In addition to the cash-back shopping help, you may also stumble upon an eBay coupon code. The coupon codes are usually made available to eBay users individually via the “My Messenges” tab at eBay.com. Sometimes, though very rarely, coupon codes become available for any and all users. You can be sure any such code will be announced here at the blog and/or at the forum.

I also buy some of the coupons I use for grocery shopping on eBay. I go through BigCrumbs to place my bid on the coupons and get cashback on my coupon purchases. Then, I use the coupons at a “double coupon value” store like Harris Teeter and by the time I’m done - I’ve saved a whole lot more money than I even came close to paying for the coupons on eBay.

In addition to the huge amount of money eBay has saved me over the years, I’ve also sold thousands of dollars worth of items I no longer wanted or needed. Items I would have sold at a yard sale or consignment store for a fraction of what they sold for on eBay.

Moral of the story…..eBay is a fantastic tool for the frugal-minded. Use it.

Many hours, days, weeks of searching the internet for quality frugal sites led me to a conclusion that I still stand by to this day.  The greatest tool for getting the most up-to-date and useful tips on money saving is an active online community geared specifically to frugals ways.  (ie, couponing, saving, etc.) 

I uncovered so many online communities claiming to offer tips on money saving thanks to countless Google seearches.  Seriously, there are hundreds of them.  So why on earth would I spend so much time creating yet another one????  Aside from the fact that I was dying to further embrace my passion for frugality….I couldn’t find a forum among those hundreds that met my personal needs.  I found them to be cluttered, overwhelming and hard to navigate.  I don’t want to have to hunt and dig deep for good, resourceful tips on money saving.  Life is too short.  I created The Frugal Inspiration Forum because I wanted the chance to offer what I felt was lacking in the available forums….a community of simplicity, resources and frugal inspiration. 

Tips on Money Saving made easy.

Free Samples of Dr. Ken’s & Nature’s Path Products:

http://www.naturallysavvy.com/survey/index.php
Enter Promotion Code: OMAG4

~*~

Free Flushable Dog Poop Bag:

http://flushdoggy.com/Free_Sample.html

~*~

Pledge to Recycle Wristband:

http://www.tampagov.net/dept_solid_waste/programs_and_services/recycling_and_waste_reduction/Pledge/

I invited my 6 and 4 year old daughters to join me on this one.  We discussed the importance and benefits of recycling and talked about the ways we can increase our part towards the cause.  Then we filled out the form to request our wristband. 

~*~

Free Breath-a-Licious Green Dog Bone:

http://www.breathalicious.com/freebone.html

~*~

So there you have it…..and as always, I posted these all at the freebie forums first.  Should I stumble across any more natural, organic, and/or earth friendly free stuff today, I will be back to add them! 

Well, I’ll spare you the diaper-free celebrating that I’m just aching to do here…. instead, I’ll share the diaper freebies.  But here’s the thing - I don’t usually share freebies unless I’ve signed up for them myself, or someone I know and trust has signed up for them.  Neither is true with these.  Since I don’t need them, I don’t want to take from the opportunty of those who do.   So, if you choose to go after these….please comment here to let me know they worked (or didn’t) for you, k?

The 1st Free Diaper Find (as I posted at the FI forum):

A large company that makes store/house brand diapers for large retailers is offering 25 Diapers and $10 for calling in and completing their survey.  They have a weekly quota, so call early in the week…(This week’s quota has been filled - mark your calendars to call Monday!)

Call: 1-888-DIAPER2

Then: Ext 634 for Girls Or Ext 646 for Boys

The 2nd Free Diaper Find (for those with a baby under the age of 12 months):

Email:
momtroop@babytalk.com

Hello moms!

Babytalk magazine is looking for moms who are willing to make the switch from commercial-brand disposable diapers to a more eco-friendly alternative for 10 days and report back on what you liked and what you didn’t like.

How it will work:
You will receive a 10-day supply of either a cloth-diapering system or an environmentally friendly disposable diaper for free, in exchange for using those diapers exclusively for the 10 days and giving us a full report on how it worked out.

We’re looking for parents who currently have a baby under 1 and who currently use commercial-brand disposable diapers, but are curious about “greener” options. If you’re interested, please respond with your name, city and state, age of baby, diaper size of baby, number of diapers your baby typically uses per day, and contact information including telephone number and email address.

If you’re interested, please respond with your name, city and state, age of baby, diaper size of baby, number of diapers your baby typically uses per day, and contact information including telephone number and email address.

Thanks so much!

The Editors at Babytalk

Okay, are you ready for this? Here is what I got in the mail today:

- 1 Mini Betty Crocker Warm Delight - chocolate cake….MmMmM….
- 1 Full Size Cover Girl Eyeshadow w/ 3 Colors
- 1 Tide Sample
- 1 Bounce Dryer Sheet Sample
- 1 Betty Crocker Mashed Potatos Pack
- 1 Organic Valley Ollie’s Kids Club Pack of Goodies (poster w/ activites, keychain, etc.)
- 1 Beyond Bodi Heat Sample & Coupon
- 1 Fiber One Cereal Sample
- 2 Kotex Samples & Coupons
- 1 Womans Day Issue (free subscription)
- P&G Coupon Pack for Survey Completion
- 8 Crocs Rivets

Freebie heaven, I tell ya………………………………….

All of the freebies above were posted at the forum… myself and a few of the wonderful freebie-loving members keep the freebies updated daily. (THANK YOU Toni-Marie, sandytrain, Krazi, 1newmommy, msgal!!!)

I’m not looking forward to tomorrow’s mail. It can only go downhill from here.

So, a few of my recent frugal finds…

~ Tickets. Concerts, Sports, Races, Theater, etc…..something for everyone. Frugal tickets, though?? Yes - who knew?!? Check out Stub Hub to find an awesome site where not only can you buy tickets at a much lower price - but you can even sell the tickets you can’t use! They offer a secure set-up with a great rep.

~ Ecards, Scrapbooks, Videos, Pictures. This site, Smile Box, first looked like yet another online photo sharing site to me. Then I dug deeper and found they they offer a lot more for free. They give you the ability to create all sorts of things with your own pictures and videos. They even have social networking and idea sharing. Good to poke around and play with…perhaps a good resource for frugal gifts, too!

~ Barbie for the Holidays. This little tidbit was shared with me today (thanks Kat!) and as a Mom of two girls, I was ever-so excited to see it! Barbie is rewarding her customers via Barbie Bucks. If you spend $100 on the Barbie toys shown at the site, you get a $50 Visa Giftcard mailed to you. So essentially you’ve gotten $100 in toys for $50. You have until 12/31/08 to take advantage of the offer. In addition to purchasing the toys for holiday gifts - considering purchasing them to donate to one of the many toy drives at Christmas time. You will have toys to donate, a gift card, a tax write-off, and most importantly - there will be little girls out there who will fill with sheer joy when they the toy you purchased and donated is handed to them.

~ Free Books. So all you do at Paper Back Swap is list the books you have to get rid of. Every time you send one to someone else, you are credited a free book for yourself. So you go find what you want and the person who has it sends it to you for free. It’s that easy. Yeah, apparently I have been missing out. If you’re just now hearing about this, then you have been missing out, too. I really wish I found this a long time ago.

Not only is building fairy houses a frugal activity - it is a free one!

To acquire our building materials, we stopped by the local park on Saturday morning and took a walk…along our way, we picked up anything different and appealing that could be a part of the fairy house.  (Don’t worry - we left the flowers alone.)  We left with a bag full of goodies ranging from straight-as-could-be twings to large pieces of broken bark.  We even took some of the grass clipping from behind the lawn crew that was there mowing.

When we got home, my daughter went charging at top speed to a tree in our back yard.  She decided that building the houses against a tree would help prevent weather damage.  (Such a smart little woman, I tell ya.) After that, the child was working on those houses with every chance she had for two straight days.  She was on cloud nine. I have never seen her so focused on any activity in all her life.  Have I mentioned it was free??

Here are pictures of the excitment:

That last one is of what she called the “Repair Shop.” It’s where the fairies should leave any damaged items that need fixing. :)  These pictures are after just an hour of work…can you imagine what is out there after two days??

All-in-all, building fairy houses is frugal entertainment at it’s best….

Where it asks who sent you, just tell them a somewhat naive and overly hopefully Mom of three who thinks maybe enough Generate Kindness stickers out there can help make the future a brighter one for her kids.

Oh, and you’ll have to read the F.A.Q while you’re there…. they gave me a chuckle.

Today my husband, three children and myself were at Babies R’ Us looking for new booster car seats for my two girls. The safest and longest-lasting seats that we found were Britax, and they were priced at $99 each. We weren’t prepared to pay that…so I told my husband, “Let me see what price I can find them for online.”

When I got home, I went right to the internet to see if I could get the exact same seats that we saw for less on the internet than we could in the store. My husband was sure that with the online shipping costs, finding them for less could not be done. I started at one of my favorite cash-back shopping sites, MyPoints. I found that MyPoints would offer me 10 points per dollar I spent on the seats at Target. (those points can then be traded in for giftcards.) So, I headed over to Target.com through MyPoints and wah-lah - the seats we wanted were on sale for $20 less at $79. I wasn’t done trying to save, though…. I’ve come to learn that every purchase made online can be discounted with a coupon code. So I went to a search engine that offers points for searching,Swag Bucks, and searched for the keywords, “target coupon code.” My Swag Bucks search won me 5 points, which can later be traded in for gift cards or merchandise. I also found a coupon code site with a 10% off code for Target.com. I entered my code and got $15.80 off.

So let me break this down for you…

If I bought those 2 seats at Babies R’ Us we would have paid $211.86

But I got online and paid a total of $168.56 plus I earned 1500+ MyPoints Points and 5 Swag Bucks Points!

I got $20 off each w/ Target.com sale, $15.80 off with 10% off coupon code, 1500 MyPoints Points for shopping at Target.com through MyPoints.com, and 5 Swag Bucks points for searching for the coupon code through SwagBucks.com!

I have to admit that there was also joy in proving my husband wrong.

A couple of months ago, I went on a mission to locate all the organic, vegan and vegetarian coupons I could find. I am happy to report that you can save money and be a vegan, vegetarian, and/or organic eater despite what seems to be an extreme shortage of coupons.  In fact, I now have so many of these coupons that I’m searching for people to send them to!

So, here is what you can do:

• Head over to your local healthy/natural foods store.  Earth Fare, Trader Joes, Whole Foods, etc.  In the front of these stores, they almost always have magazines and Mambo Sprouts books….both of which have coupons in them!   In fact, the Mambo Sprouts book is LOADED with awesome coupons!  While you’re at these stores, be sure to check the isles for coupon tear-pads/machines.
• Kiwi Magazine and other magazines based on a natural lifestyle have coupons within them every month.  You don’t have to buy the magazine, though - simply check out their websites.   
• Make a list of the brands of foods that you eat.  Sit down at the computer with your list and locate the websites for the different brands.  You will very often see a place for signing up for coupons and/or a newsletter that offers coupons weekly or monthly.  
• If the website to your favorite brands have a “contact us” link - go ahead and email them to request coupons for your favorite products.    Start your email by introducing yourself by name.  (If it is a product for your children, state their names and ages, as well.)   Go on to say something brief about why the product benefits your family.  You can then request coupons.  If you depend on coupons to stay within your grocery budget, then go ahead and tell them that, too.  Be sure to finish your email with your mailing address so they can promptly mail any available coupons your way.
• eBay is another great place to score vegan/natural/organic coupons.  *Bonus - if you place your eBay bid through a cash-back site like mypoints or bigcrumbs you’ll save even more!   Be sure to check the expiration date of any coupons before bidding.  If the seller does not state the expiration date, then be sure to ask. 
• Stop by your favorite forums (ahem: FI) and let the members there know that you are specifically on the look-out for these coupons.  Offer to swap for coupons they can use to bring in more interest. 

Happy Couponing!!