Shopping for the house & family with ING DIRECT Wave & Save

ING DIRECT was kind enough to provide $1,000 to fund my experience, all opinions contained within this post are my own, and not that of ING DIRECT

I always seem to be at the shops for something. Last week it was a haircut for Finn, junior dictionary and art folder for Keira, margarine and baking paper from the supermarket, presents for a little party next week. When asked would I like to try out the ING DIRECT ‘Wave and Save’ promotion, I knew it would be a good fit. I mean it’s a tough assignment to test out a Visa Debit payWave card at the shops and show how you could be earning 5% back on some of your shopping purchases but I was up for it. And in 2 days I did a little bit of shopping for the house and the family.

$14.95 from Typo

I opened up an ING DIRECT everyday account and armed with my card we set out with a list of the participating retailers. You can find a list of the retailers here. For the first 30,000 people who sign up for an ING DIRECT everyday account they will receive 5% back on all contactless transactions under $100 and until 30 June 2013. And the list of participating retailers had a few of our favourites like Woolworths, JB Hi-Fi, Cotton on, Typo and Bunnings. Oh do we love Bunnings at the moment as we do work on the house.

cushion from Typo

First stop was Typo to get a few things for keira’s room which I let her pick out. Going from green and gold wallpaper to lovely white walls is a big change and her room needs a bit of colour and fun put into it. I’m not allowed to pick everything these days but pink is still her favourite colour so we managed to keep a bit of pink there. Owl cushion, LOVE book/magazine holder, little alarm clock, some notebooks for drawing and stories, little pink lanterns to string around here room. We just scraped in under $100.

next stop JB Hi Fi for a little school holiday entertainment. Now to be eligible for the 5% cash back your transactions need to be under $100. Kind of a nice way to teach my little ones about money and budgeting when they presented me with 4 dvd’s they wanted and one was a boxed movie set. We put 2 back, went to the register, tapped the card, got our receipt and were off to the next store. Not having to use a pin or signature is super fast and you just hold the card over the machine and voila it says approved.

Retro daddy also did a little shop at JB Hi-Fi for some good earphones for his iPod and iPhone as he runs and does a lot of travel with them. And a DVD for a band I’ve never heard of before.

We also used the cards at Woolworths for a couple of mid week top ups. I am queen of the top up grocery shop and school holidays means everyone is eating me out of house and home. I’d been wanting to try out the Gozlemes from the freezer section and some chocolates from the USA somehow made it into my trolley. How does that happen? And some baby food for our weekend away coming up. By the way, those gozleme were not that crash hot. The spinach tasted a bit like tea (does that make sense) so I might try them on someone else in the house. I’ll stick to the little ladies at the market stalls next time I have a craving for one.

Next up we got some happy meals as a little treat (you can use your payWave at McDonalds and not hold up the queue at the same time) and I went off to Cotton On to search for a little outfit for my girls. There is always some great sale stuff in there. A tutu for tillie, $5 tees for keira, hairclips for the girls and $5 drink bottles for the everyone too. This came in at $99.75. Talk about scraping in under $100.

And then I decided to hand the card over to retro daddy to get a few things. First stop was Body Shop. For as long as we have been together I get in trouble for stealing his nail clippers or tweezers or little scissors from his grooming kit. He’s had it forever and apparently I never put anything back in it properly. So now he has 2 new bags and everything he needs when he goes away for work

And then I wanted to use the card for some practical things. I measured the wardrobe handles that I needed as we are having all the built ins painter. I counted all of the wardrobe doors and got up to Bunnings to be presented with 2 huge big displays of wardrobe and cupboard handles. Do you think any of them were the same size as my current handles. No. That would be a no. The painter then informed me I need to take the handle off a wardrobe and take it in. So I left handles for another time.

So it was onto the storage section. We have a serious toy problem here…………..in that I need toys for emerson and elodie to play with where I can supervise them but the plastic tubs are not going to suit my lovely new loungeroom when the floors and carpets are done. So I picked up these 3 packs of baskets which have a lovely rustic feel to them. I bought the last 2 sets which gives me 6 baskets for toys and magazines. I promise to share after photos because I’m going to get the little ones to fill them up and sort the toys. Well that’s the plan. And is the cutest pic ever. Honestly he just smiles around the clock. Not much fazes this little guy.

These baskets are going to look great with the freshly painted walls and nicely polished floors. I just know it And at just under $70 for both sets (total of 6 baskets), I’m pretty impressed.

Retro daddy then got to shop for some fun things like safety gates in the house. I have been asking him to get some since we moved in and at last we now have some gates. The hardest area to cover was this entry which is 175cm wide and larger than almost all gates. Using a Coles Myer voucher at Target (the Coles Myer voucher earnt him the 5% back) he picked up this gate on special for $99. Bunnings had it for $124. I’m a bargain hunter. It’s the new me. And then someone spent over an hour putting it together and drilling it into the wall so we can be safely stay upstairs this week while the painters work downstairs. I supplied the cheese sandwiches and moral support.

And then on to Bunnings for a karcher for around the house. That’s been on our list for a while. You know you’re of a certain age and a proud homeowner when you’ve got a Karcher on your wish list. Living the dream.

And the last of the money went on something we go through a lot of…………….nappies. I’d be scared to know how many nappies we will have gone through by the time Emerson is out of them.

Thank you ING DIRECT. We had a lot of fun thinking about what we could get for the house, making lists, checking out websites and then going shopping. And we kind of kept every member of the family happy and solved a few problems we had around the house. Plus the best bit was when I went to check the balance and how much I had to spend there were little credits all over my account activity for all the cash backs I had earnt. For more information about ING DIRECT Bank Accounts and the Wave & Save promotion, just visit their website.

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