Amazon Giftcards deal on Swagbucks

Thru January 1, 2010, Swagbucks is offering a "Gift Card Swagananza," which means that every day you can redeem your Swag Bucks on a different gift card for a discounted price. Today's deal is a $5 Amazon.com giftcard for 40 Swagbucks. Normally a $5 Amazon GC is 45 Swag Bucks, which is a bargain already IMHO. My husband, son and I are prolific readers and we also give books as presents - most of our family and friends and prolific readers, too! Even if you are not interested in books, go for it anyway; Amazon sells CDs, DVDs, household goods, etc.

The deal expires December 13 at 11 am PST. Here is a trick: Since you are limited to getting 2 Amazon GC per day, purchase 2 today, then come back tomorrow (12/13) before 11 a.m. and purchase 2 more.

If you are not familiar with Swagbucks, it is a site that pays you to search online. You collect Swag Bucks when you search and the Swag Bucks are redeemed for cash, gift certificates or merch. Get 3 Swag Bucks when you sign up here.

Ran across something very cool the other day. It is called Ev'reward and it is a search engine/directory of online shopping rewards. The directory includes over 14,000 rewards for over 3,000 online stores, available through more than 40 leading cash back, frequent traveler, savings reward and points programs.

How it works:

1. Go to Ev'reward
2. Type in the name of an online store
3. Ev'reward will list online savings programs that include that store and the rewards associated with them

It also has a "Browse" function, so you can look at all stores in a particular category.

Although it does not have every possible rewards program (Bank of America Add It Up and Grobux, for instance are not available through Ev'reward) it has a lot. If you are signed up with multiple reward programs, Ev'reward is a huge timesaver!

Paypal deal on Swagbucks

Thru January 1, 2010, Swagbucks is offering a "Gift Card Swagananza," which means that every day you can redeem your Swag Bucks on a different gift card for a discounted price. To be honest, I haven't been very impressed by the offerings until today. Today's deal is a $5 deposit into your Paypal account for 55 Swagbucks. Normally a $5 Paypal deposit is 100 Swag Bucks! This is free money! Jump on this because the deal expires December 3 at 11 am PST.

If you are not familiar with Swagbucks, it is a site that pays you to search online. You collect Swag Bucks when you search and the Swag Bucks are redeemed for cash, gift certificates or merch. Get 3 Swag Bucks when you sign up here.

Fuel for School

Between coupons, sale prices and the FFS refund I think I did OK.

5 boxes Rice Krispies $1.79 each (5 $1 off coupons)
3 boxes Pop Tarts 2.08 each (1 $2/off 2 and .55 off 1 coupons)
1 box Special K crackers 2.50 ($1 off)
1 box Morningstar Farms veggie burgers 4.19 ($1 off)
Shelf Price $21.88
Coupons $9.55
FFS refund $10
Out of pocket $2.33

Not bad

Weekly wrap-up - week ending 7/25/09

Earnings

Rockfish Interactive - Oral Care Survey $25.00
Being a guinea pig - $50
MyPoints $25 Amazon gift card -- and they threw in a $15 FTD giftcard as well


Stuff that will pay off in the future:

Returned about $300.00 of Lands End merchandise that I had tried on, decided it didn't work and never got around to returning until recently.

Weekly wrap-up - week ending 7/18/09

Savings

Saved $3.45 purchasing a $25.00 Target gift card from PlasticJungle.com.

Earnings

Amazon $6.75
U30 (Beer survey) $5.00

Freebies

Microwave popcorn from Yahoo.com

Getting paid to eat!

This is kinda funny -- I had a coupon for a free DiGiorno flatbread melt and thought I should redeem it before it expired on 7/18/09. On the freezer case there was a blinkie -- containing refund forms for the full purchase price of -- you guessed it -- DiGiorno flatbread melts. To make things more interesting, the deal expired today!

So I bought the flatbread melt using my coupon and dashed home and sent for the rebate. Later on I ate it -- and was very disappointed in both the quality and quantity. This was surprising, since their pizzas are very good. Can't complain too much, after all, they were paying me to take it!

Weekly wrap-up - week ending 7/11/09

This has not been a terribly productive week. I've sent in some rebates and did some online surveys -- which don't count until I've actually recieved the $. Anyhow, this is it:

Savings
$11.93 in coupon savings

Freebies
Coupon for 2 Velveeta and Cheese Shells Microwave Cups from Kraft First Taste
Free "Schnucks Cooks" magazine at my local grocery store, for purchasing over $50 in one shoppng trip

Free e-books

OK, books are not one of the necessities of life, like food and and shelter -- but they are nice to have. Harlequin Books is celebrating its 60th anniversary and Barnes and Noble is offering a FREE download of 16 of Harlequin's novels. Click here to download them.

I'm not a huge romance novel fan but I downloaded a romantic suspense novel, Stranded, and I love it.

Weekly wrap-up - week ending 7/4/09

Earnings

eCycle Group: $25.38
YouData: 0.52
Amazon: $32.94

Freebies

Coupon for a free DiGiorno flatbread melt
Free samples of Jack Daniels barbeque sauce and Lea and Perrins + coupons
Coupon for a free box of Kashi TLC cereal bars
Free sample of Crest enamel care toothpaste
10 Free Food Saver Freeze & Steam bags

Cool Giveaway at Madame Deals

Madame Deals is giving away a Rachael Ray Porcelain Enamel 5.5 Quart Casserole in Orange!

To quote the Madame Deals website:

"Rachael Ray has had such a successful career because of her glowing demeanor and infectious personality. Her rise to success has been marked by a drive in business that has led her to dominate the cooking industry; because of this, Rachael Ray doesn’t put her name on just anything, especially when it comes to cookware. The Porcelain enamel 5.5 quart casserole dish truly reflects Rachael Ray’s overall initiative of creating effective, high quality products at a reasonable price. The Porcelain Enamel Casserole dish is no exception to her emphasis on quality. This beautiful cast iron, non-stick casserole dish provides ample room to add ingredients, as well as an easy-to-use kitchen piece for those perfect stews or pot roasts. From an aesthetic standpoint, the vivacious enamel adds a delightful splash of color to your kitchen, while allowing all levels of chefs to prepare food cooked to perfection."

Click here to enter the giveaway.

Swagbucks Update

Swagbucks can now be redeemed for Paypal gift cards. ! 80 Swagbucks get you a $5 payment via Paypal.

Read about it on the Swagbucks' blog.

Click the banner to sign up for Swagbucks.

FREE Coffee!

A freebie for all caffeine addicts:

Seattle's Best coffee is offering a full purchase price refund on a 12-ounce bag of coffee. Click Seattle's Best refund to go to their website and download the form.

Compulsive internet surfing

Being frugal with money is important -- and so is being frugal with time. One of my biggest time wasters is being online, ironically enough. I don't go online with the intent to kill time; a huge portion of my life is "lived" online. I use it for:

• Blogging
• Banking
• Shopping
• Paying bills
• Searching for job/freelance opportunities
• Searching for information that helps me save money
• Keeping up with friends and family
• Networking

However, turning me loose on teh Interwebz is like turning me loose in a combination library/hardware store. I end up dashing from one thing to another simply because they look interesting and I have to find out more, which in turn leads to another thing that looks interesting, and so on....

Case in point: the other day I was checking out jobs on our local public library's website and somehow ended up downloading a copy of my great-grandmother's death certificate from the Missouri State Archives!

It's good to know I'm not the only one like this -- Web Worker Daily has an excellent article on how to avoid the humongous time suck that is CIF (compulsive internet fiddling). I highly recommend it to anyone who works online.

Weekly wrap-up - week ending 6/27/09

Earnings

Sold a ring to a coin/jewelry dealer for $62.00

Freebies

Coupon for free package of Oscar Mayer beef franks
Windex Outdoor All-in-One from BzzAgent
Free reusable bag from thatscaring.com
Coupon for free Kashi frozen entree

Stuff with a future payoff

Signed up for an account with Magazines.com (they periodically give out $5.00 credits/cash)
Took a high-value survey on oral health
Took a survey on beer
Opened an ING Orange Savings Account
Posted items for sale on Craig's List and Amazon

Make money shopping online with Ebates

Ebates is a shopping site that gives you from 1% to 25% cash back every time you shop online. You can shop at over 1000 stores including Barnes & Noble.com, Gap, Target, Buy.com and Expedia. Plus you get additional savings with exclusive coupons, free shipping offers, and limited-time sales!

I love Ebates. They have a huge variety of stores and excellent customer service. They pay out via Paypal every three months if your balance is at least $5.01. (If it isn't, it will roll over to the next pay period.)

They are running a couple of promotions:

• Get $5 when you sign up with Ebates.
• Get double rebates on beauty and health items.

Click here to go to Ebates.com.

My major screwup!

Last summer our mortgage lender offered me a credit card with 0% interest for a year. I jumped on this because our house needed such things as major appliances, shades to fit our non-standard-sized windows and professional refinishing to get rid of the acid burns on the hardwood floors. We had bought a house that had been foreclosed on -- while it was big enough for us, structurally sound, surrounded by trees and in a very nice neighborhood it had suffered some "cosmetic" damage.

I used the credit card, faithfully paid the minimum payment every month and just as faithfully deposited money in a savings account in order to pay the balance that would become due at the end of the year. I KNEW the date was 6/23/2009. I had it marked on my calendar. I went online to pay it this morning and discovered I WAS WRONG. The due date was 6/22/2009. I just paid an extra $84.84 because I was one day off!

The moral of that is -- pay attention! Double- and triple-check things! It is going to take a lot of frugality to make up for that $84.84.

Swagbucks!

Swagbucks is an online portal that lets you search the web -- with results generated by Google and Ask.com. Swagbucks are awarded periodically as you search -- a classic example of Skinnerian interval reinforcement! I guess operant conditioning DOES have real-world applications.

Anyway, once you've accumulated Swagbucks, you redeem them for...stuff, including electronics, gift cards, books, comic books, CDs & music downloads, trading cards, almost anything.

My favorite is the Amazon gift cards (45 Swagbucks will get you a $5 giftcard). They help feed my husband's addiction to reading.

Click on the banner below to join Swagbucks.

The First Post - how it started and why I'm here

My husband and I, like so many people, lost our jobs. We're luckier than most, though -- we have some savings and investments and my husband has a home-based business. Still, we've had to cut back on a lot of things and scrutinze every penny that goes out.

Our search for new jobs (and possibly a business to buy) is a whole 'nother blog -- The Frugal Midwesterner concentrates on the various things I've been doing to make money and to save money. I'll be posting tips, links and resources that I've found -- hope other people find them helpful.