Back to school, CHEAP!

Most of our kids are back to school already.  This means you probably had a substantial list of supplies you needed to provide to the school for your child's education.  Now, these supply lists are a thorn in the sides of many parents.  After Christmas, back to school season is the biggest retail season of the year.  It is also the BEST time to score great deals on all those back to school supplies.  Seriously, some stores are literally GIVING away supplies.  Free paper, pens, highlighters, glue, scissors, etc.  Just take a look below.

All of this was FREE or a penny.  This picture does not even include the stuff I already sent to school with my 3 kids, these are the leftovers!  I bet you think I must have spent hours pouring over sale ads and coupons blogs to get the deals and then running all over town, wasting gas to save a few pennies on a notebook.  Nope, quite the opposite.  I would simply look at one ad match up site a week.  That takes maybe 10 minutes and if I was near the store on a regular errand run, I would stop in.  Staples is the store that is only a few miles away and had the best deals.  I think I went there 3 times total, I didn't even get all the deals.  They gave away 3-4 reams of paper every week for 6 weeks straight!  I also did some deals at Rite Aid, but only if I was shopping there anyway for the usual stuff like diapers and shampoo.

This makes back to school shopping almost fun for me because next year, I will start my back to school shopping in my basement.  That usually knocks off at least half my list.    Then I'll see what deals pop up and head to my local discount store for those last few items.  I probably spent $15 at most on all the supplies this year.  I am not just saving money, but saving myself the stress of finding all the correct specific supplies and possibly going all around town anyway to find a specific color folder that is on every supply list and gone from every local store.