Thanks to Chex and MyGetTogether, I was able to have a Chex "Mix-change" party last Saturday! It was a twist up on the usual holiday cookie exchange parties!

Though I invited a lot of people, few were able to make it (darn holiday season is so busy)! Those of us there had a great time though and tried LOTS of different kinds of Chex Mix. Let me share some of the pictures from the party with you, but first may I recommend that you go check out the Chex Mix recipes here. I tried all 5 of the ones listed there for my party (plus a few more), and I liked all of them! See the pictures of them below!!

Here are a few pictures of the party (Please note that for some reason when I uploaded them they all went out of order and will not work right...sorry):


I loved this party and it gave me the opportunity to tell lots of friends about all the options for Chex Mix you can use through this holiday season! I LOVE that Chex Mix ix so versatile! You really can do so much with it! Do you have a favorite Chex Mix recipe you could share? PLEASE leave it as a comment if you do! I would love, LOVE to try your recipes!!

Thanks to Chex and MyGetTogether for allowing me to host such a fun party!

Many of you know that my husband is in his last year of residency (no, we aren't done. We still have a year of fellowship after resodency). We have been married for 10 years. During that time, we both graduated from college in Utah (GO UTES), he went to medical school in Omaha, internship in Spokane, BACK to Omaha for Residency, and soon we will be off to Scottsdale for fellowship. That is an awful lot of cross country moves in 10 years, but we are happy to go on new adventures. AND one of my favorite things about moving is discovering all the new things unique to the places we live. And as we have actually lived 7 of our 10 years married here in Omaha so far, we have had lots of time to discover great hidden gems around our city.As with all cities, the holiday season brings lots of fun activities. and I am a SUCKER for a free family event! (I am also a fan of inexpensive ones!!) Visit Omaha has a great list of activities you can do over the holiday season and in fact has a site it launches just for the Holidays. This site covers events for families, kids, adults, well...for everyone! Free as well as costly and all kinds of options for fun! I was sent a few of the free and inexpensive upcoming activities to share with you (These are just ones coming up this week--near Thanksgiving. There are more I will share in an upcoming post!):

Holiday Lights Festival – The festival lights up Omaha’s downtown and has been an Omaha tradition for over 10 years. The Festival kicks off with a special lighting ceremony on Thanksgiving evening, November 24th at 6 pm. For more information on the Holiday Lights Festival, visit www.holidaylightsfestival.org.

***Cost Information: This event is free.

After the Thanksgiving lighting ceremony, you can go to the Nebraska Wind Symphony Concert at the Holland Center. This free concert – part of the Holiday Lights Festival - features more than 85 local musicians. The concert takes place on November 24th at 7 pm. To learn more, visit www.nebraskawindsymphony.com .

***Cost Information: This event is free.

***Cost Information: This event is free with membership and free to non-members on Sundays. For non-members, admission is $6 for adults, $3 for children between the ages of 3-12, and free to children under 3.

The Tree Lighting Ceremony kicks off Christmas at Union Station (at the Durham Museum). This event takes place on November 25th from 4-7 pm. A highlight of this year’s celebration will be a performance by jazz singer Camille Metoyer Moten, who will perform along with a Christmas carol sing along, cookie decorating, holiday crafts for kids and visits with Santa Claus. To learn more, visit: http://durhammuseum.org/about/whats-new/details.aspx?ID=230 .

***Cost Information: This event is free with museum membership. For non-members, admission is $8 for adults, $6 for seniors and $5 for children between the ages of 3 and 12. Children under 3 are free.

Please go check out the Visit Omaha holiday site to see the other fun upcoming events. Oh, and go check out The Visit Omaha Facebook page where you can enter a contest called the “Happier Holiday’s Giftaway.” The winner gets a two night “stay and play” at Midtown Crossing!!! That is awesome!! If I don't win it, one of you should!

Oh my goodness!! Do you remember my post the other day about all the SWEET Old Navy Coats this season? Well, I hope you are ready for an amazing sale on them because Old Navy is having a PRE Black Friday Sale!!! Check it out:

Can you read what that says? It says that on THIS SATURDAY 11/19 from noon until 5PM Adult Outerwear is 75% off and on SUNDAY 11/20 from noon until 5PM all Adult Sweaters are 75% Off (In store only and clearance items do not count).

In case you need some motivation to go, let me show you the Old Navy coat I got a few weeks ago:

Oh, and I am SOOO in love with this one I tried on that I might just go back to this sale and purchase it:

Seriously, I think I will go get that Red coat...I LOVE it, LOVE! If you want to see some of the other GREAT coats my sister-in-law and I tried on, go check out this post about our Old Navy shopping trip!! Then head over to Old Navy for the in ad sale on SATURDAY 11/19 from noon until 5PM Adult Outerwear is 75% off or on SUNDAY 11/20 from noon until 5PM all Adult Sweaters are 75% Off!!

As I am preparing for one of my favorite days of the year (Black Friday), I thought I would repost my funny shopping experience from last year. It is a long but (hopefully) fun read! I know I have a lot of new readers over the past year that might get a kick out of this post! If you are a long time reader, you may want to re-read it so you can use my lessons learned to help prepare for the big shopping day! :)

Most years, I do all (or most) of my Christmas Shopping on Black Friday. I am usually one of those very organized shoppers with a list of where I am going, when I am going there and a plan for how to get all the deals I need to make Christmas happen for cheap! Since Walmart price matches, I generally try to do as much of it as I can price matching.

Well, this year, I only needed a few things as I did most of the Christmas Shopping for this year right AFTER Christmas last year. It was a new experience for me. I almost skipped Black Friday altogether this year as I thought Wes (my hubby) had to work Black Friday (he did work but only 1-10pm). So, Wes and I looked through the ads and found that there were a few things we wanted at 3 stores.

The stops would be as follows:

1-Midnight stop at Walmart...hoping to get an art set for one child, PJ's for all 4 kids, a writing toy for another kid, and the super cheap towels.

2-6am Menards stop for: pop up tent & tunnel, "Cuddle Up" (Snuggie imitation-Wes wanted to get me one for Christmas), Wii remote charging station, and "Cuddlee Pets" (imitation Pillow Pets) for all four kids.

3-Stop at Younkers to use $10 coupon and possibly get nicer "Snuggie"-like item.

Obviously with 4 kids at home, one of us shops and the other stays home with the kids-especially when the first stop is at midnight. In years past, Walmart has been my first stop and I have gone in and grabbed the toys I was after and hurried out while everyone else was still fighting over electronics. This year Walmart split up the sale so electronics doorbusters went on at 5 am and the other ones (the ones I needed) went on at midnight. I thought it would make it easier for me to get in, out and get what I wanted without SOOO many shoppers at midnight.

WRONG! Dead wrong! First, when I left my house at 11:40ish, the streets were empty except for a steady stream of minivans making their way toward Walmart-no joke! I walked in to the store and could hardly walk in it was so crowded. I was lucky enough to have a nice manager hand me a cart (they were basically gone) as I walked in (that is one benefit to pregnancy-people want to help you out generally). So I fought my way through the people back to the PJ's and grabbed the 4 pair I needed-surprisingly the exact ones I wanted for each kid. ALL towels were long gone by the time I made it to them, so I made my way to toys. The art supplies I wanted were all gone, but I DID get the writing toy. So, I was ready to make my way to a line.

There was one employee on that side of the store that was herding people into a HUGE long line that went from the last check stand, through the sections of toys, health and beauty, pets, Christmas and all the way into the garden area. It was insane. It would have been a fine idea if that was the ONE store line and it fed into all the checkout stands, but no. It fed into only ONE checkout lane-ONE! I realized this and told the employee I was not done shopping when he tried to convince me I HAD to get in that line to check out, and I made my way back over to the grocery side of the store where I got in another long line. (Not even CLOSE to as long as that other line.)

While waiting in line I had the guy behind me pinch my butt, then an older guy rammed into my cart with his cart and tried to cut in front of me in line. When I said "Really?! You think so?!" to te old guy and told him to go to the back of the line, the butt pincher behind me did and said nothing. Then tried to act like he was ready to defend my honor AFTER the older guy was gone (it was pretty funny).

There was a woman in front of me that had lots of heavy stuff and no cart and I had a cart and hardly anything in it, so I moved my stuff to the front part of the cart and offered her the back of my cart for her to rest her stuff in while we waited in line. She took me up on it and we started to talk. As we were getting closer to the front, I realized I had gotten the WRONG size for one of the PJ's, Thank goodness I had made this friend, so she watched our cart as I ran back and (luckily) found the correct size.

After over an hour in line, I made it to the front finally! I made it home from Walmart at about 2:30am, and thought I would throw in a nap.

When the alarm went off at 5 am, I turned it off and went back to bed. I woke up around 6:30/7 and ran over to Menards in my PJs. There I was able to score the Cuddle pets (all 4) and the tents. The Wii chargers were sold out, and the snuggie things were made of really coarse feeling felt so I opted to leave without one!!

Waiting in that long line was quite amusing as the lady in front of me was very funny, and the lady in front of her was even funnier. The one 2 up from me kept having people ram into her cart, and she never even flinched or got upset at them. We told her how impressed we were that she was so patient, and she said "Honey, I work at the casino! This is nothin!"

Then the 2 guys behind me in line ( who were both a little gangster looking) were telling me the funniest stories about the other places they had already been. I heard tales of Toys R Us, Walmart and Target. The funniest of which was the one guy telling me he saw a lady with 2 HUGE carts full of stuff at Walmart at 1am struggling through the parking lot, so he started to rush toward her to help, and she yelped and started running through the parking lot trying to push one cart and pull the other! He said to me "I guess I look pretty scary running over to help at 1am." He thought it was hilarious. The other guy saw a fight break out and a man escorted from Walmart at about midnight (I had seen the escort out and wondered what had happened so it was interesting to hear from someone that was back there). FYI the fight was over a pricematch for $99 Wii's.

After I went home, content with my shopping and feeling done for the day, Wes wanted to go get the nicer looking Snuggies from Younkers for my present. We went over and got them (as I stood in line for over an hour he took the kids to see Santa in the mall-with NO line BTW). I have to admit-I learned I am NOT a pet person...a mom and daughter in front of me in line were saying "I just don't know which one he will like better, he is so picky...maybe I should grab the other one?" I assumed they were talking about the pillow pets they were holding for the grandkids (they had been talking about them a lot). Then the daughter said "Let's look at them together" then she walked over and grabbed a second pet bed and set it next to the one they had and they proceeded to discuss the DOG's color and pattern preferences...I was baffled-I thought dogs were colorblind, but then again, I have never had a dog. Do they really have preferences?! Seriously pet owners, do they?!

All in all I had a successful day and got most of my goal products, but I also had a few things I learned that I want to share:

1-We are all in this together-we are all stuck in this crazy crowd trying to get the best deals, so let's try not to make it so miserable on each other-no need to be mean. Remember the things your mom and dad taught you and don't pick on other kids, don't push and shove, and be nice! (That does NOT mean you need to be so nice as to give up the things you want to someone else that wants it too-go get what you need, but don't trample others to get it).

2-No sir, there is no cutting in line no matter how old, how frustrated or how aggressive you are-that young little weak looking pregnant lady WILL stand up for herself! I will NEVER start a confrontation, and in fact I will always try to be pleasant and kind to others, but so help me, if you get in my face I WILL defend myself and as my father-in-law says, "If it is a matter of who can pitch the biggest fit, I can if necessary."

3-Black Friday is stressful-the economy is bad, and we ALL want/need that deal to make Christmas happen, so it is probably a good time to be patient and to help out a stranger and do some service for others-like the lady without a cart. It did not hurt me at all to share mine with her, but it sure made it easier on her!

4-Patience, Patience, Patience!! Would I on any other day wait in the Disneyland length lines at a store? No, no I would not. Would I have the patience for it? No, but on Black Friday I put on my most patient face and head out the door!

5-Black Friday shopping is NOT nearly as fun alone! Thank you for all my friends and family who have gone with me in the past and made it an FUN experience! Those of you that can share with me the cart crashing and we can laugh at it together! Those who have waited in those eternal lines and talked to me and helped further develop our relationships as we tried to make a stressful situation fun! Thanks Wes, Mom, Andrea, Melanie, Spence, Lindsey, Lisa, Laurie and all the others that have joined me in my madness over the years!!

6-If you can, bring a buddy with you to Black Friday-it really is better that way (see lesson 5).

So, readers-do you do Black Friday?! Any funny stories you can share?! I would LOVE to hear about it!!!

Have you seen my newest giveaway? I am giving away a pack of Carmex lotions and creams!! Check out my review and enter the giveaway here!

It has been a while since I posted about one of my favorite things, Swagbucks. So, new readers might wonder what it is. Basically it is a search engine. Why, you ask am I Searching on Swagbucks rather than somewhere else?! Well, it is because you can earn points, or "Swag bucks" which you can put toward prizes or gift cards. AND today, as with EVERY Friday, is Mega Swag Bucks day! That means more chances to earn more Swag Bucks (which will earn you gift cards or prizes faster!!)! So, make sure to use Swag Bucks for all your searching needs today! I know I will be using Swagbucks all day!

If you have not joined yet, click on my referral link here and start earning Swag Bucks with me! This is a GREAT time to join-with Mega Swag Bucks going on today AND if you join by 11/23 and use the code SBPAYSFORME you get 110 SB to start (versus the usual 30)!! As an FYI, I have made $180 in Amazon Gift cards so far and I have 341 Swagbucks which is almost enough to get another $5 Amazon Gift card. (450=$5 Amazon card).

If you are new to Swag Bucks, please read my explanation of Swag Bucks here. And my explanation of the changes to Swagbucks here.

I know I have told you often how much I love Swagbucks, and this Holiday season there is even more to love!! If you have not signed up yet, you will really want to now!! It is the perfect time to do so because if you sign up through my referral link between now and November 23, and use the Registration code SBPAYSFORME, you will start your account with 110 Swagbucks (usually you start with 30)!!! WOW-it is only 450 Swagbucks so get a $5 Amazon Gift card! You are about a fourth of the way there already just by signing up!

That is not the only exciting thing they have going on right now though! They are also in the midst of their "Swagbucks Pays for your Holidays" promotion! Through this promotion one person will have the opportunity to have Swagbucks pay for your holidays! Until Monday, November 28th you’ll have opportunities every day to earn entries for their grand prize drawing – a grand prize of $2500 in Amazon Gift Cards!! NICE! All you have to do is fill out a qualifying wish list and you have your first entry! (All the details can be found on this Swagbucks Blog post)

If you are a part of the Pepperidge Farms Fresh Ideas Panel make sure to check your email today! There is a special Thank you in the email (FREE coupon offer). Make sure you click on it and fill out the info so you can get your thank you present! I just filled out mine! :)

Who here has heard of slice™ Safety Cutter - Great for couponers?! I just recently heard of it and I need to tell you my story about it!

I have been a bad girl lately and have been ignoring my coupons. Seriously. It has been a hassle for me to sit there and cut them out when I have been busy and as a result, my coupon binder was a mess. However, I was sent a sweet little item to review that motivated me to do something about it!

I was sent The Slice™ Safety Cutter (which is said to be Great for Couponers) to review. As mentioned, my coupon binder was a wreck so I seized the opportunity and decided to clean out and update the binder. That means I got rid of lots of expired coupons then had a lot of new unclipped coupon inserts to cut out. There were so many coupons to cut this morning!!! Usually when I do this, it takes a good hour and my hands are sore from the scissors when I get done!

This time however, I used The Slice™ Safety Cutter and it was SOOO quick and easy. I did make the mistake of putting the cutter directly on my wood tray table at first which means I cut into it a bit. Oops...after that I used my noggin and grabbed my clean cutting board and cut the remaining coupons on the cutting board with The Slice™ Safety Cutter. It cut my coupons out quickly and easily and "cut" my coupon clipping time in half! Best part: my hand was NOT sore at the end! Frankly I think this is a MUST HAVE for couponers! Really!

Now I know you moms out there are wondering how this blade could cut so well and NOT be a danger to the children around. Well, it has a "Finger Friendly Design" that makes it safe for kids-in fact my kids will be using this for future school projects instead of scissors! Look at my finger pressed against mine:

In that picture you can probably see that it is a small item as well, so you can easily keep it with you in a purse or wallet. Mine is tucked nicely into my newly cleaned up coupon binder:

I Love this product for so many reasons! It is safe for the kids, perfect for coupons and small so I can carry it with me. I imagine it would make scrapbookers as happy as it has made this couponer...in fact there are SOOO many things that would be easier with this sweet little product!

You should go check out the slice™ Safety Cutter! It is a worthwhile investment in my book! Highly recommend!

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

Thanksgiving has snuck up on me this year!! Is it really next week?! I thought I would bring back this post from last year adn let you know what the best price matches are that I found for my Thanksgiving menu. Some of the items I make are standard Thanksgiving items that many of you are likely looking for as well so I thought I would share my list of price matches with you!

Turkey

• Our Family Premium Turkey Frozen 10 lband Up $.49/lb (Limit 1 with additional $25 purchase) (BnS)
• Butterball Turkeys 10 lb and up limit 2 $.98/lb (BnS)
• Festive (brand) FrozenTurkey $.99/lb (limit 2) (NFF)
• Jennie-O Fresh Turkey $.59 (limit 2 with card and additional $25 purchase) (B)
• Fastco Basted Turkey $.68/lb (F)
• Super Saver claims to have "Turkey Insurance" and that their Turkey price will be at least $.02 per pound less than the lowest advertised price of their competitors (SS)

Ham

• Farmland Half Spiral Sliced Hams $1.99/lb (NFF)
• Shank Portion Ham $1.49/lb (BnS)
• Cook's Spiral Sliced Hams half or Whole $1.77/lb (SS)

Mashed Potatoes

• Russet Potatoes 15 lb bag $2.99 (NFF)
• Russet Potatoes 10 lb $1.79 (A)
• Green Giant 5 lb Russet Potatoes $.88 (ONLY on Fareways 2 day Sale Fri 11/18-Sat 11/19)
• Our Family Butter $2.49 (BnS)
• Meadow Gold Butter 1 lb $1.88 (SS)
• Land O Lakes Milk Gallon (whole, 2%, 1%, or Skim) $2.48 (limit 2) (SS)

Gravy

• Campbells Gravy 10.25-10.5 oz $.59 (NFF)
• McCormicks Brown Gravy mix $.59 (NFF)
• Heinz Gravy 12 oz $.97 (F)
• Swanson Broth 14 oz beef, chicken or Natural Goodness Chicken $.38 (SS)

Sage "American" Stuffing/dressing

• Dole Celery $.49 each (HV)
• Yellow Onion 3 lb bag $1.49 (BnS)
• Stove Top Stuffing Mix 6 oz $.88 (SS)

Orange-Cranberry Relish/Sauce

• Cranberries12 oz bag $.99/bag (A)
• Ocean Spray 14 oz Jellied or Whole Cranberry $.88 (SS)

XiaXia's Rolls (Below are some options in case you don't want to make from sratch!)

• Pillsbury Crescent or Rolls 12.3-13.9 oz 3/$5 (NFF & F)
• Pan O Gold Brown N Serve Rolls 12 ct $.88 (BnS)
• Rhodes Frozen Dinner Rolls 36 ct 48 oz $3.74 (W)

Yams/Sweet Potatoes with Marshmallows

• Bruce's Cut Yam 40 oz $1.99 (BnS)
• Our Family Butter $2.49 (BnS)
• Meadow Gold Butter 1 lb $1.88 (SS)
• Fresh Yams $.27/lb (SS)
• Fresh Sweet Potatoes $.38/lb (W)

Ambrosia

• Kraft Jet Puffed Marshmallows 10 oz regular or 10.5 oz mini $.99 (NFF)

Jello Salad

• There were not any prices I was really impressed with...

Olive/Pickle/cheese appetizer tray

• Vlasic Pickles 16-32 oz $1.98 (NFF)
• Lindsey Black Pitted ( 6 oz) or Green Olives (5.75 oz) $.97 (F)

Cheese Ball with crackers

• Ritz Crackers 9.5-25.5 oz or Nabisco Snack Crackers 5.5-10oz $1.38 (with in ad coupon) (NFF)

Cranberry Cookies

• Hershey's Baking Chips 8-12 oz $1.88 (HV)
• Nestle Morsels $1.88 (10-12 oz) (NFF)
• Cranberries12 oz bag $.99/bag (A)

Pies

• Hy Vee Natural Pumpkin 15 oz can $.69 (HV)
• Pillsbury Pie Crusts $1.99 (14.1 oz box) (F)
• Pillsbury Pet Ritz Frozen Pie Crust 2 packs $1.99 (F)
• Mrs Smith Pies $3.48 (NFF)
• Marie Callendar's Pies $4.98 (NFF)
• Wilderness Pie Filling 20-21 oz Cherry or Apple 2/$5 (NFF)
• Bakery Cooked Pumpkin or Apple Pie 8 inch $2.99 each (NFF)
• Kraft Cool Whip 8 oz $.78 (SS)

Ham/pickle/cream cheese roll ups

• Philidelphia Cream Cheese $.98 (SS)
• Vlasic Pickles 16-32 oz $1.98 (NFF)

Green Bean Casserole

• Our Family canned Vegetables (14.5-15.25 oz) 3/$.99 (NFF)
• Libby Canned Vegetable 4 Pack 58-60 oz $2 (W)
• French's French Fried Onions 6 oz $2.78 (NFF)
• Campbells Cream of Mushroom and Cream of Chicken Soups 10.75 oz $.58 (SS)

Note the key for the stores to match: Hyvee (HV), Bag N Save (BnS), No Frills Fresh (NFF),  Baker's (B), Aldi's (A), Super Saver (SS), Fareway (F), Walmart (W).