Lombard Ultra:  still no Aquapods, still no Smart Balance, just cruddy mush bread.  Picked up four of the .88 loaves using four .55 coupons.   Back of the label says “nothing comes close to my Deluxe Bread.”  so should i  have kept my $1.38 and stuck with nothing?

I’ll use this stuff for piles of french toast.  Use my free Dominicks eggs (from that new supercoupon promotion – come on now, you’ve all seen the ads!) and make lots of cheap breakfasts/snacks.

No pix, ’cause there ain’t no products!  Ultra’s warehouse never sent the Aquapods; they are hoping to get some in by/on Saturday.  I got a raincheck for 6 and – wonder of wonders – got a raincheck for 4 Smart Balance milks at the 1.99 sale price.  They still haven’t gotten them in (same warehouse snafu?) and I guess they are trying to apologize by giving out the raincheck.  Since I still have about 10 in the garage refrigerator, that works!

Picked up 5 of the Smart Balance milk, 9 lbs total of potatoes, 2 cartons of eggs (not shown), 5 lbs of Chiquita bananas, 6 Campbell Select Harvest soup and 2 Purex 3-in-1 laundry sheets (20 sheets each).  I used 6 $1/1 printables (no longer available) on the soup, 5 $2/1 for the milk (9/12 RP), a raincheck for $2.50 Purex (normally $6.49!) together with 2 $3/1 coupons. The Purex coupons had expired, but Ultra takes them back 30 days expired.

I picked up a rain check for 6 more of the Smart Balance milks, since my family likes the taste, the exp. dates are in November and IT’S FREE (which I like).  Remember, always, always get rain checks on sale items.  You’d be surprised how often you come across coupons weeks after a sale.  Ultra rain checks never expire, so the clock isn’t ticking.  I plan to pick up as many of the Smart Balance rain checks as I can; ask you family and friends to pick one up if they shop Ultra or drive by on a regular basis.

Update:  I don’t get the weekly ad and sometimes I miss deals on-line.  The ad I picked up today has Arm & Hammer 50 oz. laundry detergent for $1.98, limit 2.  There are $1/2 coupons in 7/18 SS and 9/19 SS.

Short note on the new Ultra ad:  the Smart Balance milk is on sale for $1.99.  There is a $2/1 coupon in the 9/12RP, so you know what that means:  FREE MILK!  This milk has looong expiration dates (like months) and if you somehow don’t use it all up, it freezes well in the cardboard containers.

While I liked the MM dealio at Meijer, it’s a haul to get there, they are often (usually?) out of stock on their sale stuff or have limited quantities.  Ultra is considerably closer and their rainchecks never expire (exp. date on coupon is 10/27), so my advice?  Get in, get the milk, if no milk in stock, get lots of rainchecks, since you’re bound to come across another couple of inserts before the end of October.

Thought I’d head over to Ultra to pick up the .88 Ball Park franks;  they also have Fisher peanut butter on sale for .99.  I used four $2 printables I got from “liking” Ball Park on Facebook  and 16 $1 Fisher Products coupons.  Since I had some rainchecks for the Purex 3 in 1 laundry detergent, I grabbed four $3 coupons and was able to use them on the Pure scent (originally was not part of the $2.50 deal).  To recap, I used the approximately $7 in overage to buy ground cinnamon, red grapes (.88/lb sale) and two bags of lettuce.  I cashed in a couple of puny rebate checks and used that money to pay.

Quite often in the past I’ve had people look in my cart and say “But what do you do with all the ________?”  Normally I just look ’em in the eye and say with a straight face “I rub it all over my body and let the dogs lick it off.”  I wouldn’t recommend using this line at one of those express dating deals, but at a grocery store?  I can guarantee no one will delay your departure.  However, since you are my peeps, the actual answer for the large-scale purchases I make is that it gets donated to our local food pantry, who never ask why I have 234 boxes of frosted flakes or 50 bottles of Vaseline and mountains of Q-tips…they’re funny that way.