New Contributor: Welcome to CouponNoob

Jennifer is long-time friend of mine that I've only had the pleasure of actually meeting in person once, and that was way too long ago.  She's going to be joining me here on Money Saving Mode/ Dual Income Need Coupons and sharing her Coupon Newbie experience.  She just started couponing THIS WEEK!  Now, I'm going to let her tell you about herself and why she decided to start couponing.

I decided to start couponing for so many reasons.   I was laid off from my job as a server at a casino in December of 2009, and my husband and I decided that our 4 boys needed me at home more than we needed that second income.  Even when we had a second income, we didn't have any savings, we just spent even more money.  In July of 2009, we realized what a mistake that was when my husband got laid off also.  We had just expanded our family by adding my stepdaughter from my first marriage to our brood.  We struggled, but we made it.  He found another job in October of 10 and we started to get back on track.  In March 2011, I was getting ready to pay off our van (used, but ours!) and pay my landlord the last of the late rent, he got laid off yet again.  Well, technically he was "downsized" but that's semantics.  It was supposed to be a part time position working 3 days a week, yet since the downsizing, hes worked 5 hours.  That was 4 weeks ago.

Like I said, I have 5 children.  (Girl is 16, the boys are 13, 9, 7 and 4) They eat ALOT. They need alot of things also.  There's also a few things that they'd like too.  I want them to have they things that they need, and some of the things that they want.  I'm tired of scrambling when they come up with last minute things like all kids do.  I'm tired of telling them that we can't afford something.  I want to have savings so that we have an emergency fund so I don't ever want to lay awake at night again and worry about how I'm going to pay the rent and other bills, yet have enough to feed my family.  Believe me when I say that unemployment benefits in Mississippi don't take care of even your most basic needs.

Couponing has always interested me, and in the past I've tried it, but wasn't successful at it.  I didn't understand the concept of saving the coupons until a sale at the grocery store, then stocking up.  I have minimal space to have storage, but its enough to be able to get a stockpile going for my family's needs.  I am also a pretty faithful Aldi's shopper.  Their prices are great, don't get me wrong, but for alot of things there isn't an Aldi's brand that you can get, plus they don't take coupons.  I knew that there were things that we used everyday that I was paying for, that couponers were getting for FREE!  I wanted some of that free stuff too!

My friend Julie started a blog when she started to coupon Dual Income Need Coupons and I was so interested to see the deals that she'd blog about.  But couponing was still so confusing to me.  Then this past week, a friend that I used to work with posted a picture of her coupon file on Facebook.  I commented on her picture asking her to teach me to coupon.  She responded with some great beginner sites to read and learn from. 

I've decided to blog about my couponing journey for 2 reasons.

1. I want to keep track of my couponing and deals that I get.

2. Maybe this will help others like me that want to coupon, but are a bit intimidated by it.  Or don't understand how it works.