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Walgreens: $2.99 Brag Book through May 14, 2014

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Walgreens: $2.99 Brag Book through May 14, 2014

Photograph Credit: Walgreens

On the heels of a great Mother’s Day freebie, Walgreens is offering a FREE 4.5×6 brag book for the price of shipping.

This deal excludes extra pages and requires a $2.99 shipping charge.

To receive your $2.99 brag book, you will need to login or sign up for a FREE Walgreen’s account, upload your photographs, create your book, and checkout.

At checkout, enter promotional code FREETOBRAG, enter your shipping information, and place your order.

This FREE offer with a $2.99 shipping charge is valid through midnight on Wednesday, May 14, 2014, with a limit of one FREE brag book per account.

Brag books make special end-of-the-school-year or Father’s Day gifts. If you’ve never made one, I suggest making any adjustments to the photographs prior to uploading to the Walgreens’ website. With all the pictures prepared, you can better create your book by selecting the pictures.

In using time wisely, order your $2.99 (FREE + $2.99 shipping) brag book from Walgreens by Wednesday, May 14, 2014. Happy creating!

Question: Do you create brag books?

Walgreens: FREE 8×10 Photo Enlargement through March 19, 2014

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Walgreens: FREE 8x10 Photo Enlargement through March 19, 2014

Photograph Credit: Walgreens

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! I hope you have your green on. Even if you don’t, you sure are lucky because Walgreens has an offer for you. 😉

Walgreens is offering a FREE 8×10 photo enlargement on any single picture.

If you would like a collage, you need to create the collage and then upload it as one picture. My favorite collage builder is Pixlr – which is FREE.

You will need to login or sign up for a FREE Walgreen’s account, upload your photograph, and checkout. At checkout, enter promotional code MARCH8X10, choose store pickup, and place your order.

This FREE offer is valid through Wednesday, March 19, 2014 with a limit of one FREE enlargement per account. The order must be placed by midnight, but you may pick up your enlargement when you are by your selected Walgreens.

If you have a great snow day picture or St. Patrick’s Day photo, then this FREE offer is great for updating photos on the wall or to save for a gift. With Easter, Mother’s Day, and Father’s Day on the horizon, you can get a jump start on a gift your recipient will enjoy.

Thank you, Walgreens, and happy savings on this St. Patrick’s Day!

Question: How do you use these FREE photo offers?

ArtsCow.com: Photo Prints and Gifts – Part 2 of 2

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Photograph Credit: ArtsCow.com

In Part 1 of this 2-part series, I shared my love for personalized gifts, and one solution to getting photo books without paying full price. A solution to stretching my dollars is using ArtsCow.com.

Note: This is my referral link. By registering through this link, Using Time Wisely gets compensated without any cost to you. Your support of Using Time Wisely is greatly appreciated. For more information on my affiliate links, you can read my full disclosure policy.

I shared how this company is adaptable, user-friendly, and affordable. Today, I will explain how to place an order on their web site using your free credits and discounts.

When you are ready to order your free prints and other photo gift credits:

Log in to your ArtsCow.com account

1. Go to www.artscow.com.

2. Click on MY ACCOUNT from the menu bar at the top of the page.

3. Log in to your account using your e-mail and password.

Create a new album

1. In the MEMBERS AREA on the left sidebar, choose MY ALBUM.

2. Then scroll down to the bottom of the page, and select NEW ALBUM.

3. Change the ALBUM NAME, ALBUM DESCRIPTION, and ALBUM DATE, and click CONTINUE.

Upload your photos to the album

You can choose the Basic Upload or the Quick Upload. If you only have 20-50 pictures, then the basic upload will be fine.

To use the basic upload:

1. Click CHOOSE FILE

2. Select the pictures from your computer.

      • If you want to select more than one, then click the first picture and then hold down your CTRL key and click any other pictures you want to upload.
      • If you want to select an entire folder or a series of pictures in order, then click the first one and press your SHIFT key and click on the last picture you want. All the pictures between the first and last will be highlighted.
      • When all the pictures you want in that folder are highlighted, click OPEN.

3. If you need more photographs from another folder, then click CHOOSE FILE and repeat steps 2-3.

4. When all your photographs have been chosen, then click UPLOAD PHOTOS.

Since I usually upload 100 or more pictures at time, my preference is the Quick Upload option.

To use the quick upload:

1. Click MULIT FILE UPLOADER

You will need Microsoft Silverlight program. If you do not have this program installed on your computer, ArtsCow.com will provide the link to download. (You will only need to download it once.)

2. With Microsoft Silverlight installed, select your album name or create a new one.

3. Click ADD PHOTOS.

4. Select the pictures from your computer.

      • If you want to select more than one, then click the first picture and then hold down your CTRL key and click any other pictures you want to upload.
      • If you want to select an entire folder or a series of pictures in order, then click the first one and press your SHIFT key and click on the last picture you want.
      • All the pictures between the first and last will be highlighted.

5. When all the pictures you want in that folder are highlighted, click OPEN.

6. If you need more photographs from another folder, then click CHOOSE FILE and repeat steps 2-3.

7. When all your photographs have been chosen, then click UPLOAD PHOTOS.

8. Once the photos are uploaded to ArtsCow.com, you can move them to a different folder, choose to order prints, or go to CREATE YOUR OWN STUFF on the green menu bar under the ArtsCow.com title (for photo albums, calendars, etc.).

Place the photo prints order

1. Select the photos you want to print by either clicking the box: CHECK ALL PHOTOS IN THIS ALBUM or click the box next to each photo you want to print.

2. Then ADD TO CART.

The free photo print credits will be auto applied

When you have selected all your items, choose CHECK OUT.

Enter Billing/Shipping Information

Check out by PayPal or Credit Card

TIP: Be patient for your order to arrive. This company is based in Hong Kong, so international shipping takes about 2 weeks for delivery.

The ordering process is not difficult, but it has lots of steps. In using time wisely and preparing in advance, you can snag some great photo deals without breaking the bank through ArtsCow.com. This company continues to help me in stretching our dollars with all the credits and discounts.

Question: Which type of photo gift is your favorite? Please add your answer by clicking the Leave your Comment button.

ArtsCow.com: Photo Prints and Gifts – Part 1 of 2

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Photograph Credit: ArtsCow.com

With a love for personalized gifts, I struggle with the price tag of photo books. A simple book can run upwards of $20 with no bells and whistles. Having used a few different companies to print photo books, I have been extremely impressed with ArtsCow.com because they are adaptable, user-friendly, and affordable!

Adaptable features. To help stretch our hard earned dollars, I use my credits and discounts when purchasing photo prints and photo gifts for family and friends. The photo books are my favorite.  Around Father’s Day, I typically order one book for each child to give to Daddy.

ArtsCow’s photo book options are the most adaptable among Shutterfly, Winkflash, and Snapfish. I can adjust the text, add extra layout options for pictures, and move all the items around on the page. If the layout I need is not available in a template, then I can create my own. I am not limited by a standardized format.

User-Friendly web site. ArtsCow’s web site is very easy to navigate. As with all photo books, this project is time consuming. I spend 4-5 hours creating a book with upwards of 200 pictures. If you have fewer pictures, then you could probably create a book in less than an hour. A great feature is random fill-in where all your pictures are put in the book, and then you can move them around.

Affordable projects. ArtsCow.com often sends coupon codes which need to be validated. Once validated, the credits will stay in your account until either you use them or they expire.

I currently have coupons for free prints from now until August 2013. Though the prints are free, I am responsible for the shipping charges. I have been very impressed with ArtsCow.com’s affordable quality as they have printed our family calendar for the past 3 years, 10+ photo books, prints, and a memory card reader.

Registration

If you are interested in saving on your photo prints and using the services of ArtsCow.com, then register for free.

  1. Go to www.artscow.com. (Note: This is my referral link. By registering through this link, Using Time Wisely gets compensated without any cost to you. Your support of Using Time Wisely is greatly appreciated. For more information on my affiliate links, you can read my full disclosure policy.)
  2. At the top of the page, click on MY ACCOUNT.
  3. Choose REGISTER for a free account.
  4. Complete the required fields, word verification, accept the terms, and JOIN.

Credit and Discount

Once you have joined, you can check your credits.

  1. Go back to the HOME page (just click on “ARTSCOW” in the top left corner.)
  2. Go to MY ACCOUNT at the top of the page.
  3. Login with your e-mail account and password.
  4. On the left sidebar under Members Area, click on the 4th option down, CREDIT AND DISCOUNT.
  5. A list of your free credits will load. As a new member you should have a minimum of 1200 free prints and 3 8”x8” photo books. Now, these free prints will be spread out over most of the next year. Here are the details of the free print credits:
    • Please use the credits between the start time and expire time
    • If you have free print credits in your account already, the new prints credits will be added after them.
    • No more than 100 free 4×6 and 50 free 5×7 print credits can be used per month.
    • Shipping fees are not included
    • Promotion details may change at any time without notice
    • Valid on orders placed and shipped within the globe only (really . . . no shipping to Mercury or Halley’s Comet?🙂 )
    • All credits issued will not be deleted except repeated registrants
    • ArtsCow.com reserves the right to terminate this offer at any time without notice.

Coupon Codes

While you are still at the CREDIT AND DISCOUNT page, add the current coupon code for an additional 600 free prints. This coupon code expires on Monday, August 22. You do not need to order your pictures by Monday, but you must validate the coupon by Monday. The free prints will be tagged on at the end of your current 1200 free prints.

  1. In the VALIDATE BOX, enter AUG11PRTS.
  2. Click the VALIDATE button.
  3. You will receive a message stating that 600 more prints have been added to your credits.

As the credits keep coming, you will be set with free photos for a long time! ArtsCow.com sends out e-mails periodically with coupon codes. Just add the coupon codes to your Credit and Discount page and validate. You will then have the credits when you are ready to order your prints and gifts.

Using ArtsCow.com to order our photo prints and gifts with our credits and discounts has helped stretch our hard earned dollars. In using time wisely, I find ArtsCow.com adaptable, user-friendly, and affordable. In fact, I just placed an order for 3 free 8”x8” photo albums, 10 free 5”x7” prints, and 1 memory card reader discounted to $7.99 and paid a total of $23.15.

ArtsCow.com saves me money (from credits and discounts), energy (searching for promotional codes and other deals), and time (get to adjust and create my own layouts). Come back next week for Part 2 where I will walk you through the process of placing an order with ArtsCow.com. Until then, keep stretching your dollars while using time wisely!

Question: How do you stretch your dollars when purchasing photo prints and gifts?