Out with the old, In with the new

I've always used coupons. I can remember being barely old enough to use scissors, sitting in the floor clipping coupons for my mom on Sunday afternoons, then going down to my grandma's house and doing the same thing for her. I still do this on Sunday, only now I set aside coupons for Mom and mailing her what she uses. She in turn does the same for me. People at church even leave diaper coupons in Quinn's cubby in the nursery (thanks for those!!), and friends at work save me their whole coupon sections from the paper. I also pull coupons from the dispenser boxes in the aisles of the grocery store. I use websites like CouponBug.Com, and Coupons.Com to print coupons. Because of this, I have accumulated quite the stash of coupons.

So I've decided that my current way of keeping up with my coupons was not working for me anymore. Can you blame me?? Take a look at my coupon organizer, and see what I mean.

There is absolutely no rhyme or reason to what is going on in here. The only way you could say this is organized is that the coupons were in order by date. I kinda, sorta knew where certain coupons were based on date. For example, any Proctor and Gamble product (Pampers, Dawn, Cascade, etc) would be near the end of the month. Other than that, I would have to search through this humongous stack, hoping to find the right one. (And yes, that envelope does have several pockets, and no, I was not using all of them...just one!)

So after reading some coupon posts on MoneySavingMom and on Life As Mom, I decided it was time to re-organize.

I pretty much used the idea of MoneySavingMom as seen here. To make this coupon box, you need some small envelopes, some small index cards, and some sort of box. I used a leftover baby wipes box.

Basically what you need to do is tear off the flap of the envelope. Then take an index card and staple it to the inside. Also write the category of item on the index card as well. I discovered after I had stapled all the cards in that the lid of the box wouldn't shut, so I had to go back and trim the cards down. You may want to write the category just above the envelope and then trim the top of the card off.

Then I went through all my coupons and sorted them based on category. What did I use for categories? Well, if you go back up and click on the link of how Crystal (MoneySavingMom) did her box, I used many of her categories, as I thought she had broken them down really well. For example, she didn't just say "Cleaners". She had an envelope for all-purpose cleaners, bathrooms, furniture, glass, etc. I added some categories, took away some categories, and pretty much fit her list to our family's needs. Then I alphabetically organized all the envelopes. Then I organized the coupons in each envelope by date, so the most recent date is on top.

Now, my coupon box looks like this.

I am hoping this will resolve my coupon issues and will allow me to quickly find what I need.

If you do the "coupon thing", how do you organize your coupons?? If you don't coupon....tell me why! I can't imagine people not using coupons, but I know some do. Either way, I'd love to hear your methods!

For other Frugal Ideas, check out Frugal Friday hosted by Life As Mom.