Yesterday my hair stylist informed/agree with me that my hair is falling out. It's always been really thick and fine, and now it's just fine. She told me about a GNC product that works well, I looked it up on a few sites and it's gotten 5 stars across the board.

So, went through eBates (5% cash back), to drugstore.com, which is having a $25 off $100 on GNC products. That's quite a bit of GNC! My GNC Gold Card expired last week, so I renewed it, getting a discount of 20% on everything, found the protein drinks and bars MD eats on sale, 25% off, so 20% off of that, then the 5% eBates and the 5% from using a dividend cashback mastercard, which gives 5% on drugstore. Plus got a few free with purchases and some other items we needed, as long as I was getting free shipping anyway.

Free gifts with purchase, well, there is always a use for them. drugstore.com always has Philosophy freebies, usually a bath gel, and they make nice gift baskets, or I use them myself. Last year there were freebies on Apple Cider and Gingerbread bath gel, which smelled nice but not exactly to soak in. So I diluted a bottle to make 10 bottles of hand soap, which replaced potpourri and candles in already crowded bathrooms, and smelled wonderful every time you washed! I had leftover concentrate, which I saved for this year. Guess I'd better get on that!

Yves Rocher is also having quite a few freebies, I did order a hand cream kit since washing my hands constantly from the sick dog has pretty much stripped them. Received the crystal earrings watch set, a large bottle of perfumed lotion, a 15 piece trial size set, free shipping, a purse, a free "most expensive item on your list", etc. Plus 15% back from Ebates. So, I'm starting gifts to collect for next year.

I am careful about not getting suckered into the loss leaders, just buying things I have no use for to get the freebies that I have no use for. And I'm careful about getting a decent freebie, not just a trial size something. Drugstore.com, beauty.com, always have nice size freebies. Some of the other sites, it's like "why?".

So, trying to get back into the wise and wiser shopping mode. I did NOT appreciate that drugstore.com, which always has free UPGRADE shipping to 3 day, now wanted $4 to upgrade, and automatically put it in. I caught it and took it out, but how irritating!

Must be getting back to my cheap little self.