COUPONS

So, a lot of people have been telling me how they have been saving with coupons. I thought it was a great idea. So, I ordered the Sunday paper to get all the coupons, plus I've collected some from my favorite websites and at the grocery store. Today was my first attempt. I thought I did pretty good for shopping at the commissary on base. I would have originally spent $72.29 without the coupons (sad because it doesn't even look like that much). But I only spent $44.06!. That is a 39% savings. Now, there is a large bag of dogfood and a gallon of whole milk missing from this photo. And, I normally don't buy all this stuff at once, like all of the air fresheners. But what I am learning is that you stock up! I plan to go to Fry's Market and get their VIP card. I think I will be able to save even more there because they have more sales than the commissary. Hopefully next time I can save even more! It is kinda fun going through the isles with your coupons and seeing how much you are going to save! If anyone has any tips for me, I'd love to hear about them!

SPLASHING AROUND

my friend alyssa and i took our kids to this little splash fountain area in this shopping/movie/arena area. i saw it last summer when we went down there but calvin was too small. so i was so excited to take him. he LOVES the water and even though the fountains splashed up in his face, he loved that too. i'm so glad he enjoyed it. i enjoyed just watching him and the excitement on his face. here are a few pics of our afternoon.

CALIFORNIA

So we had a wonderful time in california last month. it was quite a busy week. we got into town on friday morning. saturday we took a trip to san francisco to visit joe's sister, rachel. it was a fun day. we started down at the pier, walked around. looked at sea lions, took a ride on the carrousel and then went to ghiradelli's square where i ate the most delicious of cupcakes.

we then went back to rachel's place for presents and a brownie cake. one of the presents was this awesome bubble blower. i think checkers enjoyed it more than calvin. it was a lot of fun. thank rachel.

then we went to the beach with calvin and that was a lot of fun. it was his first time there. he ate a lot of sand. dad let him get wet in the waves. he loved every minute of it.

i also got to visit with some friends this week. thursday was wendy's baby shower. that was a great turn out. friday we headed to the park with joe's folks. calvin loved the tunnel and the swings. but mostly he loved to pick up leaves off of the ground and any garbage he could find.

i got a surprise that becky was coming up with litty maddy. it was fun to see her with calvin. they did pretty good together but they both liked this giant toothbrush. so we had to let them take turns.

here's a cute picture with calvin and my dad. we went to d'boni's for pizza with my family and my grandpa. don't they look so cute in their hawaiian shirts. my dad took calvin out to see all of the old cars in the parking lot. they were having autumn cruise night at the plaza.

joe's mom gave joe a bag of clothes from when he was little. here is one of his outfits. it's so dang cute on calvin. what a little 80's man in his little shorts and tank top!

saturday we had calvin's first birthday party. it was a lot of fun and quite a few friends and family came to celebrate it with him. he enjoyed all of the people. when it came time to opening up his gifts he could care less and just walked around with the balloons in his hands. it was cute.

here he is eating his yummy cake. it was a mickey mouse cake (his favorite cartoon). he got most of it on the floor and all over himself. boy did he like it!



well, that's a quick recap of the great week we had. i am hoping to get lots of pictures from everyone else that was there this past week. i was so busy having fun that i didn't take as many pictures as i wanted. so hopefully there will be more to come in the future. but i did have a great time and was so nice to see everyone again. hopefully we'll get to come back soon.