If you know me, you know I absolutely LOVE a deal.  While I do enjoy having nice things, I enjoy them a LOT more if I don’t have to pay a lot for them.  I know a lot of people have advice for how to save money and I have a few ways that have seemed to work for me.  I’ll start my first Thrifty Thursday with something very obvious: watch for clearance sales.  I love finding things on clearance, especially for the kids given that they only wear things for a short period of time (relatively speaking of course).  It also never hurts to watch for things on sale for me and Gabe.

When I find a great deal I can’t help but tell EVERYONE about my deals.  I want everyone else to be able to get such great deals too.  When I score a fantastic item at a rock bottom price I tell every person in ear shot.  My most recent “can’t believe I got it for that price” find was on Dec 26th.  My lovely aunt Cheryl got me a really pretty shirt from Gap but it just didn’t fit.  It was a gorgeous coral color, which I loved, but it didn’t do a thing for my figure.  I was disappointed but figured I might find something to replace it when we went shopping the day after Christmas.

The t-shirt she had given me was around $25.00 and once I made the return and had the cash in my pocket, I couldn’t seem to find a thing in the store that would replace what I had returned.  That was until I happened by the clearance rack and found this:

I instantly loved the color.  Sorry, I took these pics with my phone a few weeks back and they’re not the best quality.  The coat is a really deep plum color with a faux fur collar and the picture doesn’t do it justice.  It’s blurry but the price tag is obvious.  $49.99 for a GREAT wool peacoat.  A peacoat that had previously been on sale for $79.99, which when all the sale tags were pealed back originally sold for $158.00.  I was instantly tempted.  What a deal already!  How in the world could I pass it up?  Well, I could pass it up because we really didn’t have the extra money to meet in the middle and make up the approximately $25.00 between the money from my return and the cost of the coat.

I tried it on and looked in the mirror and it fit just perfectly.  That’s where my luck kicked in that day.  Given that it was the day after Christmas the Gap store was offering lots of awesome deals, including a small, inconspicuous sign that said all clearance was an additional 50% off – the LOWEST price!  You read that right, the coat wasn’t $49.99, it was really $24.99 plus tax.  After tax my coat was less than $27.00 and I only put in a little over a dollar to make up the difference.  My aunt couldn’t believe I had somehow turned a t-shirt into a coat but I know it was a little luck and little bargain hunting that let me bring this pretty piece home.

Do have luck with the clearance rack?  What kind of fabulous finds have you happened upon recently?