Giving Small

Enough cow for each letter of the alphabet !

2010-02-21T12:06:00.000-08:00

Cadence, cow #26 is out of the barn. Hurrah!

Thanks to so many people who donate their bottles we have another cow. I know I won't remember everyone (I'll try who helped with this batch) - Kate and Murray, Beth, Murray Research, Dean's Office, ITS staff, Special Collections/Archives, Rita and Peter's Surveys. I've also sold a few items on Kijiji donated by Mia - thanks Mia.

Donating Locally

As many of you know I started donating locally last year after my adventure in trying to trade coupons to buy a cow - we came close to paying for one whole cow but it was not the way to go.

However, with Shopper's points that people have donated, coupons, icoke pins etc, I have been able to put together an ongoing "give local" project for the Drop-in Centre at Aids Saskatoon that helps people and families who have someone who is HIV positive. Many of these people are dealing with homelessness and poverty and donations that for basic health and hygiene as well as Ensure and Boost are helpful.

If you know anyone who would like to give their bottles to the cow, let me know. I'm happy to pick up and recycle them. :-)

Let's work together to help out more locally

I would love to have a small group of people who focused on helping out locally either by contributing some time and collecting small items that help:

coupons
icoke pins
Disney reward codes
lots of different reward codes are helpful for donations -- I'll happily send you the list
barcodes from some products like Pampers, Bluewater frozen seafood, Kodak printer, cameras or paper **really want Kodak barcodes**
travel size soaps and shampoos,
gently used gift bags and store paper bags like AE or the Gap
gently used plastic grocery bags
and much much more ....

Or if you are able to donate money (it takes about $100+/month to cover the amount on the items below AFTER coupons and the taxes). If there was some extra donations, I'd love to add cases of ensure and buy some more of these items. Any financial donations that you make are eligible for a charitable tax receipt.

Each month, I try to buy about 25-100 of each of the following using coupons:

shampoo, conditioners, toothbrushes, toothpaste, soap, body wash, tampons, pads, men's deodorant, women's deodorant, razors, shave gel

I also shop for items that they use like toilet paper, kleenex, laundry soap, dishwasher soap, dish soap, cleaners etc. as well as some food and drink items for the Soul Food lunches held once a month.

Here's an example of items purchased last August:

Our next cow is called Calliope.

Cows and Skiis: More items donated for Kijiji cow fundraising

2010-01-20T18:09:00.000-08:00

Can cows ski?

Probably not but giraffes may be able to and if you know the reason why - leave a comment.

Speaking of cows and skiis, it's a logo on this maple syrup bottle made on the Robb family farm in Battleboro Vermont.

If you're into collecting cow memorbilia, you can order the Maple Syrup here.

The Net is grand -- See for yourself that giraffes can ski:

Water Ski Giraffe - See more funny pictures and videos at Fugly.

Kijiji Donations -- Sorry No Giraffes for Sale But There are Skiis

Before Xmas, I received items from Doris and Gaye to sell for the cow. I had also had a few books and posted those. Almost everything has sold and my next job is post a few things from Mia and a photo of the downhill skis in the garage. I spotted them the other day and remembered setting them aside in the summer to see when the snow was on the ground for the cow.

Thanks for donating stuff to sell - it all helps towards these cows. $32 was collected from Kijiji sales for Birdie, cow #24.

Well we have snow and great skiing weather so I'll get these up soon I hope.

Shopper's Friends Come Through for the Cow - woo hoo 20,000 bonus points

2010-01-20T17:47:00.000-08:00

Thanks to everyone who signed up for Shoppers' Tell a Friend. 20,000 bonus points are in my account which means $40 on redemption day for donations. Most of the Shoppers bonus points go to local charities but if you happen to have something you want to buy at Shoppers let me know. I'll use my redemption to buy it, and you can pay me and I'll pop it in the cow fund.

Speaking of cows - we're on cow number 26 named Cadence

Today thanks to Rita and Wilf -- a fun soccer grandmother who knows how to cheer - I picked up bottles for recycling. Today's recycling haul was $24.40 putting us over half way to Cadence.

Belle, Cow #24 is on her way

2009-11-17T08:41:00.000-08:00

We did it. Two dozen cows in about eighteen months - quite the herd. And yes we'll keep expanding the herd so save up those bottles.

Thanks to all the bottle donors and to the folks who buy things on Kijiji. I have been selling just a few things on Kijiji. Maybe 5 at a time.

The hot item was Elmo doing the Chicken Dance. Apparently Elmo does the Hokey Pokey and other dances too as well as sings and young children love these. Who knew?

Chapter 3: The Fourth C is Christmas

2009-10-19T01:44:00.000-07:00

In August I started getting to know more about the 601 Outreach Center to see where I could best put what energy I might have on a given day, if any.

I took on one small project and after a lot of thought, I decided to tackle a BIG one and work at it in my "Giving-Small" way - a bit here and a bit there and see what could happen.

So the big project is to try to fill 70 Christmas hampers with food for a Christmas meal and then food stuffs for 4 weeks. We'll also try to add age appropriate gifts. The organization does receive some donations for the hampers but last year it was a major challenge to get 50 together. With the increase in the number of people who are HIV positive, there are more hampers to fill this year. This is definitely an area where some extra help was needed.

So am I nuts - trying to fill 70 Hampers? Perhaps. Well there's a still librarian in me even on leave. I like to collect, sort, store and make things available.

I thought I would try to do some of it and never thought I could fill them. I wanted to do 1 or 2 juices in each box, some pasta, some rice, soup, and then the fixing for Christmas dinner. In my dreams I thought of coffee and tea and chocolate and nuts and Mandarin oranges -- it is Christmas. Then there some items which I had no idea how I would get them with coupons -- the stuffing, gravy, potatoes, and of course turkey and vegetables.

So on September 22, the hamper starts off looking like this:

Check back Wednesday to see what happens when Giving-Small posts a list of items she's looking to trade for on the couponing discussion board.

The Three C's - Coupons, Cows and Charity

2009-10-19T01:31:00.000-07:00

Some of the grocery items donated this summer.

The Three C's - Coupons, Cows and Charity

Chapter 1: You can't really milk coupons for cows

Many of you will remember my hopeful entry into the world of coupon trading for the cow. I soon discovered that I am not cut out to be a traded and it's much much slower to trade enough to eventually be able to convert Canadian Tire money, gift cards or points into "cow money". I still keep trading a wee bit and hope to finish it up by Christmas. That's my deadline for raising the money for one cow. I'm at $225 after 9 months so with a bit of work, the cow should be in the shopping bag so to speak.

Chapter 2: Coupons put milk and cereal on the table.

While coupons aren't so great for cows, they turn out to be a super route to give locally and help people here and the established charitable organizations that serve them. I have taken things bought with coupons for free or near free to Crisis Nursery, Aids Saskatoon Homeless Drop-In Center, Food Bank, YWCA Shelter and SCAT.

I spent some time to talking to all of these groups to find out what was the "best match" in terms of their needs and my ability. In the end the best fit was the 601 Outreach Center that helps the homeless. They don't get tons of donations so things are really appreciated and used there. The staff is outstanding and the people who use their services are very helpful. When I pull up with my van, they all offer to help unload it.

So I still want coupons - lots of coupons so I can continue to buy health and hygiene items - toothpaste, toothbrushes, shampoo, soap, deoderant, as well as household and food items like laundry soap, dish soap, juice, cereal, snack food and dry goods etc.

Where does the time go?

2009-10-19T01:25:00.000-07:00

September was so beautiful and it's come and gone. And then October rolled around - belated Happy Turkey Day everyone.

Thanks so much to all of these folks who contributed bottles and more. We have raised $209 towards "Belle" - cow #24.

Robin, Frank and Cara - new collectors and donators for the cow :-)
Gigi and her roommates
Peter and Barb
Beth
Kate and Murray
Frank and Diane
Urve
Nancy - that cute dog bed was snapped up on kijiji
folks from Kijiji who bought books and Ikea chairs
Dean's Office bottle recycling
ITS bottle recycling
Access Services bottle recycling - special thanks to Iffat that coordinates this
Cheryl and Ron
All the great folks in Special Collections and Archives - special thanks to Kulwant who always lets me know when it's time to pick up
Bottles from Data Services
Neil
Fullcircle coupon helpers - Carole, Zoe, Cecelia

I know I'll forget to thank someone, so please forgive me -- my brain is a bit like swiss cheese memory wise - flavourable and delicious but full of holes. The joys of being ill. I've discovered that I'm just a whole lot more human (error prone) than everyone else I meet. Everyday I get to be around people who have super powers!

Woo Hoo - We Did It - Cow #23 Belaphron is off to Bangladesh

2009-09-12T01:29:00.000-07:00

I accidentally posted this on my Library related blog - oops. So moved it over here and used the original post date.

For some reason cow #23 took soooo long. I think it was the long name - Belafron. Babe just raced out of the barn.

Thanks to all the recent bottle donations that pushed us over the edge: Kate and Murray, Frank and Diane, Beth, Gigi, Peter and Barb, Vicki and Paul, Special Collections, my mom - wish I had a picture of her stopping to pick one up and put in the basket of her walker! I know there were other donors too but that part of the brain is on coffee break.

Also thanks to Nancy who donated a cute dog chaise lounge that was sold on Kijiji for the cow.

Some coupon trades also helped out with the cow thanks to Melly in Ontario and icoke pins. Thanks to Celeste for more Canadian Tire money for the cow fund.

Cow Riddles

Here's a couple of riddles from jokes.smashits.com:

1. How to you know that cows will be in heaven?

It's a place of udder delight.

2. What do you call a cow who argues with her husband?

A bullfighter!

Overheard in the court room one day

Your Honor, it was an accident! I had to run into the fence to keep from hitting the cow! Was it a Jersey cow? I dont know, I didnt see her license plate!

September First Moo News

2009-09-01T22:39:00.000-07:00

Have you been missing cow puns and jokes and silly cow photos? Don't despair ... there's another cow headed your way. We're on cow #13 - Belaphron and at $256.00 so it won't be long before we get to 24 - 2 dozen cows. Moo hoo!

Yes I'm still buying cows AND collecting bottles as well as selling the odd thing or two on Kijiji. Today I sold two of the Culligan water bottles for $2. Steal of deal I'd say.

On Kijiji I have a cute chaise lounge dog bed for sale and 19 beginner piano books. The items for sale are eclectic for sure but every bit helps with the cow.

My experiment with using coupons to raise funds for the cow turned out to be a Giving-Tiny adventure. I've raised $200 (2/3 of a cow) so it works but it'll take a year to get a cow. It turns out that donating locally is way easier with coupons and I have only dipped once into the bottles I personally contribute to the cow (about $25 in total) to help with donating. It helped me up the learning curve.

My latest local donation (in the photo above) to the Homeless Drop-In is for formula for four moms who can't breastfeed due to health reasons. Thanks two generous coupon donations from Kay and Smurf I was able to buy this formula for less than $10 for all 4 cans.

Cow and Street Cat Garage AND Baking Sale - June 20 at 438-5th St. East

2009-06-19T11:18:00.000-07:00

Urve and I have teamed up to have a garage sale. There's a gadzillion books and assortment of other garage sale items and a big "free" pile. The Buena Vista area is having a community garage sale.

Drop in and visit ... munch on some homemade baking.

And save me from decorating my house to look like this with the left over garage sale items. My neighbors will personally thank all of you. I have to say this is growing on me - brightly coloured, shiny bits ...

Slight Clutter via Flickr (cc)

Read the story behind the photo.

I got you Babe!

2009-06-19T10:54:00.000-07:00

Natalia & Gabriel via Flickr (cc)

I haven't spotted these in the donations for the cow, yet. I suspect they would be worth a pretty penny.

We have enough $$ to purchase Babe. Thanks to all the donators of bottles: Gord and Lorraine, Cheryl, Special Collections, Sue and Chris, Kyle and family, Peter and Barb, Paul and Vicky, Anwar and family.

My "small" Kijiji stash is also working out. Three boxes of scrapbooking magazines sold plus kids life jacket and other odds and ends.

If Small is Beautiful, Micro is?

2009-06-08T23:09:00.000-07:00

Most of last year the fundraising efforts focused on bottles and garage sale items. Then we switched to coupons, points, icoke and aeroplan pins etc - what I would call "micro" fundraising.

Lots of non-profits have been using microfundraising online for years. Click to give for X cause. The screen snapshot above shows the Click to save the rainforest site. Revenue comes from advertisers.

Is micro fundraising worth it?
It depends. Some micro fundraising works well. Most require volume and with the "cow" community it's easier to get to a critical mass. So for example 2 iCoke pins aren't worth it but 20 add up for the cow quite nicely.

By the way icoke pins (10 digit codes) are now found on the labels of Powerade drinks and under sprite caps, are easy for someone to save for the cow and are super easy to trade. They actually add up almost as quick as recycling bottles.

Aeroplan expanded the products that have Aeroplan pins to include Tostitas Corn Chips so buy the aeroplan pin products and sent me your pins.

Micro fundraising works better for donating locally as some of the efforts convert into rewards that your redeem at stores or restaurants.

Stay tuned for info on More Ways You Can Help with Micro Cow Projects

I'll be sharing more of the micro fundraising projects I am working on like box tops for education, Futura rewards, etc. that any of you can help with by using a scissors and cutting out codes for the cow/local projects.

Want Help Out Now - Try these Micro Fundraising Sites where you click or for word whizzes try Free Rice

Online micro fundraising is alive and well online. From Click to Preserve the Rainforest, to Animal Rescue to defining words to donate rice, FreeRice, to games in Facebook that help different causes. Micro fundraising has taken root perhaps more than micro-payments, an oft talked about idea for charging for things online.

Babe, the Blue Cow Named in Honor of Paul Bunyan's Ox

2009-05-31T15:55:00.000-07:00

Martin LaBar via Flickr (cc)

I'm going to love Babe - reminds me of the tall tales about this lumberjack. Babe the Blue Ox, Bunyan's companion, was a massive creature with exceptional strength Paul supposedly created the Great Lakes so Babe could have a pond to drink out it.

I'm willing to be that most of you would have thought that it was a tall tale (or a load of bull) that we would buy 20 cows in just over one year through a "giving-small" project.

I had no idea if I could get one cow let alone enough to be one big blue ox.

If we put all these cows together (20 of them) x 1000 pounds we would have 20,000 lb cow or ox, probably the size of Babe.

Moo-valous Garage Sale Pays Off : Blink and You'll Miss Cow Twenty

2009-05-31T15:35:00.000-07:00

Don't blink now - but this Argos (cow #20) passing through.

pietroizzo via Flickr (cc)

Many thanks to all the garage sale helpers - Beth, Urve, Kyle, Julie, Earl, Austin and Alan and the Street Cat Rescue group. Thanks to everyone who donated stuff.

Okay - I have never done a garage sale with this much stuff ... I had no idea how much stuff I had accumulated. More 1000 books easily ... a few hundred cow items and that's the tip of the iceberg.

Thanks to Urve, I had tables, lots of tables.

The big surprises were the RAOK (Random Acts of Kindness) - one neighbor sent her wee son over to hand me $20 for the cow as a donation. Wow! At the very end of the day, when I was tuckered out and packing up, out of the blue someone pulls up and says now these are "garage sale prices". I explain it was for charity and he pulls out his wallet and peels out two twenty dollar bills for the cow. Then he really made my day - he took the headboard. LOL ... I could have paid him $20 (just kidding) but seeing a big furniture item walk off was great.

The Big Scoop on the Moovalous Sale - $380.52

Photo from Ebay sale for Ice Cream fairy dish
We made $380.52 including $61 in donations. So a cow and third almost. Moo hoo! I also have reclaimed scads of space. Our left overs are going to SCAT and I have kept about 3 boxes of stuff to post on Kijiji.

Annabelle is Out of the Barn - At Last

2009-05-31T15:24:00.000-07:00

Photo by margo_rita369 via Flickr

I started to think Annabelle was stuck to the barn like this cow. Finally, she's off to Bangaldesh to help a family.

Special thanks to Vicki and Paul for their large Sarcan contribution that tipped us over the edge.

Cow #19 is done and I suspect Cow #20 - Argos - could be quick indeed with the Moo-valous Garage Sale coming soon.

Springing Ahead - Cow and "Cow Equivalents"

2009-05-12T16:03:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it's a month since I've posted. The bottles have been flowing in - thanks to Norma and Brett, Celeste, my neighbors Sue, Kyle and his family, D&D crowd, Cheryl, Vicki and Paul, Cathy and Lyle, Peter and Barb, the Archives and Special Collections Staff, Research Services main floor office, Natural Sciences Library, Dean's Office, and Information Technology Services.

I took about 6 weeks off posting to Kijiji and have restarted at a slower pace. I am accumulating more and more books as Kijiji isn't a great venue to sell these. Soon the books will take over.

The Bottom Line:

The cow and "cow equivalents" are chugging merrily along with bottles, coupons, Canadian Tire money, points donations, garage sale items etc.

What do I mean by "cow equivalents"?

Well based on the poll about helping out locally with coupons and from talking to folks, people seems to think it was okay if I put aside $15-$20/week to try to pick up deals on food and shelter items. My goal is to get to the point where for $15 we get at least $30 to $60 dollars worth of food/tiems.

So I have been putting my coupon know-how to work and purchasing things for the Food Bank, YWCA Shelter and Aids/Homeless center. When the amount I spend equals $300 (the cost of the cow) that's a cow equivalent.

So we have our first "cow equivalent". And we've almost got Annabelle - cow #19.

I try to use the Shoppers points for the cow when I can but this requires finding people to "shop" on the redemption day and shop ALOT. The last redemption day there were no cow supporters eager to shop at Shoppers so I used the Shopper's Bonus redemption to buy baby formula.

Here's a few examples of what I've bought.

6 Cans of formula powder plus 2 small flats of "instant" formula. Each can is about $30 each.

For those of you who are Shopper Optimum point gurus - I used 75,000 points for $200 and earned 18,000 points toward the next redemption.

Dawn Dish Soap - 33 cents/each after coupons

Two Tubs of Cereal and Nutrigrain Bars (ignore Eggos) - $2.97 for all after coupons

14 Reach Toothbrushes - paid just the tax after coupons

Shampoo and Conditioner - on sale for $2 each but each had Shopper's Bonus points equivalent to about 75% of their cost.

Liptons Sidekicks and Lipton Cup a Soup Deal - Spent 75*10 Sidekicks ($7.50) after coupons, plus 10*$0.53= $5.30 after coupons for the Cup a Soups. Cup a Soups are regularly at $1.97 to $2.29 at Shopper's

3 Chunky Soups and 6 Gardenay for $2.97 after coupons

Stayfree and Feminine Products - 99 cents each after coupon, plus tax

There is a coupon for Stayfree $2 off and they go on sale fairly often for $2.99 so I buy a few to donate.

Best Deal of All: Huggies Good Nites - just the tax $0.97, normally $7.99/each plus tax

Other Donations

During the winter I started gifting clothing, household linens and items to the Homeless shelter if I couldn't sell them. I estimate that about 50 boxes have been gifted and their clothing depot is running low all the time. They look for clothes in season.

I also gave some of the free paper towels (from a coupon deal) to the Street Cat Rescue Group and some to the shelter. I had about 20 packages.

So keep saving coupon flyers for me everyone. Special thanks to Urve, Lorraine and Rob who have kept them all for me.

Coupon trading for the cow is still going on but it's micro-donating ... a few cents here or there. After 4.5 months, I have raised $117.35 for the cow. Definitely better to use these coupons locally to help food bank and shelters.

Happy Birthday Giving-Small

2009-04-08T19:44:00.000-07:00

websteria via Flickr (cc)

I posted my first blog entry on April 2, 2009. The first week of April marks the beginning of a year long journey into personal fundraising, cows, gifting, community and feeling grateful for all we have here.

When I started I didn't know if I could do one cow and I was apprehensive. I'd probably be working on that first cow and be deeply discouraged if it wasn't for each and everyone of you. Your support, interest, time and donations have made the cow project work.

Thank you so much. I think the one thing I have learned is that Giving-Small can be mighty. 18 families have a livelihood from dairy cows. Other families have a livelihood too. We've been able to help locally with the food bank and Station 20 West.
Time for some calculations:

Items Purchased	Amount
18 cows	$5400.00
Christmas Livelihood Gifts	$807.00
Station 20 West including matching funds	$1200.00
1 Donkey	$120.00
Food Bank Donations	$75.00
Cash on Hand	$115.58
Grand Total	$8,317.58

Too Much Choice is Bad, Really

2009-04-07T01:01:00.000-07:00

Well - I tried to edit the date of this post and ended up posting it in 2007. LOL. Typo city. I'll share it now and hopefully you'll get a good laugh and enjoy it.

If you don't believe me watch this funny video from the standup comedian and economist, Yoram Bauman.

Then if you still don't really think economics can explain happiness, look at the research about choice and happiness presented at the Ted conference. Barry Schwartz talks about his research on the paradox of choice.

Librarian's Razor - When in Doubt Alphabetize It!

So there I was paralyzed by choice -- all those wonderful cow names. I realized that I was spending a lot of time trying to choose the next cow name, when I had one of those librarian moments - let's just sort the list A-Z. So here they all are -- all 57 names that I have not yet used.

That's a lot of names. We have our work cut out for us. We better get moo'ing.

So cow #16 is Amistad, which means friendship in Spanish. This name was suggested by Gord who has yet to spill the beans on where his eclectic and a tad unusual set of names was compiled from.

Amistad

Amity

Anna Mary

Annabelle

Argos

Babe

Becky

Belaphron

Belle

Birdie

Cadence

Calliope

Cowabunga

Cowcow

Cowlick

Dagmar

Daisy

Darlene

Dobias

Emma

Flicka

Frieda

Gabrielle

Galileo

Geraldine

Hailey

Hannah

Heidi

Inger

Isadore

Jersey

Jessie

Juness

Lacta

Lily

Lullie

Maggie

Mattie

Mazie

Minnie

Molly

Moxie

Nellie

Nellie

Pattie

Penny

Quaff

Rosalie

Salchow

Sally

Samantha

Shirley

Shobi

Sidse

Sigil

Vacha

Wil-cow

Happy St. Patrick's Day Cow Supporters

2009-03-17T12:29:00.000-07:00

Picture by Aidan - the first of many to come, cow inspired creations

Are you feeling Irish?

Buy a pint for Anna Maria (the "Irish" cow) with the online donation form.

She really really loves green beer.

Photo of green beer by Eustaquio Santimano via Flickr

Cow Enthusiasts Go Irish

What can I say - some folks just love to combine two of their favourite things.

Does everyone want to own one of these? Buy it here.

Into ties - show this one off at work. Buy it here.

Small is Mighty: Carrots, Trains, Points and Bottles Add Up to Another Cow

2009-03-04T23:20:00.000-08:00

The cow fundraising is moo'ing along merrily. The cow-mmunity continues to grow and every couple of weeks someone new joins in from near and far. As a result, we can buy Amistad (#16) and are well on our way with #17 Amity. By the way Amity means friendship, too. Hmm - sure seems to be a spate of "friendly" cows - Amity and Amistad.

As the weather warms up the items donated for Kijiji are flowing in and out again. Many thanks to Tracy, Cathy, Maureen, Michael and Jennifer for donating items. Some of the unusual items posted this month include Marklin model railroad cars and track. The donor and I were pretty sure that given the size of Saskatoon this might take weeks or months to sell. Well the universe provides and within two hours, a collector spotted the Marklin train lots and they were sold. There are still two lots left.

Among the interesting (and hot items) sold this week was a velvet carrot shaped jewelry box featured above. A stuffed Elmo was a hot item and takes the record for the most emails.

On the bottle front, I'm a wee bit behind on pickups but managed to make it to Peter and Barb's recently. I was able to snag quite a few bottles at the soccer tournament a couple of weeks ago too adding to our supply. Julie's friends Kyle and Reamus dropped off a few bags. The last SARCAN run was just over $25.00. SARCAN and the model railroad sales helped to finish off Amistad, cow #16.

This month I received two of the fattest envelopes ever. One was stuffed with coupons donated by a someone from Toronto. The other was also from Toronto and it was stuffed with $7.75 cents of CT money courtesy of Michael, Jennifer and friends.

Kate and Murray dropped off bottles and cans from their house and Natural Sciences Library (thanks everyone at Nat Sci). They also brought a penny jar and Canadian Tire money. I'm hoping other folks will consider setting aside a penny/spare change jar for the cow. You really won't miss those pennies and nickels and dimes and it really adds up for the cow.

Beth contributed a gift certificate for Montana's restaurant. And I have gift certificate for Red Pepper's Restaurant - they're each $10 - any food fans out there who want to buy these for the cow?

There was another Shopper's Optimum "tell a friend" event and I didn't just tell, I also phoned and to create a small herd of people. I've also been keeping my ears open for Shopper optimum fans and found a friend's parent who lives in Regina to sign up and be the cow's friend. The Tell a Friend is a great deal for the cow and the Friend. Both accounts get 5000 points ($10) i they shop on the designated days. So the good news, is the cow has 6 Optimum friends so if all six shopped, the cow will have 30,000 points - that's like $60.

Let me know if you will hop on the next train. I'll pone you and do all the typing. It just takes your Optimum number and birthday and your email. Oh, and you have to shop and spend $20 on the designated days. We'll know how much we made by March 15. I also helped the Street Cat Rescue Folks get started on their first Tell a Friend train.

Tags: coupon | cow | fundraising | giving | giving small | have a cow | points

Coupons, Cows, Food Banks and Shelters

2009-02-25T10:31:00.000-08:00

Items bought for almost free using coupons to donate to shelter, food bank, etc.

Couponing 101

My undercover couponing adventure has turned me into a believer in coupons. I always liked the odd coupon but I have been amazed at the savings. In 2 months, I have saved $140 with coupons and bonus point deals. And I'm not good at it yet.

And yes, this is based on buying what I would normally buy. The biggest pitfalls of couponing is that you start buying stuff you don't need or use.

Couponing for the Cow

Trading coupons is not going quite so well as saving on groceries. We have raised $43.30 with coupons. Some of the coupon total is from Aeroplan codes -- the 10 pt and 25 pt on Tropicana OJ and Quaker cereals and granola bars. Please send me those 12 digit pins if you're not using them. The pin codes under coke and sprite bottle caps are also hot items to trade for the cow.

Giving Small with Coupons

What I've discovered is that lots of couponers stock up on things that they can buy with coupons for free, or near free, to donate for shelters, food bank, animal rescue groups, nursing homes, etc. I checked with the Saskatoon Food Bank and they take food and non-food items.

Non-food are placed in the Clothing Depot in the Grass Center. So shampoo, toothpaste, razors, soap, household cleaners, pet food, toilet paper, diapers, baby oil, etc. The clothing depot has a $2 charge per bag and people can take up to 2 items from the shelf of non-food items. The Street Cat folks can use paper towels I know the community gardening folks are always looking for seeds for planting.
I plan to phone the shelters next to see what they take and need. Do you know any groups who need things? Let me know.

Test Run - Donating Items Bought with Coupons

I decided to test this out on a small scale. For the past 2 weeks I collected items that I could pick up easily. Keep in mind, that I hadn't really been collecting coupons with this in mind.

The photo at the top of this post shows items collected. All of them cost about $10. To buy them without coupons and watching for sales/clearances would be about $70.

You'll notice there's no food -- it's pretty tough to get food items for a few cents but there are great deals to be had for 50 cents to a dollar per item. That's where a little seed money is needed.

For example, I spoke to the manager at the Rexall drugstore and they said they'd call me when they're marking cereals down to $1 a box. I think it would be great to buy up a case if that happens.

Feedback Needed

So here's what I'd like everyone to give feedback on. Should we designate up to $50 per month as seed money from the bottles/cans/Kijiji sales etc. to go towards donations for shelters and food bank items?

I'll scout good deals and use coupons where I can and try to make up a big box.

Please vote, email me or talk to me - what do you think? Have a better idea - suggest away.

Do you support the idea of using $25-$50 per month to help out the shelters, food bank, animal rescue etc? ( surveys)

Why Cows Shouldn't Climb Trees

2009-02-06T00:13:00.000-08:00

clarissa- via Flickr (cc)

There's probably a few reasons cows shouldn't climb trees. First being black and white may look nice up in those lofty branches but it is not basic requirement for climbing trees. Before we look at some of the old ASCII art that I dug up showing why cows ought not to climb trees, there are lots of folks to thank who have helped with Gertrude and now Amistad.

This weekend Kelly dropped off a bag of bottles from her workplace: Robinson and Lukenchuk Optometrists. Many thanks to Kelly and her moo-valous co-workers.

Juliane, a new cow supporter, dropped off some things for the Kijiji virtual cow sales and the hockey skates have whizzed out the door as well as some other things. Many thanks Juliane for the donations to the cow.

Nancy, the lover of retro chairs, helped with a chunk of Gertrude as this wonderful stool was picked up by another chair connoisseur.

I am about to post some vintage Swiss model railroad track, cars and more stuff. An old university friend was in town for Christmas and, of course, I had to tell the cow stories. It turns out he needed to pack up some things up from the family home so I now have the joy of trying to find a buyer for the model train works. Many thanks Michael and Jennifer I hope I can mooo-ve this right along to a train enthusiast.

Remember to check out the Kijiji items - you'll never know what treasure or household item that you'll find. A pineapple corer anyone?

And now, some retro Ascii Art

Ah for the days of the Saskatoon Free-Net, dial up over a 2400 baud modem that seemed like the speed of light after a 1200 baud and 300 baud modems before that.


|    |                              |    |           *
|    |            (__)              |    |            \       (__)
|    |            (oo)              |    |             \      (oo)
|    |     /-------\/               |    |          -----------\/--
|    |    / |     ||                |    |          ----|      |---
|    |   *  ||----||                |    |              --------
|    \______^^____^^___             |    \_________________
|     _________________             |     _________________
|    /                              |    /
|    |                              |    |
|    |                              |    |
|    |                              |    |
|    |                              |    |
|    |                              |    |
|    |                              |    |
|    |                              |    |
/      \                            /      \
Cow perched on a tree.              Cow attempting to fly off tree.
|    |
|    |
|    |
|    |
|    |
|    \_________________
|     _________________
|    /
|    |
|    |
|    |
|    |
|    |
|    |                                (__)
|    |                      *---------(..)
/      \                        ^^----^^\/
The attempt results in an udder disaster.

Gertrude is Ready for Lift Off

2009-02-05T17:05:00.000-08:00

flikr via Flickr (cc)

We're ready to purchase Gertrude, cow #15. Yes! Our first cow of 2009 is ready to go to a family in Bangladesh.

In January, we also purchased Mildred, a kick ass donkey, from the money raised at Kate's birthday party.

And here is the receipt for purchasing Mildred from Oxfam Unwrapped.

Shopping at Shoppers for the Cow Gleans $150.00

2009-01-24T10:58:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago I headed to Shoppers Drug Store with Carol to use up the Optimum points that were donated in December. We had hit the top redemption level (more than 75,000 points) which is worth a $150.00 in goods at Shoppers.

I had been looking for a big Shoppers spender to tag along with to use up the points and convert to cash. Carol graciously volunteered and with 4 gals in that household, they didn't have any trouble using the $150. After I used the points up to pay for their things, Carol wrote me a check for $150.

Pretty moo-valous of Carol, Jessica, Annamona, and Adrienne to help out the cow. Thanks!!

We're 50% of the way to Gertrude, cow #15 now.

Tags: coupon | cow | fundraising | giving | giving small | have a cow | points | rewards | Shoppers

RAOK Results a Simply Bovine Giving Small Signature Graphic

2009-01-24T10:37:00.000-08:00

What's a RAOK, you wonder? Random Act Of Kindness. My journey into coupon land continues and I am amazed at all the ways to save and make coupons work. Who knew?

While I'm there learning about coupon trading for the cow -- $25.15 in trades this year so far -- I'm also learning about deals and savings. I have saved at least $100 this month with coupons and deals by buying the same things that I always buy. And I'm definitely not good at it yet.

Along the way I have also met some really neat people. Someone in Ontario is raising money with coupons for the Humane Society. Several other people use their high value coupons (free products or combine to get free) to buy shampoo, soap, razors and personal items for people in need.

This week I had the good fortune to stumble upon fallenpixels, a fellow couponer, and notice her beautiful signature graphic and then the note that said - message me to get a signature file. Wow - she made one for the cow project the same day I sent a message and isn't it great. And this was a RAOK - a random act of kindness - she doesn't want anything for it. I even offered chocolate or coffee card - she said she was doing it to support the cow project.

So moo-valous, many thanks fallenpixels.

Tags: coupon | cow | fundraising | giving | giving small | have a cow | points | RAOK | rewards