Shopping and a Visit Downstairs

Rite Aid

• 4 Super Poligrips (0.75 oz) $2.49 and $1.24 each (BOGO 50% off sale), used four FREE coupons (8/26 SS) and got back two $2 UP's (WYB 2, Limit 2) = $4 profit
• Sani-Hands Hand Sanitizing Wipes (50 ct) $2.99 and will get back $2.99 (SCR #591, valid 9/2 - 9/8, Limit 1) = FREE
• Organix Moroccan Oil $4.99, got back $3 UP = $1.99 *Kills me that I got suckered into buying this at the salon for just a bit more money.  Oh well
• Reese's candy $0.59
• Used two $4 UP's, total was $1.69

CVS - found another store with vanilla in stock!  Bought that for $0.66 and got some cinnamon too ($0.66), used a $1 EB to pay and got another one back from my green bag tag!

Price Chopper

• 6 Temptations Cat Treats $1.66 each, used six $0.50 coupons (or here or 8/26 RP) = $0.66 *Was expecting to get back a $1 catalina as reported here but didn't.  I wonder if its because two of the bags were All Natural Temptations?
• 3 Old El Paso Taco Seasonings $1.19 each (regular price), used $0.60 off 3 coupon and will get back $0.60 Savingstar rebate (WYB 3) = $1.77 or $0.59 each

Bought some other stuff too - Banquet sausages for $1 each, Stouffers pizzas $2.50 each, some beans and random not-so-great-prices-but-we-needed-them-stuff

Saturday Night Fever aka "Catnip Fever" cat treats - I love it! 

I am so grateful that the previous owners left us this freezer.  We have a regular fridge/freezer in the kitchen but its too large for the space its in and you can't fully open the freezer door.  Its one of those with a vertical split down the middle - fridge to the right, freezer on the left, so the freezer is narrow to begin with.  I don't think I could fit a full-size frozen pizza in the upstairs freezer if I had to!  Its very frustrating to try and squeeze food in and out of there, so this full size freezer has really been awesome.  I really need to organize it up a bit, but c'est la vie.  All it looks like we have in there are the Easy Fries I got for a penny each at S&S last week, but there's lots of food behind them.  Frozen pizzas, bagels, chicken patties, hot dogs, kielbasa, butter.  The freezer also needs a good defrosting but that isn't going to happen anytime soon.  We got some eatin' to do!

We use these three plastic boxes to sort out our meat - chicken in one, beef/steak in another and pork in the third.  Its really helped us not to lose meat in this big old freezer.  And its makes eating the oldest meat first pretty simple.  We label our freezer bags with the date purchased and use the oldest first.

 Shall we progress onto the stockpile room? We haven't been here since the renovation!

Really stocked up on paper goods at Price Chopper a couple weeks ago.  My paper towel pile has reached the ceiling:

I just love this metal shelf.  DBF's mom gave it to us.  Its super strong and has wheels, so its easy to move around if I need to. I think she got it at BJ's?

I was trying to think of different ways to really maximize the space in this room and I decided to put these two shelves back to back, rather than up against a wall.  As you can see, they're not quite even due to years of use (I've had these since college) and they don't always stand up very straight.  Putting them up against the walls just emphasizes how crooked they are, and also drives me crazy, so this works better.  I've kept the stuff stored on them pretty light so as to not add to the strain.  

Happy stockpiling!

The Stockpile!

Well, its not 100% yet, but here goes.  Let me tell you, moving all this stuff was NOT fun.  At least most of the items were stored in the garage at my apartment, so they were already on the ground floor.  

We have an extra room off the first floor of the house that's our dedicated stockpile room.  Da boyfriend built the small shelf you see there for the paper towels.  We had some minor flooding a couple weeks ago from a backed up drainage pipe outside and I didn't want to take the chance of losing anything should it happen again.  DBF cleaned out the pipe and put up a new one at a sharper angle, so there shouldn't be any water coming in, but you never know.  


I've had these white plastic shelves since college.  They're awesome!  The bottom shelf is pasta sauce, then up from that are oils, mayo, gravy, cooking sprays, etc.  Go up one more for canned fruit and mushrooms.  I used to have food on the top shelf until I discovered that some mice had taken up residence in this room.  Now all the food is in the room over (see below) so I have some random odds and ends on the top shelf until I figure out what I want to keep there.

The two black shelves on the left hand side of the pic were clearanced finds from CVS.  I've got tissues in the left and Ziploc bags of all sizes in the right.  These aren't the sturdiest shelves, so I didn't want to put anything too heavy on them. The nice thing about this room is the built in shelf running across two of the walls.  It gives me extra space for stuff - sponges, napkins, foil and toilet paper.


I got the set of wooden drawers on the right from outside the dumpster at my apartment years ago.  Stuff is shoved into them right now, but I'd like to get them set up with all our vitamins, cold medicine and little stuff like that.

I am in love with these metal shelves!  They are a gift from DBF's mom.  They're super strong and on wheels, which is so handy.  She has another set of three shelves that goes on top of this but has to move some things around at her place before we can add them to our stockpile room.


I've got all our canned soup, tomatoes, trash bags, dishwasher detergent, juice and soda on this bad boy.  The plastic container on the top right is full of Crystal Lite and the containers in the corner are full of pads and tampons.

This shelf was going to be all food, but after the mice incident, I moved a lot of stuff out.  Now its home to peanut butter & jelly, tampons and pantiliners, loofahs (in the bag), candy and some toilet paper.  Fun combination, huh?

All of the animals' treats are behind the door on this lightweight over-the-door shelf.  I've also got some Jello and granola bars on there.  

This is the room adjacent to the stockpile room.  For now, I'm storing all the food in plastic containers that I hope are mouse-proof.  I tried to keep everything together - one for cereal, one for crackers, one for chips, one for flour and sugar, one for baking mixes (brownies, muffins), one for snacks and one for cooking stuff - rice, boxed potatoes, etc.  

The upstairs bathroom has this amazing closet.  The shelves are really deep and I decided to store all the personal care stuff here, right in the bathroom.  I have a tension rod and a curtain I may put up to cover this.  There was a door, but it opened up into the bathroom door and was a huge pain the ass.   

Shampoo & body wash.  Those darn JF bottles are so wobbly, I decided to keep them towards the front.   

Conditioner and DBF's soap.  Gotta get him some more body wash! 

I know I have more shaving cream for DBF somewhere, but the women's shaving cream is two rows deep.  I've got all of his razors here in the storage bins, 

...and mine too plus some lotion.

Its hard to see (and take pictures of) but these bins have all my face lotion, face wipes, Biore strips, etc.  In front is the open stuff and things I use on a daily basis.  I wanted to keep them within easy reach. 

That top shelf is pretty high, so I only put light things up there.  Toothbrushes, mouthwash and toothpaste are on the second highest shelf.  I left lots of space open for expansion too.

Come take a peek

Time for stockpile pictures! Its been a while since I've posted some shots and my stockpile room is quite a bit messier than it was in July. C'est la vie.
I have a bunch of pasta sauce crouching behind the Campbells and some Crystal Lite next to the Ziplocs. I'm hoping for a good sale on CL soon, I'm getting low and I drink it almost every day.
The top shelf is a bit of a catch-all - an extra hair dryer, candles, hair stylers and sponges.
Laundry stuff, fabric sprays, mouthwash and dishwashing detergent - those all go together, right?
I love my dumpster-dived set of drawers! Its so handy. The top shelf is razors, vitamins and lotions. Shelf 2 is tamps and pantiliners and shelf 3 is cold medicine.
That plastic bag is full of loofahs. I love loofahs and the RA sale a month or so back was the first time I'd seen a freebie sale on them so I loaded up. The plastic shelves are pretty much just full of tampons. The Busch boxes have kitty litter and trash bags in them.
Ah, my paper good table. This has definitely gotten a little out of control with the great sales lately. Behind the tissues on the left are a bunch of toilet paper and a storage box full of face wipes (Garnier, Olay, etc). Behind the napkins are paper towel rolls. The stack of diapers on the right has a whole other stack behind it and the black reusable bag is full of Tugaboos diapers. And nope, not preggers - just stocking up for some day when I might be. Diapers are pricey man!
Soda, more detergent, bottled water and plastic cups.
Poo/conditioner, more Ziplocs, toothpaste & brushes behind it and hiding behind some shampoo - a storage tote of deodorant.
DBF's shelf - razors (in the brown tote), deo, shaving cream. Tugaboos overflowing from that blue tote, my shaving creams, Dove soap, lotion and body wash.

Thank you for visiting. Come again soon!

Clean House

My garage stockpile room was overdue for some TLC. After the mouse incident, I wanted to take everything out, clean it and reorganize everything. So that's just what we did!

Once everything was out of the room, I used my favorite applicance - R2D2 (aka my shop vac) to clean up all the cobwebs, dirt and random junk on the floor and corners of the room. I didn't want to sweep it all out since that would just move the dirt onto my stockpile stuff, defeating the purpose of a deep clean. Then I scrubbed down my two large white shelves (the hardest hit with mouse "debris") and DBF reorganized the room as I cleaned each piece of furniture off.
All the stuff was organized into a couple main categories, a la Clean House: Keep, Donate and Sell. The above picture is all stuff that I decided to donate to my local food pantry. The pic below is stuff I had already set aside to donate, but hadn't had a chance to drop off yet.

When we finished cleaning and organizing, we loaded up the trunk of my car and dropped all this stuff off. It took two trips to get it all, one Saturday and one today. I gave some stuff to my mom as well. Her office is doing some donations too.

These bags are full of items I'm hoping to sell on ebay - some body wash, lotions, etc. I'll see if its worthwhile to sell them and if not, they'll get donated too.

Time for the "after" shots! DBF's mom bought me the "beware" bag because she said it reminded her of Mousse. I keep reusable shopping bags in there. I've also got some plastic bags tacked to the wall. Its so handy to keep bags down here for when I'm bringing a bunch of stuff upstairs or to donate. I found the wooden chest of drawers by the dumpster one day, so that was free. Underneath the table is laundry detergent and Glade/Febreze sprays that I use all the time.

The first drawer houses razors, vitamins and small bottles of lotions. Pantiliners and tamps live in drawer two, followed by random household stuff in drawer #3.

The top shelf is all stuff for DBF - razors (in the fabric bins), shaving cream, deodorant and body wash. The rest are all me - body wash, shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste and brushes.

Ignore the frosty on the top shelf please, it was really hot today and a frosty was in order.

Now everything is organized and clean and I love it!

Everybody's Favorite - Stockpile Pictures!

Its been a while dear friends, so let's take a peek and see how my stockpile's doing!
My everything closet - pasta, brownie and cake mixes, granola bars, makeup, cold medicine and cleanersAnd the overflow on the floor - crackers, detergent, cat litter and underneath all that are baskets of batteries and tea light candles.

My ebay closet, mailing envelopes, bubble wrap, packaging tape and tons of printer paper.

TP everywhere...

And everywhere....

And everywhere!

I had a dream last night that some random guy wandered into my stockpile room and asked if he could take two of my Garnier lotions. No! I exclaimed. He wandered off with them anyway. How rude!

Still working on all these CVS waters from I got back in January. The brown storage cube is filled with Dove, Degree and Suave deodorants.

Juice, soda and lemonade overload

And lots of Crystal Lite

Salad dressing, tomato sauce, peanut butter, shampoo, body wash, shaving cream, conditioner and household stuff on the bottom shelf - garbage bags, cleaners, cat litter, etc.