Posted by Ayren Jackson-Cannady

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Issue 10 of All You magazine is now on sale, which means we have a new sweepstakes! Enter for a chance to win a Crock-Pot Cook & Carry slow cooker, a Halloween movie collection, or a Fabulous Fun with Puzzles book.

Featured in Issue 10: Halloween costumes and decorations, our favorite recipes for slow cookers, ways to boost your energy, jackets that flatter you, plus more than $43 worth of coupons. Pick up a copy today at Wal-Mart. Never want to miss an issue? Subscribe and you’ll receive two free trial issues.

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Posted by Julie Parrish, a Shopping Strategist and co-owner of Hotcouponworld.com.

I haven’t bought toilet paper in two years.  I haven’t bought dryer sheets or floor cleaners in five years.  It’s not that we don’t use these products, it’s just that once they were on sale at a price I couldn’t afford to pass up, I bought so many that I haven’t had to think about buying them since.

Since the economy began heading south year, the shopping advice from local and national media has been “try not to buy more than you need at one time” which makes me cringe every time I hear it.

While it may seem counter-intuitive to shop for something you don’t need and buy a boatload of it, if you’re buying an item at its rock bottom price and you can stock up on it, then you won’t have to buy it later at full price.

The key to this strategy? Add one or two sale items a week that weren’t on your list that you’ll likely use anyway.  Use coupons to sweeten the deal and buy as many as you can at that price.  Today at Target, 150-sheet lined notebook paper was on clearance for .12 cents each. Needless to say, at a savings of 88% off full retail, I bought enough paper for the kids that I won’t I won’t need to buy it again for several years.  I’ll toss it in a Rubbermaid tub and pull it out when we need it.

As you begin to shop this way, keep a few things in mind:

• How much can I budget on building my stockpile each week?  Take a percentage of what you currently spend and reallocate it to shopping for long-term-use deals.

• Will my family use up the product before it expires?  My kids go through one jar of peanut butter a week, so when I can get it for less than .50 cents per jar, I buy at least 52 jars to get me through a whole year.

• Do I have room to store these items in a way that makes sense?  An investment in storage totes, shelving and a deep freezer can help you save in the long term.

If you can incorporate this tactic into your personal shopping routine, you might spend a little more at first, but ultimately, it will reduce your groceries costs more each month.  A few years of shopping this way, I’ve cut our grocery bill down to about $200 a month. My family could live off the products stored in the garage for several months if we ever came on tough times. And best of all, I can take the money we save and use it somewhere else.

Head here for more on how to start a stockpile.

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Maybe I’ve been watching too many episodes of Sex & The City reruns, but nothing makes me feel more womanly and powerful than slipping into a pair of sky-high stilettos. [Did you know that ‘stiletto’ means ‘slender dagger’ in Latin?] I definitely find myself strutting a little more, and besides, what else shaves ten pounds off your look instantly?

Well, my beauty equivalent of power stilettos is mascara. For va-va voom lashes, I used to swear by Dior’s Dior Show mascara, but I just couldn’t justify shelling out a whopping $24 (+tax) every other month for a tube of mascara. (A year’s supply would set me back over $150. That’s just crazy.)

So you can imagine my excitement when I discovered its match—CoverGirl’s Lash Blast—for less than a third of the price ($7). The chubby orange wand has over 300 tiny plastic bristles that glide over lashes smoothly (so no clumping). It finds lashes that I didn’t know existed, and just one quick coat transforms my quiet lashes into a soft plump fan. By simply switching to Lash Blast, I save over $100 a year. This makes saving up for a new digital camera so easy!

CoverGirl Lash Blast, $7; at mass retailers. For information, go to covergirl.com.

Posted by Tomoko Takeda, Associate Beauty Editor

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Most people think (myself included) that you have to shell out the big bucks to get a high quality bath towel. This is not always the case. Today I found some super-absorbent towels made of 100% Turkish cotton for less than $15 each at World Market. Besides being easy on the wallet, these towels have a graphic floral design that will instantly perk up any bathroom. This pattern comes in a few colors, so pick out a hue that suits you best.

Posted by Dwyer Paulsen, Associate Style Editor

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There’s practically nothing I love more than that first truly crisp day of fall. It gives me a perfect excuse to pull on a cozy sweater, enjoy of cup of tea and, best of all, bake a batch of cookies! I recently discovered Wilton’s 101 Cookie Cutter Set, which makes my baking afternoons even more fun. Whether I’m using dough from scratch or store-bought, these cutters add a festive touch to every batch. Featuring basic shapes like numbers and letters, the kit also includes cutters for every season, from pumpkins to candy canes to bunnies—so I’m covered no matter what the occasion. And at $14.99, the set—which comes in an easy-to-store plastic bucket—is an absolute steal. Now if only I didn’t enjoy eating cookies as much as I enjoy baking them…

Posted by Jayna Maleri, Associate Food Editor

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It can be tough to find a good variety of plus-size clothing at the mall. But I just came across a terrific site called onestopplus.com that will help solve that problem. The site carries lots of affordably priced clothing lines specifically in sizes 12W-44W. The abundance of styles is thrilling—including lingerie and accessories too! Check out the Good Buy Summer section for amazing bargains on end-of-season clothes.

Posted by: Althea Guss, Fashion Editor

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What do I love more than snagging unbelievable deals? When those deals are actually designer goodies for a whole lot less. Last week, I scoped out the launch party for Target’s much anticipated Bullseye Bodegas, which are temporary pop-up stores that only sell merchandise from their designer (think: Sonia Kashuk, Jemma Kidd, Napoleon Perdis, etc) collaboration collections. My fave? Anything Soap & Glory! (S&G founder Marcia Kilgore also founded cult-favorite Bliss spa.) With retro packaging and catchy names like “Wash Almighty” (body cleansing gel) and “Endless Glove” (hand cream), they’re truly beauty products with a lot of personality. Last night I took home their new body scrub, “Sugar Crush.” It literally was scrub at first sight! The brown sugar buffed away my dry, flaky skin, and the almond oils and sweet lime left my legs silky-soft and refreshed. Bonus—the tub is huge, so it’ll definitely last me until the end of winter

Soap & Glory The Sugar Crush, $17; at Target and target.com.

Posted by Tomoko Takeda, Associate Beauty Editor

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Posted by Julie Parrish, a Shopping Strategist and co-owner of Hotcouponworld.com.

When Albertsons rolled out the first 10/$10 sales several years ago, it was the perfect promotion. Get 10 items for $10 bucks! How simple could that be? And even better, they didn’t make you buy all 10 items; so really, you were getting a variety of items for $1. Now, those sales are commonplace and the bargains are harder to find. The sales have morphed into “Buy $20 worth of Brand X, and we’ll give you $10 off”. The problem with that is that Brand X is on sale for $4.99, which means you’ll need to spend $24.95 to get the $10 off.

So, how do you get past the gimmick and make these sales work to your advantage?

Combine manufacturer’s coupons with the sale:
This week, Albertsons has 32-ounce Gatorade on sale 10 for $10. Using a $1 off 2 coupon, it brings them down to .50 cents each instead of the $1.99 they normally retail for – that’s a 75% savings.

Use a high value store coupon:
Stores in my area issue coupons for $X off $Y purchases. So this week for example, Safeway has a $10 off $50 coupon. You can find these types of coupons in your local newspaper or in the Entertainment Book. Albertsons, and many other chains around the country have coupon policies to accept these as “competitor’s coupons”.

This week, I’ll be using that Safeway coupon to match with a sale on Campbell’s soups at Albertsons. The deal is to buy 20 for $10, no limit. However, the Safeway coupon represents an additional 20% off that price, bringing the final price of the soups down to .40 cents each. With my eye on the winter right around the corner, I’ll be buying enough soup for my family, some for the local food bank, and save 66% off the retail price. Using manufacturer’s coupons will yield additional savings.

Buy all 10 items:
Even if you don’t have a coupon, most times the items in these sales are about 50% off the shelf price. If you know you’ll use a product more than a few times a month, don’t just buy the one – buy all 10. It might cost a few more dollars in the short term, but it beats buying that same item again at full price next week.

Get a rain check:
Lastly, if the store is out of an item on the 10-for sale, get a rain check. It gives you time to hunt down manufacturer’s coupons to match so when you go back to the store to redeem the rain check, not only will the item be in stock, you’ll get the additional coupon savings as well.

Make it a point to scour the sale ads weekly to see how you can incorporate these 10/$10 type sales into your meal planning, beat the gimmick, and cash in on the savings!

Like this post? You might also like:

Deals on groceries.

5 places to find coupons online.

And for even more ways to save, head here.

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It’s finally chilly enough outside to officially break out the knitting needles. But rather than devote all your knitting projects to family members this year (do they really want another pair of socks?), why not knit with a charitable purpose?

I recently came across this site, the online home to a grass-roots program called Knit Your Bit. Started in 2006 by the National WW II Museum in New Orleans, the group asks knitters and crocheters nationwide to download scarf patterns for free (at the site above), and then send the knit scarves to the address listed online. Knit Your Bit will then deliver the thousands of cozy scarves to V.A. hospitals and veterans centers all across the U.S.

Neat, right? But if you’re a knitting novice like me who still has to work her way up to long scarves, you can also participate in a project called Knit Your Itty Bit. For this, all you do is put together an 8” x 8” square. They’ll be pieced together into quilts—then shipped off to vets.

I’m off to try my hand at the square. Happy knitting!

Posted by Melissa Fiorenza, Associate Editor

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