January 2026 -Frugal Chatter-

I hear ya @lilo0003 wrt to AM at Shell. I basically only collected minimal AM from Shell, Pharmasave, Global Pet Foods and airmiles.ca
and even then only when they had flash and special offers.
My main rewards come from gas ( Petro Points ) as every fill up I get between 8 and 13 cents off per Litre. Depends on which gas savings
card ( 0.5 or .10 cent ) I have loaded up. The extra 3 cents comes from paying with the linked RBC CC. Can Tire points earned on the same
gas purchase from Petro stations once I linked Triangle to it. ( feels like a double dip? )

With Scene jumping over to Shell that sweetens the pot for me, since our Scene points are rarely earned by going to a movie, usually they come
from FreshCo shops. I often miss out on offers because I don't " hunt them down " the way I used to. I'm grateful when sc members post them.

Good Morning Everyone,
I am so overwhelmed over here.

Sunday I woke up in a funk, not feeling it, just overwhelmed. I did managed to get my sh*t together and went out to shovel and clean the cars and Mom's won't start again. Like what the, I drove it Friday and two days won't start. The battery is 6-months old we had to replaced in July, my car has an older battery and started with no issue.

We got snow but nothing like Toronto did, I did manage to make it to work yesterday as I was scheduled for 2 meetings in head office. Both meetings went well but added more meetings and more to my to-do.

Mom got an email at 9:30 last night that we need to move out cars. Everyone at work was telling me to have it boosted and see what happens but I don't have time to deal with it. I don't have time to drive it today and since we are still in this Polar Vortex will it start tomorrow so I am going to try to have it towed in between meetings which is not what I wanted. I was hoping I could take it to work one day drop it off and pick it up because now I have to figure out how to pick-up the car. First issue, I am completely booked all week now with work so when can I go but also I cannot drive myself and bring back both cars.

I am in a weird place where there is family all around but I also feel so alone because everyone has their own stuff going on. It just feels like everything I need to take care of is piling up.

Last night I got home late, my meeting went until 5 pm so by the time I got home made dinner it was time for bed. But well I was making dinner, 3 more things I have to do came up. I just feel like I cannot get ahead, but such is life.

I am trying to be positive but it has been a struggle but today is a new day and I need to knock out a workflow before my first meeting.

Happy Tuesday Everyone.

@SassyAshley THAT IS a lot of SH*T for anyone to deal with, let alone being all on your shoulders!
Why do vehicles have to behave like a petulant child ? ( sorry to all petulant kids, you do you! ...lol )
Seriously, I'm having trouble even trying to come up with solutions for you to navigate around this.
How about this? :hahaha: RUN AWAY!!! :biggrin:
You were right about T.O. getting the brunt of this snowfall. I don't want to drive anywhere. The amount
of snow that's piled sky high in different spots on our teeny front yard is concerning. Soon there will be
nowhere else for DH and DS to dump it.

Everyone do the very best you can today....or wait until this all melts.

Attachment 383552

Sassy i hear you it is so frustrating when family doesnt help out .I felt that way when i had mom for 6 and a half years living with us .I even cried once to a social worker when she was in hospital years ago as hubby and i booked a cottage up north and they wanted to release her .The social worker said no other family members can help,anyway they kept her 4 more days in rehab after her operation .(Dont know if they would do that today)

I hope this airmiles change will be good .Walkonby i am like you we go to petro and use our credit card that is linked .

Son messaged me we havent seen the girls in a week and a half ,so he asked if we could go over for supper tonight .Wings ,fries i may indulge as i have been eating so healthy.

Daughter sent me pictures this morning ,she is on her way to work snow pants with a dress overtop ,it is brutal she said her driveway is not plowed out ,she rents and they pay a firm to do it.She sent a picture of Sebastian in his full body snow suit ,he doesnt look happy at all (some kids made fun of him in it a few weeks back) ITs a 10 minutes walk to school .

Everyone have a warm and cosy day or try to.

Good Morning!

Started off my morning with a panicked text from my bestie. She was on the way to the airport to meet her husband and left in a panic and was questioning if she only let one dog back into the house. So I jumped in my car and drove down to check. All good. Both were in the house but at least she has peace of mind!
Her dad will let them out this morning and then I will go there early afternoon and stay for 2 nights with them. Trying to get everything done for work that I will need my printer/scanner for so I don't have to leave her house at all and just stay put for 48 hours!

I have a million things to get done but this is how I seem to work best....under pressure!!

Have a great day!

It is Wednesday
*** Dont forget to save your 4 pc offers ***
i just did mine.

Good Afternoon Everyone,
I think I might be at the if I don't laugh I might cry phase but we are pushing through.

Yesterday did not go as planned. First off Mom was having issues booking the tow truck so I had to (which is fine but I was at work, trying to do two things at once and apparently I cannot explain customer buying patterns and enter vehicle details at the same time).

I get it booked only to find out there are high call volumes and they cannot give me an ETA, so I wait, I have some time, I get dispatched but still no ETA and time is now counting down. How am I going to move this car.

Turns out one of my co-workers has a booster pack and offered to come and boost me so at least I could move and wait for the tow. At this point I was so done, so I cancelled the tow, we boosted the car and I sat in it well they plowed because I was not turning her off.

Went back to work finished my day but turns out there was a meeting I wasn't in which lead to questions so I was on the phone until quarter to 6 with my boss, so by the time I was done and realized I have no plan for dinner because I expected to be done at 4, dinner was again late. Also I was going to try to start the car when I got home but I had to come straight in because my boss needed me to log in and check something and at 6, I wasn't going back out.

Good news, today was a work from home day. I am knocking out the work stuff. I tried and the car started so I took her for a drive because I had to put gas in her. I am still scared for tomorrow because it is going to be colder but we will see I will try to start her again tomorrow. I just need her to make it to next week when hopefully I can book her into the shop which is down the road from work and I can just work from head office for the day (only catch is, I need good weather so I can get her there).

Now it is time to make dinner again and I have no plan, between taking the car for a drive and 1-hour meeting turned into 2.5 hours plus trying to get all my stuff together that is due this week, I lost track of time. This whole what's for dinner things happening day after day is a little much LOL.

Happy Thursday Everyone.

@coupon girl , yesterday at work we were discussing dealing with aging parents vs children because and decided parents are harder. They are adults they have their own ways of doing things and have their own opinions on things. In my Mom's case she has been forced to retire earlier than she planned but not only that with limited mobility her life is our house.

Which I mean is the thing, she is home all day every day and seeing things she cannot do herself which frustrates her so then it becomes a "thing"

Being the one who has to tackle all of the "things" but also working full time there just aren't enough hours in the day.

I am so grateful for what I am able to do and that we make it work but some days you want to hide from your own life.

Not to mention sometimes you look at what is going on and it seems so small compared to what others are dealing with which can make you feel guilty but at the same time, it does not change how you feel.

All we can do is keep pushing forward.

Looks like I am the odd one out when it comes to points and gas. Most of the time I go to Esso and get my PC Points.

Our local Shell is always higher in price, I think it is because of there location, there are only gas station in that area.

I have not had much success with AM, but again I think it might be small town living, I don't go to Shell, we don't have a Metro (although I guess Metro is now Moi), not sure of what other stores offer AM but I don't think we have them in town.

Sassy ,one day at a time ,you can only do what you can .You are there for your dear mother and that in its self is awesome .

As for airmiles i only have pharmasave ,but sassy you can do airmiles receipts ,it changes every thursday .Just upload your receipt and get small amounts of airmiles for food items plus toilet paper ,paper towels .Its on the airmiles app,i took my airmiles from about 500 in june ,when we got the cell phone now i am at 1,300 airmiles .

There are 3 sets of twins in my twins’ grade at school. Each winter one set of twins has a pool party and invites everyone in their grade. I kept that in mind and bought 2 identical winter toys during spring clearance specifically for this twin birthday party this weekend. We are reusing gift bags for these gifts.

Air Miles is changing, but I’ll continue to use it while we can. Air Miles has electronic gift cards on sale for 85AM = $10. I redeemed for Amazon gift cards, which arrived within 3 days. I also loaded bonus Air Miles offers for gas at Shell and grocery receipt offers.

I buy gas at Mobil to get the points with my PC credit card. Over the last few weeks I keep getting bonus points offer for Mobil. This week I had 2,000pts wub $20 gas. The new flyer has a Mobil gas offer for 3,000pts wub $30.

I received an email yesterday informing me that Shell is switching to Scene+ in May.

@cath007 thanks for the post about the siggi’s coupon. It’s my only choice for yogurt and I kept scouring for coupons and finally found some at Metro. It seems like the coupons have such short dates now, I would hope it would mean people not take them all but sadly that’s not the case. @SassyAshley we get 3 cents off with CAA at Shell and last year we got an additional 2 cents with our BMO MC so she’ll just made sense for us, also in NS we live in the boonies and it’s our only gas station. When in Ontario I go wherever I have the best offer, but with the 3 cents off Shell is often the winner.

I am yet to find the new coupons . Will be checking RCSS and FreshCo in the morning hopefully I find some

I always buy my gas at Costco as it is about 20 cents per litre off. They also have cheaper propane for the BBQ-I figure just on these 2 items savings I cover a basic membership. Anything else is gravy.