The winner is….beautiful weather!  This past week, I didn’t take the time needed to coupon and it showed.  The excitement of being outside in the beautiful weather was by far greater than sitting at my desk in full couponing throttle.  So, with the glory of the sun shining on my pale skin and a warm breeze upon my cheek, I spent some much-needed playtime with my family.

Then before I knew it, a thunder was rolling in.  Not the thunder of bad weather, but rather another kind of storm.  We were quickly running out of things.  Yep, we do still run out of things.  Milk, pull-ups, wipes, bread, peanut butter (I thought I was covered for a year…not so much), tp, and a few other things.  These items are part of our daily routine and to be out of them isn’t a possibility.  Which meant one thing.  I had to make a quick list and go.

Usually making a quick list isn’t an issue, but I was suddenly out of another thing.  Take a guess.  Any clue?  One of the worst things to be out of when you’re a couponer.  Printer ink.  Talk about a show stopper.  Feeling like I was thrown back into the stone age, I actually had to write out my lists and I couldn’t print any coupons either.  Of course, if I had time, I would’ve tracked some down.  That wasn’t an option this time though.  Eventually, I muddled through and made a list and clipped my coupons.

When I got to the store, I wasn’t excited, I was scared.  I knew I didn’t do a great job making my list.  Like I said in the beginning, it showed.  I did save $50.00, but I spent $160.00 on two weeks worth of groceries.  My budget has been $150.00 with me usually staying around $100.00-$120.00.  Ok, so I know it isn’t horrible, but I felt awful.  I’m a little shocked at my own feelings.  It could’ve been a lot worse.

The good news, the weather seems to be sticking.  However, I’m going to dedicate a little more time to making sure an unexpected storm doesn’t roll in.  Once again, I’m reminded of how important a routine and printer ink really is.