Dollars & $ense - ShoppingQueen.com Blog

School Supply Deals for 8/17 - 8/23

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Here are this week’s school supply deals:

If you have been waiting for a great deal on a graphing calculator, now is the time to buy. Office Depot has the TI-83 Plus for $65 and Staples has the TI-84 Plus for $70 (both after rebate.)

Office Depot

10 cents: Acrylic 12″ ruler
20 cents: Office Depot brand school glue
25 cents: Westcott 5″ scissors
50 cents: Wood pencils 12-pk and PaperMate ballpoint stick pens 10-pk
99 cents: Wirebound notebooks 6-pk and Uni-Ball Jetstream ballpoint pens 3-pk

(The above deals are only valid Sunday - Wednesday.)

Free After Rebate: Sharpie fine point permanent markers 5-pk

TI-83 Plus Graphing Calculator: $65 After Rebate ($100- $10 instant savings - $25 rebate)
TI-84 Plus Silver Graphing Calculator: $100 After Rebate ($140 - $15 instant savings - $25 rebate)

OfficeMax

1 cent: Elmer’s school glue
10 cents: OfficeMax No.2 pencils 12-pk and Spiral 1-subject notebooks
20 cents: Crayola crayons 24-pk
25 cents: Poly two pocket foler and Bic round stic pens 12-pk

Staples

FREE: Dixon pencils 8-pk and 12″ plastic ruler

20 cents: 2-pocket poly report covers
25 cents: 1/2″ and 1″ plastic binders
50 cents: Plastic pencil boxes

$15: Case of staples paper after rebate with purchase of 2 cases ($60 for two - $30 rebate = $30)

Valid Sunday & Monday only: TI-84 Plus Graphing Calculator: $70 After Rebate ($120 - $15 instant savings - $35 rebate)
TI-83 Plus Graphing Calculator: $80 After Rebate ($100 - $10 instant savings - $10 rebate)
TI-84 Plus Silver Graphing Calculator: $100 After Rebate ($130 - $15 instant savings - $15 rebate)

Target

10 cents: 2-pocket portfolio
25 cents: 2-pocket plastic portfolio
69 cents: No. 2 pencils 24-pk, pick erasers 2-pk and pencil sharpener

Walgreens

12 cents (with coupon in weekly ad): 2-pocket folders
25 cents (with coupon in weekly ad): Penway highlighter
39 cents (with coupon in weekly ad): Filler paper, PaperMate mechanical pencils or pens 10-pk, No. 2 pencils 10-pk, writing pad 100-sheet, Sharpie marker
39 cents: PaperMate No. 2 pencils 6-pk and 8-pk, Corner Office sheet protectors 10-pk, Penway products including: compass, protractor, pencil sharpener and crayon sharpener, glue sticks 3-pk, colorer pencils 12-pk, crayons 24-pk, jumbo crayons 8-pk, metal ruler and school glue.

School Supply Deals for 8/10 - 8/16

Here are this week’s school supply deals:

K-Mart

50 cents: Designer portfolios and stretchable book covers
$1.50: Westcott scissors

Office Depot

These offers are valid only Sunday - Wednesday

5 cents: Eraser caps 12-pk and 6″ protractor
50 cents: Crayola markers 10-pk and Office Depot glue sticks 4-pk

Free After Rebate: Sharp Scientific Calculator

TI-83 Plus Graphing Calculator: $70 After Rebate ($95-$25)
TI-84 Plus Silver Graphing Calculator: $105 After Rebate ($130-$25)
Free with purchase of any TI Graphing Calculator: Protective calculator case in assorted designs

Spend $50 or more this week at Office Depot and you will receive a coupon at the register for $10 off your next purchase of $20 or more in September.

OfficeMax

1 cent: 2-pocket folder, 12″ wood ruler
15 cents: Office Depot filler paper
30 cents: 1″ and 1.5″ poly binders

Staples

FREE: Elmer’s glue, Free after instant rebate
9 cents: Filler paper 150-sheets
20 cents: 2-pocket plastic report covers
25 cents: PaperMate mechanical pencils 5-pk
33 cents: 3″ x 5″ ruler index cards 100-pk
75 cents: 1-subject notebook 100 sheets
79 cents: Crayola markers 10-pk
99 cents: Expo dry erase markers 3-pk and Staples highlighters 6-pk
$1.99: Staples copy paper 500-sheet ream

TI-83 Plus Graphing Calculator: $80 After Rebate ($100 - $10 instant savings - $10 rebate)
TI-84 Plus Graphing Calculator: $90 After Rebate ($120 - $15 instant savings - $15 rebate)
TI-84 Plus Silver Graphing Calculator: $100 After Rebate ($130 - $15 instant savings - $15 rebate)

Target

27 cents: RoseArt crayons 24-ct
50 cents: Pencil box, stretchable book cover, vinyl pencil pouch and Mead Five Star folders
88 cents: Crayola colored pencils 12-pk, construction paper 96-sheet and drawing paper 40-sheet
$2: Crayola crayons 64-ct and Crayola watercolor paints 8-ct

New York City Discounts

For visitors vacationing or residents staycationing in New York City there is a great website for discounts for restaurants, tours, shopping excursions and more. NYCVisit.com has both information on where to go and a deals and promotions page with ways to save. Some of the offers are exlcusive to American Express card holders but most are available to everyone.

Wallet Shock Today

My dear husband called me this morning at 8:30am and said it’ll be $3,700 and please come pick me up in an hour. That woke me up faster than five cups of coffee. No, my husband was not calling from jail. He was calling from the dentist’s office, the periodontist’s office to be exact.

I was shocked. I paid $3,000 for labor and delivery charges for the birth of our second daughter in November 2007. I stayed in the hospital for two days and was served salmon with hollandaise sauce. So a one hour procedure was going to cost $3,700?

Pregnant without maternity coverage had made me an excellent healthcare negotiator. So when my husband needed some dental work, I did some research and began calling local periodontists to see what I could negotiate. To my dismay, I found it to be much harder to get any kind of financial information over the phone. Everyone required a consult before they quoted anything. Now I wasn’t asking for a written quote, just a verbal ball park figure.

Finally, I made the appointment with the periodontist recommended by our dentist. He also had the most reasonable consult fee, so I figured his other fees should be reasonable too. So just before he is about to go under the knife, my husband calls me to inform me of the total. Obviously at this point, I have little bargaining room, but I still managed to cut the fee about 10% to $3,400.

Since we didn’t have that much in our HSA account, we paid it from our savings account. Now we have to come up with another $3,400 to fund the HSA account so that we can write a check to ourselves from that account. Complicated and confusing, but that’s the brave world of healthcare we live in today.

On the positive side, the doctor was very nice and did a great job. I actually would recommend him.

School Supply Deals for 8/3 - 8/9

Here are this week’s school supply deals:

K-Mart

25 cents: RoseArt crayons 24-pk
33 cents: PaperMate pens 10-pk
$1.50: RoseArt markers 10-pk
$5: Sharpie markers 12-pk

Office Depot

1 cent: Office Depot slider pencil box, pencil sharpener and wood 12″ ruler
5 cents: Office Depot 2-pocket folder with or without prongs, Scholastic crayons 16-pk
25 cents: PaperMate pens 10-pk
79 cents: Kids 5″ scissors 2-pk
99 cents: Bic mechanical pencils 5-pk, Sharpie highlighters 6-pk and Mead Five State 4-pocket folder

Free After Rebate: Child I.D. Kit

TI-83 Plus Graphing Calculator: $75 After Rebate ($100-$25)
TI-84 Plus Silver Graphing Calculator: $115 After Rebate ($140-$25)
Free with purchase of any TI Graphing Calculator: Protective calculator case in assorted designs

OfficeMax

OfficeMax doesn’t have any specific school supply deals this week. They are running their bag promotion. In the Sunday paper there is an OfficeMax brown paper bag and you can take that to the store and receive 15% off anything that fits into the bag.

Staples

FREE: 2-pocket folders with or without prongs (Free after instant rebate. 10 per customer.)
5 cents: 1-subject wide ruled notebook
25 cents: Composition book
50 cents: Graphing notebook

TI-83 Plus Graphing Calculator: $80 After Rebate ($100 - $10 instant savings - $10 rebate)
TI-84 Plus Graphing Calculator: $90 After Rebate ($120 - $15 instant savings - $15 rebate)
TI-84 Plus Silver Graphing Calculator: $100 After Rebate ($130 - $15 instant savings - $15 rebate)

Target

50 cents: Target kids scissors, RoseArt colored pencils 12-pk and RoseArt washable 8 colors watercolors
85 cents: 1-subject notebook

Walmart

5 cents: 70-sheet notebook
15 cents: Twin pocket folders
22 cents: Crayola crayons 24-pk. Elmers 4oz. glue and Elmers 2-pk gluesticks
46 cents: 3″x5″ index cards 100-pk
50 cents: Composition book
88 cents: Crayola markers 10-pk and Bic pens 10-pk
97 cents: PaperMate No.2 pencils 24-pk and PaperMate pink erasers 2-pk

TI-84 Plus Silver Graphing Calculator: $94

Welcome Miami Herald Readers

The Saturday edition of the Miami Herald included my website as a reference for money saving tips for back to school shopping.

So Welcome to all of the new visitors from Miami! I hope you enjoy my site and blog.

Secrets of saving on back-to-school shopping

Sales Tax Holidays this Month

In time for back to school shopping, many states will have a sales tax holiday this month, especially this first weekend. Qualified purchases are exempt from state sales tax. Here is the Guide to State Sales Tax Holidays which includes participating states, dates and qualified purchases.

It’s going to be busy at the stores, so here are some tisential tips to help parents save money and their sanity:

1. Know what is sales tax free ahead of time. It will be a busy weekend and you don’t want any surprises after waiting in the long check out lane.

2. Ask stores to price match or honor competitor’s coupons and promotions to avoid running from store to store to get the best price. Many stores including office supply stores such as Staples and Office Depot will meet or beat a competitor’s price as well as honor competitor’s coupons.

3. Take advantage of stores’ extended hours. Many stores will open early and close late, shop during these times to avoid the mid-day rush.

4. Have a list and a budget to focus your shopping and time. Just because computer purchases up to $1,500 may be tax exempt does not mean you can not get a good student computer for only $500.

5. Research store sales flyers ahead of time. Many retailers put their sales advertisements on their website, you can check out the sales before you head to the store. Don’t forget to check out ShoppingQueen.com to print your coupons too.

Miami Restaurant Months

I was quite surprised when I saw this. As I had mentioned in a previous post, many cities are having a restaurant week to entice diners to try some of their cities’ finest restaurants. Well Miami wants to one up all the other cities by having Miami Restaurant Months. Yes, that’s right months!

This August and September nearly 100 restaurants will offer diners three course meals for $23 for lunch and $36 for dinner. So if you live in Miami or plan to visit Miami make sure to take advantage of this event. For more info and list of participating Miami restaurants check out Miami Spice.

Cheesecake Factory Celebrating 30th Anniversary with $1.50 Cheesecake

Happy Birthday to the Cheesecake Factory. In celebration of 30 Delicious Years and in commemoration of National Cheesecake Day on July 30, The Cheesecake Factory will offer every slice of its more than 30 varieties of cheesecake at $1.50 per slice on that day to dine-in guests (limit one per guest)- just as they were when the first Cheesecake Factory opened in Beverly Hills in 1978.

In addition, a special, limited edition cheesecake, the 30th Anniversary Chocolate Cake Cheesecake, will be introduced on National Cheesecake Day with $0.25 from the sale of each slice of the 30th Anniversary Cheesecake sold this year being donated to the national hunger-relief organization, America’s Second Harvest - The Nation’s Food Bank Network.

Free Food at Chipotle Restaurants in Georgia and Iowa

Chipotle has a special promotion in Georgia and Iowa. (Those are the only states I am aware of having this promotion. If there are others, please share.) Chipotle customers who purchase a burrito, taco, salad or burrito bowl on July 30 and/or July 31, can return Aug. 2 and Aug. 3 for a free burrito, burrito bowl, order of tacos or salad, with proof of previous purchase.

Chipotle Promotion in Georgia

Chipotle Promotion in Iowa

Thanks to a gracious reader for sharing this deal.