Enough is Enough..Or Is It?

A couple of days ago Mark and I finished organizing our garage and getting rid of the last bits and pieces that we won’t be using here in the new house.  I have had a little table out there for my mini-stockpile since I started teaching myself to coupon a few months ago.

Mark commented that I was running out of room (not a very big table..really) and could use some shelves.  Oooh.  Shelves.  I want some of those.  Remember the women on Extreme Couponing?  They had shelves.

So.  Mark comes home from work the next night and says he has a surprise for me!  What!?  Flowers??  Jewelry??  Chickens??  (Long story short, I want chickens. Mark repeatedly crushes that dream)

Her name will be Posey and I will take her everywhere.   Photo courtesy of Motherearthnews.com

 No…SHELVES!  Almost as good as a chicken!  So he set them up for me and I spent a joyous afternoon arranging and rearranging my little stockpile of goods that I keep out there.  I love those shelves.  True story.  Also,  I am pretty fond of the buyer of those shelves.

He loves it when I sit and take pictures of him doing projects around the house. (This is a huge lie)

Once we got everything organized,  I realized that I didn’t have as much stuff as I had thought.

I find myself wandering out there at night and staring at it like a parent watches a sleeping child. Then I go upstairs and stare at them, too.

My lofty idea at the beginning of learning to coupon was to do it well enough to supply us with one year’s worth of non-grocery items.  A year’s worth of TP, razors, shampoo, soap, toothpaste, etc.  So far I have several months worth of some things, but a year’s worth of only dish soap, hand soap, air fresheners, razors and shaving cream.  Ooh, and toilet paper that I got an excellent deal on through Amazon.com.

Photo courtesy of Amazon.com

I get 36 rolls of Quilted Northern Ultra Plush for $16.06, delivered.  I found this deal on Chrystie’s “I Love to Gossip” site.  I chose to have it delivered every 3 months.  There was a $1 coupon to clip on the site and I signed up for Subscribe & Save to get free shipping and an extra 5% off, which makes it about 44 cents per roll.  Awesome deal!  And yes, we use a lot of toilet paper.  OK….I use a lot of toilet paper.  What?  Look, millions of women suffer from overactive bladder.  We will discuss this in depth some other day.  I know, I know…I’m excited about it, too!

Anyhoo,  I was looking at all of my coupon-gotten goods.  Most of it was free or pretty close to.  Now that I have shelves, I have more room..shelves yet unfilled.  I feel the need, a base, primal need to fill those shelves.  More.  Free.  Deals.  Stuff.  So, when exactly, and how exactly do you know that enough is enough? When do you cross the line from couponer to hoarder?  I’m nowhere near to walking that fine line yet, but I do see it.

In a post I wrote on my personal blog back in early August, I asked the same question.  I still see a great deal of one person having way too much stuff they’ll never use…the couponer standing in line when the doors open with binders thicker than my leg waiting to get 100 boxes of (insert something completely unnecessary here) for free.   BUT!  But…I see the allure now.  The allure of getting stuff legitimately, a lot of stuff for free or close to it..is a siren song I find myself unable to steer my shopping cart away from.

So I’ll keep putting along, filling up my shelves and waiting for the right sale with the right fistful of coupons.  Next on the hit list is deodorant.  And tissues.  And paper towels.  And garbage bags……..

 

 

Allyson Sorenson

About Allyson Sorenson

Bangor mom. BDN blogger. Volvo lover. Coffee drinker.