Great Carseat Deal!

This car seat is one of the best brands, and the price is the best I've seen in a long time.  You can use this one from 20-100 lbs, up to 65 lbs harnessed and then as a high back booster.  It's a plush and comfy seat and will be a great seat.  It won't last at $139 for long, so get it while you can.

More Great Sales

Here are a few more great deals from my inbox:

• Woman Within is having a sale, with $5, $10, and $15 items.  They also have a page where if you buy a certain item, you get a certain free item.  Check it out.  Also, I am able to send out $25 off $50 coupons, but would have to have your email.  If you're friendly with me and know my email or FB page, let me know you want one. 
• NY&Co. is having a huge Mother's Day sale with 50% off EVERYTHING.  You can get free shipping when you spend over $85 with promo code 2630.
• Bath & Body Works has a great gift bag, but looks like it's an in store only deal.  Get a $100 value bag (10 free full size products) for only $20 with $40 purchase.  This $10 off $30 coupon should help defray the cost.

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• Here's a coupon for buy one get one free Off Clip on.  You might have to be registered with Bzzagent to get it, but I love Bzzagent and it's free to register.
• Here's a coupon for one free Snikiddy product.  I don't know where to buy them, but I'm sure the site will tell more about that.
• Toys R Us has great deals in this weekend's ad.  This link (will probably have to enter your own zip code) has a ton of printable coupons for them. 
• Looks like Babies R Us is doing the same kind of ad, so HERE are their printables.
• Get 15% off $75 or 20% off $100 at Old Navy with code ONSAVEBIG
• Origins is giving two free samples with any order.  You choose from 4 different options.

Again, there should be more to come.  Enjoy, and pass it along to your friends if you'd like.

Freebie Friday!

I have found a few good ones to share:

• Free Pampers points, just received in a free coupon book I just got in the mail.  GETSTARTEDNOW10 for 10 points.  Sign up to get their mailers while you are there, because I just got some terrific coupons in their May coupon book, including a $3.50 off diapers and wipes coupon that can be stacked with a $3.00 off coupon from TRU in the same book. 
• Free coupon books!  Go to Mambo Sprouts for a monthly book with recipes and tons of coupons for organic products.
• Sign up at Rouge Mag and get a monthly coupon book with really great beauty product coupons!
• Have your child read some books, and they can receive a FREE children's book at Borders!
• Get a free pedometer! 
• Vocalpoint offers a cool free sample pack of Pampers.  You'll have to be a member, but there are awesome coupons and freebies to be had from Vocalpoint.

Will be back later with more great deals as I weed through my inbox.

Fun Friday!

There are some great deals around the internet today, so I thought I'd share a few I've found.

• Don't forget that Fridays are MegaBucks Friday at Swagbucks.  I see a lot of people on my friends' list making 30-50 on searches (no such luck for me yet)
• Amazon has some great deals going on.  Grey's Anatomy: The Complete Seasons 1-5 , Desperate Housewives: The Complete Seasons 1-5 and Scrubs: The Complete Seasons 1-8 are today's deal for TV on DVD.  They're all over 50% off, so grab them while you can.  Remember that if you go to the main page for the DVD deals and add one to your cart, you can get offered a free month of Amazon Prime.  Just go in and cancel auto-enroll to keep from being charged when the month is up.  You also do not have to actually buy them, this is just the way to get into the trial.
•  Don't forget to check out the Friday Sale
• Today there is a huge Friday TOY Sale which isn't common on the Friday sales, so be sure to check out the toy deals for today only.

That's all I have time for right now, but read back and see if you've missed anything during the week on here.  I've been trying to do a lot more posts each day, and there are a lot of good freebies I've posted so far this week.

Low Cost Substitutions--Foods

I've been working on this post off and on for a while, and it's time to put it to bed.  Some convenience foods are really nice to have for recipes in a pinch or a quick snack, but so often they are not only higher priced but bad for you.

Cream of Chicken Soup

Case in point-cream of (whatever) soup.  It's high in sodium and usually also has MSG in it.  If you want to make some tuna noodle casserole, the ultimate comfort food, you can use a can or two of cream of mushroom soup, spend some time making your own roux.  I like to use this recipe.

9 cans of cream soup (change servings and units)

Change to: cans of cream soup US Metric

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Ingredients

• 1 cup powdered milk
• 3/4 cup cornstarch
• 1/4 cup instant bouillon granules
• 2 tablespoons dried onion flakes
• 1 teaspoon basil
• 1 teaspoon thyme
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper

Directions

1. Mix all the ingredients together.
2. Store in an airtight container.
3. For the equivalent of 1 can of cream soup, mix 1/3 cup of dry mix with 1 1/4 cups of cold water. Cook in sauce pan until thick.
4. Entire recipe makes the equivalent of nine cans of cream soup.

The best part about this is that you can adjust it to your liking by changing the flavor of boullion you use.  The recipe makes the equivalent of 9 cans of soup, and it's very inexpensive.  My helpful hint for the day is this: don't use 1 1/4 cups of water and then wait for it to cook down.  Use more like 3/4 cup of water and it will thicken much faster.

Microwave Popcorn

Next up, the ever popular microwave popcorn.  Filled with transfats, too much sodium, and more fat and calories than you can shake a stick at, it just isn't worth it for a snack.  It's convenient, though, and much easier than some of the more traditional methods for making popcorn.

Did you know that you can make your own microwave popcorn with a plain brown lunch bag?  Use about 1/4 cup of unpopped kernels, then salt or the seasonings of your choice.  You can put a little oil or butter in the bag with it, but you don't even have to do that.  Fold the top of the bag down and cook it just the same way you would any bag of microwave popcorn.

For some other really great ideas, including a milkshake that doesn't use ice cream, head over to Hillbilly Housewife.  She has some great ideas, so be sure to look around the site while you're there.

I decided to split this up, and will have some low cost cleaning alternatives in a later post.  Keep checking back!