08/31 Garden update

Here are my tomato plants about a week ago.
I had quite a few red ones.....that were all rotting on the vine.




I ripped every single plant out and put them in a trash bag. The blight was so bad this year. Maybe we will have a drier summer next year.

Here is my garden now, minus the tomato plants.

The green and yellow beans are on their second round of blossoms.

Many of my squash plants had leaves that looked like this so I cut all of the affected ones off.

The squash plants have been producing only teeny tiny squashes in the past week. But I'm not seeing all that mold or fungus or whatever it was.

My cukes are the super stars of my garden this year. I am up to my eyeballs in cukes!!!!

My method of staking the cuke plants and guiding the vines so the cukes grow off the ground has been a complete success and I highly recommend it!

My pepper plants are producing finally!!

I'm hoping to pick this and the other big pepper I have growing this week : )

I plan on doing a harvest update and flower update post this week. Hope all of your gardens are still producing and healthy!

08/26 Super cheap king size candy bars at Rite Aid!!

Sorry, no pictures of my huge pile of candy, too busy. King size candy bars are buy one get one free at Rite Aid this week. One is $1.49 and there is a coupon from this Sunday's paper for $1/2 Snickers, Milky Way, Twix or Three Musketeers which makes each candy bar $0.24 after sale and coupon! Plus, there is a coupon from this Sunday's paper $0.55/1 any Reese's and after sale and coupons makes each King size Reese's peanut butter cups $0.19 each.

***Attention coupon bloggers (you know who you are)****

If I see you suddenly post this deal on your blog without giving me credit I will call you on it!! None of you have done a post on this yet so it will be real easy to see who is stealing my ideas. Stop taking credit for my ideas and making money off of them with your monetized and product promoting blogs!!

If the thievery doesn't stop I will make a separate blog for non-idea stealing followers and bloggers that is invitation only for my deal ideas.

08/12 Day of firsts in harvesting and blanching!

I harvested my first cukes and squashes today! Not impressive in size but hopefully they will be impressive in taste.

Above-harvest #2

Below-2 days later harvest #3 of yellow beans.

I don't want my family to get sick of yellow beans so I decided it was time to try blanching and freezing. It was not as difficult as I thought. I love this free Ziploc pump (coupon) and bag system. The pump is easy to use and can be washed in the dishwasher. If the pump holds up and the veggies survive freezing I will do a full review at some point.

How is your harvesting and preserving going?

Why do I bother?

I've been coming up with lot of original coupon/sales matchup deals lately and posting them. The day or two after these big coupon bloggers post these ideas and don't give me credit. They give other people credit when they are posting about someone else's original deal ideas but not me. Very irritating. I always give credit to the person I got the idea from and put a link to their blog. People are so greedy and selfish. It makes me want to stop posting about my deal ideas and freebies. These are also the same people that seem to shop EVERY DAY and clearly have a shopping addiction. Very sad.

08/09 FREE stuff at Walgreens + Walmart + MONEY MAKER at Wags!!

Walgreens

Transaction #1

6 8 pk. Bic pens $3-3 $1/2 coupons ($3)=FREE

1 Colgate toothpaste $2.99-$1/1 coupon=$1.99 got $3 RR $1.01 PROFIT

1 Listerine +1 Reach floss+ 1 Reach toothbrush twin pk $9-$3/3 coupon=$6 got $6 RR=FREE
2 Band-Aid boxes $5.98-2 $1/1 coupons ($2)=$3.98 got $4 RR $0.02 PROFIT

Total spent-$11.97-$7 RR (from last week RR sales)=$4.97

RR earned and unused=$13

coupons used=$9

Transaction #2

2 Walgreens children's activity books (found in pharmacy) used as fillers to use RR=$1.98

1 Listerine+1 Reach floss + Reach toothbrush twin pk $9-$3/3 coupon=$6 got $6 RR=FREE

Total spent-$7.98-$4 RR-$3 RR (from transaction #1)=$1.67 (including tax)

RR earned and unused=$6

Coupons used=$3

Transaction #3

2 Band-Aid boxes $5.98-2 $1/1 coupons ($2)=$3.98 got $4 RR $0.02 PROFIT

1 Colgate $2.99-$1/1 coupon=$1.99 got $3 RR $1.01 PROFIT

2 pop toys (not pictured) used as fillers to use RR=$1

Total spent-$6.97-$6 RR (from transaction #1)=$1.41 (including tax)

RR used=$6

RR earned and unused=$7

Coupons used=$3

Transaction #4

1 Listerine+1 Reach floss+ 1 Reach toothbrush twin pk $9-$3/3=$6 got $6 RR=FREE

1 Plackers flossers clearance (used as filler to use RR)=$0.75

1 3 pk pens clearance (used as filler to use RR)=$0.49

Total spent-$7.24-$3 RR-$4 RR (from transaction #3)=$0.88 (including tax)

RR used $7

RR earned and unused=$6

coupons used=$3

Transaction #5

1 Colgate $2.99-$1/1 coupon=$1.99 got $3 RR $1.01 PROFIT

2 Band-Aid boxes $5.98-2 $1/1 ($2) coupons=$3.98 got $4 RR $0.02 PROFIT

1 nail polish (used as filler to use RR)=$0.99

Total spent-$6.96-$6 RR (from transaction #2)=$1.40 (including tax)

RR used=$6

RR earned and unused=$7

Coupons used-$3

Total spent at Walgreens-$10.33

Total RR earned and unused (from transaction #4 + #5)=$13

$2.67 PROFIT!!

**The Walgreens children's activity books have coupons in the front. Each has a $2/1 Neosporin and they are on sale for $3.99 and if you buy 2 you get $4 RR back. Sooo if you buy 2 Neosporin for $3.99 a piece and use 2 $2/1 coupons it will cost $3.98 and you will get a $4 RR so $0.02 profit!**

Walmart

4 Glade soy candles free after I used 4 FREE coupons that just came out this week!

08/08 Garden update

This lovely image of blight in my garden snapped me out of my gardening naivete very quickly in the past week. I started seeing leaves in even more advanced stages of blight about 2 weeks ago but didn't realize the magnitude of what I was looking at. I saw a post from a fellow blogger about 2 weeks ago with horrific photos of her completely rotten tomato plants and realized that the same thing was beginning to happen to mine. I have been gardening by the seat of my pants this summer with no real knowledge of the all the things that could kill my veggies. I now know that there are more than bugs and slugs that can wipe out an entire crop. I will be doing my homework this winter so that I will be able to garden organically at a higher level next year.

There are no zukes for me. I was given seeds that were labeled zukes but all I have is summer squash. Anybody got good summer squash recipes?

This is the reason I staked almost all my plants. We have had terrible storms and winds this summer. I also think that keeping my plants off the ground helps prevent rot and keep them away from slugs and other ground dwelling predators.

The big one.

The yellow beans and green beans.

We have already had a dinner with yellow beans this week!

The green beans are coming along.

Here are my stripped down tomato plants. I have stripped about half of the branches off in the past week to keep the blight at bay. These things are the size of small trees! Should I cut back the tops?

I have pulled off about 4 rotten tomatoes so far. Hoping to actually get a couple that ripen and are edible.

The peppers.

The big one #2. #1 fell victim to some bugs and had to be picked off and chucked.

This is 2 different cuke plants that I have criss crossed between the stakes.

The big one. My first cucumber has bit the dust. This is the biggest one now.

The other cukes.

The cukes have been growing across the tops of the squashes and attaching themselves to the squash stakes. I think next year I will alternate rows of squash with cukes to save room.

This one is strictly vertical.

These cuke plants are producing spiky punk rock looking cukes.

Hope you are all doing well with your gardens!