Friday, August 21, 2015

When God Shows Up in the Cereal Aisle

My younger kids have been asking for cold cereal.  They like that for breakfast, and it is something I rarely buy.  Filling up five kids -- three of them teen boys -- on Cheerios is just not cost-effective. 

So this week, for various reasons, I had $10 to do the family grocery shopping with.  I really wasn't too worried about it, as there just wasn't a lot we needed.  I planned to sit down and look at ads on Tuesday before heading to town, but that just didn't happen.  On my way out the door, however, I noticed a stack of coupons and stuffed it into my purse.  Thinking at the time, "Seriously, like you are going to be buying anything not on the list."

At the grocery store, I went through, grabbed the couple things we needed, and spent six bucks and change.  I headed out... and saw a display of cereal at the front of the store.  I paused to look at it, and noticed the deal was that if you buy 4 boxes, they are $.99 each. 

I stared at the cereal displayed, then reached into my purse to look at the coupons I had nabbed.  Sure enough, I had a coupon good for one box of Trix, and one for a box of Cocoa Puffs. Our stores double coupons up to $1 off total, so I grabbed my $3 something in change and the above four boxes of cereal and headed back to the register.

$1.96 was my total.

And those are coupons I printed using Swagbucks, so at some point down the road, I'll get $.10 each for using those coupons.  But I don't really count that when calculating my costs.

If I was a super-mega-couponer, that deal would be nothing.  You know, I'd have had two more coupons with me, so they'd have been paying me four cents to take that cereal home with me.  And since the deal could be done twice on one transaction, I'd have had four more, so I'd have gotten eight boxes instead.

But that's the thing.  I didn't plan this.  I just happened to choose Safeway, who happened to have a deal going on cereal.  I just happened to print coupons for cereal I *NEVER* buy (I think I printed these before a trip... and I do sometimes get "junk" cereal to take on road trips).  I just happened to pick them up off the desk and bring them along.  I just happened to notice the display on my way out, after just happening to NOT spend all $10.  And I just happened to remember I had coupons with me that maybe I ought to look at.


I'm not going to over-spiritualize this.  This is so much of a 'no big deal' in the big scheme of things.  But what a blessing to be able to provide my kids with a couple mornings of cereal, and still stay significantly under my miniscule grocery budget.


Disclaimer:  The above Swagbucks links is a referral link.  If you sign up for Swagbucks using it, I'll get some percentage of some of what you earn.  My Swagbucks earnings go towards paying our electric bill and buying groceries -- and half of it is donated to the building fund for a new community center that will serve as a food pantry out here, among other things.  Feel free to find Swagbucks through another link if you wish.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Love it when God shows up in the little things of our life! I always consider happenings like this sweet blessings from God! Thanks for sharing!

Walking in His Grace,
Laurie
Grace-Filled-Moments.blogspot.com

grtlyblesd said...

:) I bet your kids were delighted!