Thrifty Thursday

Today I am going to share a few of my favorite finds on the internet to save money and enjoy some of my favorite things.

First of all, I love to read and buying books can get expensive. I also love to cook so cookbooks are some of my favorite books to have. Well, those can be extra expensive. I just started an account at a really cool site. I suggest you check it out. It's called Paper Back Swap and it's pretty great. If you have some books laying around that you have already read and don't mind getting rid of you can just input their ISBN numbers onto the site and make them available for other people to order. Once you load 10 books onto the site that you don't mind getting rid of you get 2 credits on the site to get 2 books that someone else has loaded up. I just ordered Rachael Ray's 30 minute meals and 30 minute meals 2 which retail for $22.00 on Amazon.com (total) all for free. I just loaded up 10 books that I was done with and that was it.

You can continue to load books up, purchase book credits (for much cheaper than the book) and you can swap your life away with other readers. When someone orders one of your books, you just mail it to them (usually only $2.00-5.00) and you get more book credits. It's a great way to collect books that you really want or just read and pass on to others. I am keeping my cookbooks but there were plenty little reads I could just read and put back on the site. Also, if you are like me, I pick up a lot of my books at Borders or Barnes & Noble on the Bargain book table and they cost so little it would be worth it to read and them load them up on Paper Back Swap. I will let you know when I receive my first book so I can kind of review the site!

Another thing I recently came across was a site called SwagBucks where you use the site for a search engine and earn points to get great things like music, giftcards, etc... Please check it out and if you join use this link so that I can receive points for referring you....





So far it's been pretty easy to earn points since I normally use Google all the time. This site uses Ask.com and Google to make their search engine and you don't have to download anything. I really like it so far and also, I will update you on it when I receive a reward for using it. I like to make sure and report on how these sites actually operate.

Another place that you can sign up to receive points and get emails is My Points All you do is sign up for an account and receive emails. Each email is worth 5 points and you just click on get points in the email and as you collect points, again...you can cash them in for gift cards. I have been using this service for over 8 years and I have received a lot of gift cards for clothing, restaurants, starbucks, etc... You can also go from the mypoints home site and shop for things you already buy like ink for your printer, groceries, etc... by shopping online and you earn so many points on the dollar. I have used this for books at Borders.com, Clothes that I have ordered online, shoes, etc... and it makes your points add up much faster. Nowdays, I don't have a lot of extra shopping money so all I do is read my emails and click and I still stockpile tons of points. I would suggest that if you don't like a lot of email in your email box, open up a seperate email account for things like this (for example on gmail or hotmail) that way you can go there once every couple of days and deal with these issues. I now use my points to cash in for gift cards for Anthony and I to go out to nice dinners and have date nights. It's nice for neither of us to have to pay. :)

Those are my thrifty tips for today but I promise, I'll keep them coming! Happy Money Saving!!!