What a lovely spring day it is!

“God writes the gospel not in the Bible alone,

but on trees and flowers and clouds and stars.”

~Martin Luther

Great Buy This Week . . .

Today's Rite Aid purchases turned out to be better than I had planned.  Out of pocket, I spent $10.78 after coupons for my first transaction (4 Nivea body washes and 2 Little Colds) and received $11.00 in UP rewards, and will get $2 in single check rebates.  Then my second transaction (2 pkgs. Scott Toilet Paper, 3 Dixie plate pkgs., 2 Lysol wipes and 2 boxes Mr. Clean erasers) totaled $6.46 after coupons and rolling over the UP rewards from the first transaction, and I received a $10 UP rewards to use next time.  

So, after spending $17.24 out of pocket, I have $10 in UP rewards and expecting $2 in SCR.  That equates to $5.24 for everything!  (And we really needed toilet paper!)

All items were on sale.  Here are the coupons I used:

1st transaction:
$3 off $15 purchase (from bottom of last weeks receipt)
(4) $3 Nivea manf. coupons
(2) $1 Little Remedies manf. coupons

2nd transaction:
 $3 off $15 purchase (from bottom of another receipt)
$5 off 3 Dixie plates - a Rite Aid Video Values from last month
(2) $.75 Magic Eraser manf. coupons
(2) $1.00 Scott tp manf. coupons
(2) $1.50 Lysol printables (like it on facebook)
$1.00 Lyson - a Rite Aid VV from this month
$11 in UP rewards from 1st transaction

Thankful

Today was a very good day.  It is my birthday!  My husband bought me a very nice piece of pottery and filled it with roses.  One of my daughters woke up early to bake me my very favorite recipe - super easy chocolate cake (with honey crystals - yum).  Another worked diligently on finishing up the laundry for the week and vacuuming and mopping weeks worth of dust from the floors.  My little one made me a sweet card - inside a line of colorful smiley-face stickers, outside cat stickers with some peeled off so she could "gaw a wivewr."  "Bon appetit" adorns a beautiful linen towel with embroidered fork and spoon.  I can't wait to use my new potholder, made from the same linen and dressed with gathers of blue.  Very soft.  The girls had been secretly working on them a little at a time for days.  My mother in law gave me three beautiful fashion prints framed in gold with pretty blue mats - ladies from the 1800's.  I love them.  She also gave me a check for "one for each year."  I think I'll trade it in for a watch - I want to be careful to redeem the time.  My sweet mother bought me the corner cabinet I had seen at an estate sale.  My friend treated me to a white chocolate mocha.  A crowd secretly gathered together to sing the happy birthday song.

Today was a very good day.  But it's not all that pretty stuff that matters.  It's the love that went into every thought and deed, every loving act of service.  Yes, I recognize all the MEs and MYs preceeding.  That's why I am most grateful to Him who saved me from myself!  I don't deny that I would have many happy returns of the day.  Yet I am one day closer to standing in the presence of the Creator of the Universe!  What can compare?