Penny Pincher

I have become a pretty frugal person. However, I do love to shop. Before my baby daddy came along, I didn't think twice about plopping down the plastic and going ba-nan-as at every store I hit at the mall. Then came Victor. Victor is a bargain hunting, coupon coding, discount store fanatic. He's always on the hunt for the best deal. I laugh, because the man doesn't blink at a $200 bar tab, but will audibly gasp at a $200 anything...unless it's on sale. I learned early on that I could bring home anything I wanted as long as the big reveal was followed by, "you wouldn't believe the sale Nordstrom was having! I just couldn't pass it up!" He would look on in admiration and think my shopping the sales transformation was complete. Hello, $58 $18 Lulu Lemon yoga mat, I needed you.

Over the years I have picked up a few of his tricks and I can honestly say that the man knows what he's talking about. I always used my debit card and saved my credit card for emergencies (because I had debt and was quickly paying it off). He then introduced me to the rewards program game: Open a new card, put everything on it, pay it off, and in three billing cycles I'd have a free round trip ticket to Europe. Winning! Oh, and the Hyatt card? Get it, get it now! Hyatt will give you two free nights at any property in the world when you hit their 3 month spending minimum. We used those two nights in Paris and stayed at the Park Hyatt Vendome. Our room rate was 1,000 EUR ($1,000+) a night and we stayed...for FREE :)

I will never forget this bathroom - SIX faucets filling up that amazing bathtub!

Now for my favorite penny pinching lesson learned from Mr Bargain Hunter...Fatwallet. Have you used this site before? SO EASY! Click here to create an account. I reference this site before every online purchase. Retailers pay fat wallet a referral fee to get you to their site. They then pass on a portion of that fee to you. Every click adds up fast! In the past year Fatwallet has paid me $132.81 for buying stuff I would buy anyway.