My shopping trip 10/29 and a little challenge

If you have looked around this blog, you will see that I usually have pictures of my shopping trips... Not this time!!  I came home from a long afternoon of shopping and started getting things ready for our oldest child's 16th birthday party.  No time for pictures!!  It didn't take long to do the actual shopping, but I drove an hour one way to do the shopping.  You may be asking why I would do such a thing especially when I have so much to do for the party.  I will explain!
My dear husband gave me a challenge this month with my couponing.  He challenged me to spend no more than $500 in a month.  Easy enough!  I have plenty stockpiled to feed and clean our family of 9 for a while.  Here is the kicker... I still had to have $1000 savings in my purchases for the month. Hmmm, a little more challenging, but do-able.  Then he added something else.  If I could keep my spending below $400 for the month, I would get a trip to the mountains... just the two of us.  I do love my children and a love the time I am blessed to have with them as we homeschool, but I love my husband even more and cherish any time we can spend together as a couple.  We could call this a late anniversary getaway.
When I agreed to the challenge, I forgot one little detail.... our oldest son's 16th birthday party!  How could I forget that was this month?!  The last day of the challenge is November 6.  As of last night, my totals were: $355.99 spent, $1096.48 saved, and $26 in store rewards.  The store rewards I have left at the end of the challenge will be subtracted out of the money I have spent.  I still needed some supplies for the party.  So off to Publix I went, since they will let me stack store coupons, manufacturer's coupons, and competitor's coupons.  I also made a stop at Food Lion and CVS.  Here is a list of my purchases:

Publix
9 pks of Publix hotdog and hamburger buns
3 Schick shaving creams
2 Schick Hydro 3 razors
8 bags of Totinos Pizza rolls
2 boxes of Gorton Tilapia
1 Cascade ActionPacks 20 ct.
2 SunDown vitamin D 100 ct.
After all my coupons, I paid $1.20 out of pocket and saved $91.04. Wooohoooo!  Got the buns I needed for the party and a whole lot more!

CVS
1 Oral-B Vitality rechargeable toothbrush
I used a rain check that I had when they were on sale a few weeks ago.  It was on sale for $23 and then you were able to get $13 ECBs back.  I had a $10 coupon for the toothbrush, so I ended up spending $14.61 out of pocket and saving $19.99.  I have $13 ECBs to use next week on some sale items, so I will have very little if any out of pocket expense.

Food Lion
8 Coca Cola 2L products
4 Campbell's SpaghettiOs
I paid $6.21 OOP and saved $16.74.

I ended up spending $22.02 OOP and saving $127.77, with $13 ECBs to use next week.  I saved 85%!!!  So how are my challenge totals going?!  I have spent $378.01 and saved $1224.25.  Unless something major was to happen, I think I might just get that mountain trip!!