). Total credit = $4 - Total price after coupons = $1
• Buy two boxes of Honey Nut Cheerios and print two of the $0.55 off one coupons (will double to $1.10 each). Total credit = $4 - Total price after coupons = $1.80
• Buy two boxes of Betty Crocker fruit snacks and print two of the $0.40 off coupons (will double to $0.80 each). Total credit = $4 - Total price after coupons = $2.40
• Buy two boxes of Betty Crocker shaped fruit snacks and print the $0.50 off two coupon (will double to $1 off). Total credit = $4 - Total price after coupon = $3
• Buy one BC cake mix at $1 and one can of BC frosting at $1.50. There is a coupon that requires you to buy both and take $0.50 off (will double to $1 off). Total credit = $2.50 - Total price after coupon = $1.50
• Buy one box of Fiber One snack bars at $2.50 and print the $0.40 off one coupon (will double to $0.80 off). Total credit = $2.50 - Total price after coupon = $1.70

In my scenario here, you will have met the $30 purchase quota ($31.31) and the final price you really pay after coupons is $17.41. Then at the end of the transaction, the $15 Catalina coupon will print out, pretty much making it $2.41 for all of those groceries! Of course you can modify this deal based on what you need or use and the final total may vary a little bit. But especially if you do this deal before your weekly shopping (if you have that kind of time, lol) you can head right back into the store and use the $15 coupon for the rest of your groceries and really lower how much you spend out of pocket on one day.

The other deals for the week:

There is another Catalina deal where you purchase $20 in Proctor & Gamble products get a $5 Catalina coupon for your next purchase. Check the circular for all of the participating products (Charmin, Bounty, Puffs, etc.), but there are coupons available in the P&G Brandsaver insert from Sunday's paper.

Kellogg's Pop-Tarts 8 ct. are on sale 5 for $5 (must buy five!). There was a Kellogg coupon insert in Sunday's paper that had two coupons to use here, one for $1 on any 2 Pop-Tarts and a $1 on any 2 Blueberry muffin or Chocolate banana split. Use them both and get 5 boxes of Pop-Tarts for $3. That's only $0.60 each!

Eggo Waffles 10 ct. are buy one get one free at around $3.59 each. There is a $1 off 2 coupon in the Kellogg insert making two boxes $1.30 each.

Finally, there's a bunch of buy one get one free deals throughout the circular and on the back page. These include Tyson Chicken strips, Herr's Tortilla chips, Oscar Meyer bacon, Hatfield deli ham, and more.

Find any awesome deals or have a question? Leave it in the comments!

First, if you are new to working deals at Acme, please read the background info on this post. This will explain how the coupons double & how to print two copies of the printable coupons.

Prices aren't too great this week. There's a bunch of Buy one get one free items this week (Bogo) which seem to be some of the better deals. For me and my Coke Zero addiction, the best deal is the Coke 12-pack circular deal. Here's what I see:

Circular deals:

Stouffer's Red box, Lean Cuisine, Multi-Serve, Hot or Lean Pockets are all 50% off.

McCormick Grillmate marinade packs are $1 this week. If you still have the $0.50 McCormick coupons they will double to $1 making these FREE.

First, if you are new to working deals at Acme, please read the background info on this post. This will explain how the coupons double & how to print two copies of the printable coupons.

You can get some free marinade and rub, and scroll to the bottom for a Catalina deal. Here's what I see this week:

First, if you are new to working deals at Acme, please read the background info on this post. This will explain how the coupons double & how to print two copies of the printable coupons.

I can't believe how few deals there have been lately. As I look through the circular the "sale" prices of some items (like Nabisco crackers, Kraft dressing, Juicy Juice) are at the highest. What gives Acme? Bring us some good summer deals :D Anywho, here is a quick post of the only good deals I see.

First, if you are new to working deals at Acme, please read the background info on this post. This will explain how the coupons double & how to print two copies of the printable coupons.

I'm sorry I'm so late on getting this post up, it has been a crazy week yet again for me, but I feel like there are actually some decent coupon matchups this week and you might want to run and pick them up between now and Thursday!  You can get free McCormick grill seasonings, more than free Kraft bbq sauce and a bunch of stuff for $1.