Our Big Fat Almost Free Vacation

This is actually a post that I wrote a couple of weeks ago, but took until now to load up the pictures. Have I complained enough about being too busy lately? I need to go back to this place!


Well we are back from our "almost" free vacation. It was such a fun time together. I think planning it for free was half the fun. Here is a list of what we had to work with to produce a free vacation.


1 - my parents gifted us the use of their timeshare condo on the beach in Ormond Beach

This was the view from our unit...watching the sunrise every morning with my coffee......aaaahhh...

2 - We purchased 95% of our food using the buy one, get one free items from Publix over the past few month. We ate spaghetti, taco's, harvest casserole (meal makers) and had chicken for the grill, but ended up bringing that home. We also had all our breakfast, snacks and lunch stuff. We brought back a LOT of groceries.


3 - We had about 150 dollars in cash from birthdays (Pat and I), a walmart gift card for $10.

4 - Four Disney coupons good for a day at Walt Disney World from their Give A Day, Get A Day campaign. This was a great savings as it turned out. I had NOT idea Disney was so expensive!

We did have expenses that we didn't know how we were going to cover. Such as the food at Disney and any soveniers for the girls. Well on our first day at the condo, they offered us a hundred dollar VISA gift card if we would go and listen to a high pressure vacation sales pitch. We looked at each other and said "sure". After a free breakfast, 90 minutes and a "we don't make any decisions without thinking it over for 24 hours", we had our gift card! (On a side note, the vacation plan sounded really good!) We used that Visa card for our Disney day!


We did well finding resources for miscellaneous spending and the vacation. But knew that we would have to pay $140 for our dog who was with a dog sitter. On our last day on the beach, someone approached us about seeing yet another vacation speal. Well, we all said no. Then the guy said he would give us $120 CASH and a 3-day stay in Gatlinburg, TN. Dad said "that will pay for Lucy" and we are agreed to go. After 2 hours, we had the money for the dog. Well almost, we were 20 bucks shy. Turns out, when we arrive to get Lucy, her sitter said "120" because she was such a good dog. Go Figure! That is exactly what we had earned for our last pushy sales pitch!

So the vacation was a success with minimal out of pocket and loads of fun. We had time to reconnect as a family and just hang out. That is priceless in my book. Can't put a price tag on family.

This.....is pricesless......

A Free Ride - Possible?

My parents so graciously gave us a free week at the beach in Florida during September. A timeshare that they don't plan to use, right on the beach. What a blessing. Since our "extra" income has been somewhat limited, or eaten up by emergent needs lately, we don't have a lot to spend on the luxuries such as vacation. That sparked an idea. We already earned free tickets to Disney World through their Give-A-Day-Get-A-Day awhile back. The girls and I were talking and wondering if we could pull off going on vacation.......FOR FREE. So far we had a free place to stay for a week right on the beach, free one day tickets to Walt Disney World (a two hour drive from our beach place by the way). All we need is food and gas money and maybe some cha-ching for our pockets.

Well, recently a good friend explained how to coupon shop to me and I have been on a shopping trip or two. But, fell out of the habit rather quickly. We decided to get back in the habit and to bank all of our our "free" items from the "BuyOne, GetOne" deals out there. A few days ago I made the first trip to begin our food bank and here is the first stash to go into our vacation box. Not bad. Even have a spaghetti dinner and chips and salsa! Not a bad start. I get a lot of help from Southern Savers and IheartPublix. Our goal is to not use any household money, buts to eat off of all our free stuff for the week and use any gift cards (Pat and I both have birthdays in August) for dairy and meat. Any "cash" we receive for birthdays will go for gas for the trip.
I have decided to use eBay to sell items we no longer need or want to raise the spending cash for Disney. I am going to have the girls do a heart to heart in their rooms and decide if they would like to part with any toys, books, etc.... Combined I am hoping to raise enough for a cheap hotel after a day at Disney and some spending money for the park.

My friend Patty over at ReasonsforChocolate recently did a post on her children's "Go Bags". I normally do "Go Bags" for my children, but need to be able to fill them "free" or almost free for this vacation. I had a few dollars from selling a homeschool book. I headed out to where my friend Patty found her treasures - Target. I was in luck. The summer items with the black dot were on clearance and half off (in the cheapo bins to begin with). I got some cute items which I can't list because C-Sunshine reads this blog. (I will sneak in a post closer to the trip)......

My First Coupon Shopping Day

Okay, after hearing everyone rave over how much money they are saving for their families, I decided to do a day of Coupon power shopping at Publix today. I was always hesitant because we eat mostly whole organic foods. But because I am trying to save some cash these days, I decided to venture in and see what I could get.

I went to SouthernSavers and IHeartPublix to get the lo down on what to buy. I also went to the publix website and made my shopping list. I had purchased the papers for coupons last Sunday, but honestly, most of the coupons I printed online. I am impressed with what I got. My total ended up being $47.26 and I had a savings of $64.97. Not bad my first time out of the box! This even included a few items that were not on sale and I had no coupons for. But needed. I am going to try and do this power shopping each week along with my organic produce co-op ONLY. We will see how I do.

Today's take included 3 boxes of organic granola bars, 2 1/2 gallons of organic milk and two boxes of organic cereal. And tons of other stuff. Yes, I did buy the toaster Strudel. It was free, so I couldn't pass it up. My girls are really excited about that. They were my helpers today. If you haven't try the coupon and deal grocery shopping. I suggest you get on board for a week and see what you can get for your money. Now we can spend the extra on fun stuff for learning! :)