Giving From the Heart: Laurie at the Passionate Penny Pincher

By Amber on August 20th, 2010


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giving of your heart

Laurie is a  stay-at-home mom to three kids, ages 3, 7 and 10,  and she has been married for almost 14 years.  She has been couponing for 4 years and blogs at Passionate Penny Pincher.

Over the last year our family has committed to donate more frequently to our church’s food pantry.  In the spring of 2009 our church gave out $100 in cash to 100 members of the church as Kingdom Assignments, asking us to “grow it” for God’s kingdom.  Well, when my husband came home with the $100, I almost strangled him (I could see work in my future!)  I then changed my attitude :-) , and we prayed about what to do.  After lots of ideas, couponing that $100 was what we knew worked best for us, because it was something we already knew how to do, and we were pretty impressed with the results.

My husband and kids helped clip a few coupons (and we printed coupons on every printer we could find!), and after six weeks we ended up with almost $600 worth of groceries for $100.  (We based the price on Walmart pricing, because it just seemed unfair to use Publix full prices as a real price, even though that’s where I did almost all of the couponing!  I think I estimated the cereal at around $2.50, and spaghetti sauce around $1, etc.)  The day the kids and I stuffed our car full of those bargains (and made LOTS of loads into church!), we were so excited!

Since then, we’ve chosen to spend $3-$5 of our weekly grocery budget on items to donate, and while it isn’t much, it’s something small we can do.   I try to think of different places to donate odd items – medicine goes on mission trips, food and toiletries head to our church’s food pantry, cleaners are taken to my daughter’s preschool program, and we even have a local group home that will take frozen or refrigerated food when there are bargains on those items.

Each week on Passionate Penny Pincher I’ll continue to highlight the top donation deals at Publix (just like on Publix Penny Pincher) and also add the top Kroger deals.  I’d love for you to check them out and join me in sharing a few fabulous finds with someone in need!

What else could we do?  Cook a meal for someone you know and surprise them, help someone with yard/house work, volunteer anywhere (homeless shelter, soup kitchen, school, church, etc.),  visit the nursing home etc.  Take a hard look at your family, neighborhood, community and see where you could be of help.   I know that giving of my time is harder even though it doesn’t cost me any money, but trust me when I say, it can make a serious impact.

Leave a comment and let me know how you give, I would love to share it with my readers!

Have you been giving or donating lately?  If so stop by and enter to win a $10 Target Gift Card.

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  3. Shop to Give Sunday Week 17
  4. Giving from You Heart: Heather’s Story
  5. Shop to Give Sunday Week 12
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One Response to “Giving From the Heart: Laurie at the Passionate Penny Pincher”

  1. Cheryl @ Simply CVS says:
    2010/08/21 at 5:49 pm

    How fantastic!! It’s a great lesson for the children, too, they will be in the habit of thinking of others. My husband gave my girls and I each a $10 CVS gift card on January first one year and told us to see how much we could get to donate that year–this was before we had to pay tax on extra bucks which meant we could spend very, very little each week. We still had money left over at the end of the year and boxes and boxes of stuff to donate.

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