Is there such a thing as a stupid question?

Yes. A few of my favorites:

Why does your gynecologist leave the room when you undress? I've wondered this. He/she will see your naked hiney one way or another.

If a person owns a piece of land, do they own it all the way down to the center of the earth? I believe you own the airspace all the way up, too.

Why can't women put their mascara on with their mouth closed? Why can't men look at pretty women with their mouths closed?

Why is it called alcoholics anonymous when the first thing you do is stand up and say "hi, my name's Bob. I'm an alcoholic"? If I call myself "Bob" then I'm still being anonymous.

Why is there a light in the fridge but not in the freezer? I actually had to go check my freezer.

Why do toasters always have a setting on them which burns your toast to a horrible crisp no one would eat? My toaster seems to do that on any setting.

Who was the first person to look at a cow and say "I think I'll squeeze these dangly things here and drink what comes out"? I think it was a man.

If Wile E coyote has enough money to by all that Acme crap why doesn't he buy his dinner? Does Banquet make road runner fingers?

19. If corn oil is made from corn and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, what is baby oil made from? Goats?

If a man is walking in a forest and no women is there to hear him is he still wrong? Yes.

Why do you call it an asteroid when its outside the hemisphere, yet call it hemorrhoid when its in your ass? I hope I never get a hemorrhoid as big as an asteroid.

Did you ever notice that if you blow in a dogs face it goes mad, yet when you take him on a car ride he sticks his head straight out the window? Bad breath? Nah...they sniff poop so why would they care about bad breath...

Tattoo Time!

I'm working toward a sleeve on my left arm. I had more work done last night. Rosetta is one of the Disney fairies. I just love Disney-style fairies. They look so pixie-ish and cute. Not just like a woman with wings. I'll be going back for another fairy on the back of my arm in December.



For those who haven't seen my other tattoos, here are a few of them:

This is the rest of my left arm before he finished coloring it in

Super-Couponing

Well, with the way prices are, I've begun doing this again. It's really pretty easy, so I don't know why I ever stopped. I joined The Grocery Game again to re-familiarize myself with the stores' sale cycles and am slowly building up my coupon collection again.

I thought I'd post some of my recent activity:

11-10-08 Jewel

Total Before Savings (TBS): 131.68...32 items
Preffered Card Savings (PCS): 16.23
Manufacturer Coupons (MC): 3.60
Store Coupons (SC): 24.04
Total Savings (TS): 43.87
Out of Pocket (OOP): 87.81

11-11-08 Jewel
TBS: 35.60...13 items
PCS: 9.39
Avenu Savings (AS): 5.00
MC: 1.05
TS: 15.44
OOP: 20.16

11-16-08 Jewel
TBS: 23.52...8 items
PCS: 10.25
AS: 1.00
MC: 3.95
TS: 15.20
OOP: 8.32

Now the following are several transactions I had in the same day. Yes...I will go back into a store several times if it will benefit me. Jewel was having some great deals where you purchased specific products and received Catalina coupons good toward you next purchase. The General Mills deal gave me 3-$5 coupons and a coupon for 4.50 toward milk (you save the entire amount even if the milk costs less) when I bought 10 qualifying products. You can't use all the $5 coupons at once, hence the multiple trips. The ConAgra deal gave me a $10 coupon for my next purchase if i bought $20 in qualifying products. But the key here is that it was the SHELF PRICE that counts toward the $20...not the sale price!

11-18-08 Jewel #1
TBS: 54.74...21 items
PCS: 16.20
MC: 5.90
TS: 22.10
OOP: 32.64
I actually made money on this transaction. For the ConAgra deal, I bought 9 Swiss Miss Hot Chocolates on sale for $1 each ($9 total). Since the shelf price is $2.35 each, my $10 Catalina printed! They paid me $1 to take home 9 boxes of hot chocolate! Plus I got 2 bottles of vinegar for free. They were on sale for $1 each and I had 2-$1 coupons.

11-18-08 Jewel #2
TBS: 35.66...7 items
PCS: 2.40
MC: 20.20 (used $19.50 in Catalinas plus other coupons)
SC: 12.91 (sirloin steaks and chicken breast were buy 1 get 1 free with store coupons)
TS: 35.51
OOP: 15 CENTS!

11-18-08 Jewel #3
TBS: 11.29...4 items
PCS: 3.80
MC: 8.50 ($5 Catalina plus other coupons)
TS: 10.30
OOP: 99 CENTS!

11-18-08 Jewel #4
TBS: 7.37...3 items had to buy cookies for PTA at full price :(
PCS: .70
MC: 5.00 (my last $5 Catalina)
TS: 5.70
OOP: 1.67

11-20-08 Ultra
TBS: 30.76...16 items
MC: 2.00
SC: 5.21
Sales Discounts (SD): 3.87
TS: 11.08
OOP: 19.68 between SC and MC, I managed to get 4 boxes of cereal for $1.08 each!

11-11-08 Walgreens
TBS: 60.23
SC: 16.16
SD: 11.37
MC: 4.80
TS: 32.33
OOP: 27.93

11-16-08 Walgreens
TBS: 65.71
SD: 13.98
OP: 51.73 I got 2 free toys!

11-17-08 Walgreens
TBS: 89.75
SC: 21.85
SD: 14.71
MC: 40.76
OOP: 48.99

11-17-08 Walgreens
TBS: 63.18
SC: 15.76
SD: 10.00
MC: 4.10
TS: 29.86
OOP: 33.32

11-18-08 Walmart
TBS: 56.77
MC: 14.16
OOP: 42.61


Sooooooooo...in the last couple weeks, my OOP has been $383.87. This includes grocery, household and MANY Christmas presents. My TS have been $295.29. The total for groceries only is $177.43 My freezer is full, my pantry is stocked (including 17 boxes of cereal) and my medicine cabinet is overflowing. I could probably get by for the next month without buying a thing.

Kitty Litter Cake

I made this for the second Halloween party I went to. Looks disgusting, but tastes delicious!



The recipe---it's a cinch!

My Halloween Costumes

I had two parties this year and a girl can't wear the same thing twice, right?

Party #1--Ms. Pacman.





My friend went as my ghost.



Party #2--Lady Scarecrow; Andrea came as a crow. I made both costumes and was pretty happy with the outcome. I won $100 that night for my scarecrow costume!





A better look at my hat

Scrapbooking Weekend

Twice a year, my mom, aunt, cousin and I go to a scrapbooking weekend. It's held at a beautiful inn alongside a lake in Michigan. Our fall trip proved to be very productive. We worked into the night on Friday and Saturday and up until we left on Sunday afternoon. The food, once again, was delicious.



The view of the lake was gorgeous on this perfect weekend



The side and back view of the inn





The room where we were hard at work all weekend



And last, but not least, my favorite page

Decoupage Hat Box

My friend, Jody, had a birthday this past weekend. She recently moved to Southern Illinois by herself while her husband sells their house up here. A friend and I wanted to get her something for her birthday to help keep her occupied with all of this time to herself now. I went to Joann's and picked up loads of scrapbooking materials...paper, stickers, etc....along with lots of other little crafty items to keep her busy. I wanted to put it all in a special container that she could use again. I found a plain paper mache hat box and decided to decorate it according to her style so she could later use it as a keepsake box.

Well, anyone who knows me knows that I can never just quickly throw something together. I originally was going to just decoupage some cute phrases to the box. I painted the box to give a pretty background, sponging in blue, pink and white:





Then I decided that the inside needed decorating (this is where the madness begins). I cut pieces of fabric and glued them to the inside of the box;



I applied a layer of Mod Podge over the fabric:



After I cut words, phrases and pictures from magazines, I pasted them to the outside of the box. That didn't seem to complete the look I wanted, so I took some ribbon out and glued it to the box and then glued buttons to the top. I applied a layer of Mod Podge to then entire outside of the box and let it dry over night:





















It took me a total of 6 hours to finish the box, not including drying. It was worth every minute, though, because she loved it!

I also decided to make her a card, too, but that's a story for another day...