Why BOGO Greenio (yo)?

"What's it all about?" I hear you ask...

Looking back I guess I’ve always been a little bit cheap and a little bit green.  I could never justify spending $500 on a designer handbag like some of my friends, but that was probably because I just didn’t have that kind of money.  On the green side, I recycled at work, but nothing too serious.  Now that I’m a SAHM (stay-at-home-mom) my love of cheap and green have been “stepped up a notch”.  I'm like a yellow belt in both and aiming to be a black belt!

Photo credit to Munchkin #2 and my crazy skills in MS Paint "haaaaay- yAH!"

I’ve been couponing for about a year and I’m not extreme, but I’ve developed my own system (I think that’s key, I'll be blogging about it soon) and by combining store sales (BOGO) with coupons I’ve recently been able to hit my spending goal for weekly groceries ($150 for a family of four).  I usually save about $50-$60, but sometimes as much as $70.  I think it’s also important to live within your means and my quest for bargains is definitely a major part of that now that we’re on one income.  My love of BOGO helps me save pennies for “luxury” items such as trips to the hairdresser  and maybe, one day, a vacation (one can dream, right?).

The green part seems obvious to me, but not everyone sees it this way…there’s a saying that we don’t inherit the earth from our ancestors we are borrowing it from our children [http://www.quotegarden.com/earth-day.html].  In my opinion, the earth is not an infinite resource to be used up and spit out without a second thought.  It’s a delicately balanced system and one of these days we might tip the balance too far the wrong way.  I don’t get why people don’t care that the plastic we throw out might end up floating around the ocean for thousands of years or that stuff we flush down the drain ends up in our rivers or that every day we’re releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that has been stored in the ground for millions of years.  The world is a beautiful place and I want to do my part to not totally mess it up!  No one is perfect and I don't live in a tree and eat bark, but I’m trying to make the best choices I can as a modern (dare I say it - gulp!) housewife (yuk!  I don't like describing myself in such a 1950s kind of way!  I prefer CEO/CFO of my house!).

OK (steps down from soapbox), got that off my chest.  On with the fun!  I promise not to be so serious in future J