Ohio Sales Tax Free Weekend and some random "days" we celebrated
Once again, our family took advantage of the (now) annual Ohio Sales Tax Free weekend which occurred the first weekend of August. A large percentage of Donnie's earnings are taxed- either by the feds, the state, the cities (both Dayton where Donnie works and Springboro where we live). Additionally, we have to pay taxes for our house and the land on which it sits. Finally, almost every service for which we pay is taxed and of course every item that we purchase. So, a weekend with a tiny break in "the system's" fingers in our pocketbooks was most welcome.
Alyssa and I were in Canada for most of the tax free weekend but we were still able to do some school shopping for her. We shopped online (and didn't have to pay sales tax) at Kohl's, JC Penney and Nordstrom. Alyssa is not super keen on shopping in stores so online shopping was probably preferable to her. Donnie and the teens did some shopping (in Ohio) as well. Donnie and Abby went to the Dayton mall on Saturday and on Sunday, Donnie, Abby and Jacob all went to the nearest outlet mall to us. They (the teens and Donnie) didn't buy too much but they all got a few things.
Alyssa and I arrived home from Canada by 4:00 pm on Sunday. The sales tax free holiday ended Sunday at midnight so we only had Sunday evening left to purchase school supplies tax free. After dinner, the girls and Donnie and I went to Wal-Mart to go school supply shopping. Picking out new school supplies is one bright spot in the killjoy that is a new school year starting. And so, the girls, despite the crowds in Wal-mart, undertook their mission to procure school supplies with, if not glee, at least a grim satisfaction that their school year would start with folders, notebooks, binders in colors and designs that they picked out and that would look good for at least a few weeks into the school year :).
That was our sales tax free weekend. I would be remiss to add that as much legitimate griping about taxes that I do (it doesn't take too much effort to find news articles that relay astonishing government waste/ fraud/ abuse in social services/ projects for which tax dollars are spent), I'm not ready to go off the grid. Some amount of taxes are legitimate and necessary. Also, after spending time in Canada, especially during the Ohio Sales Tax Free weekend, I'm aware of just how much worse we could be taxed. In Ontario, the sales tax is an astonishing 13%. Talk about unlucky 13.... Also, gasoline is taxed so high that in Ontario, when Alyssa and I were there, gas was about $5/ gallon. Canadians buy their gas by the liter but it's not difficult to do the math to convert it to gallon prices. I gassed up in Ohio both ways (the other two states that we drive in to get to Canada and then back home- PA and NY have high (for the States) gas taxes so I always fill up in Ohio, lol) and paid less than $3/ gallon.
Besides taking financial advantage of the little break that The State bestowed upon us, we've celebrated a few random days here and there. We celebrated National Chocolate Chip Day back in May- that is not to be confused with National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day (August 4th) which, alas, we didn't celebrate. While there are any number of ways to celebrate chocolate chips, mixing them with butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, salt, and baking soda, forming small balls with the ingredients and baking said ingredients was as good a way as any we could think of to celebrate the day. Yes, we made chocolate chip cookies.
More recently, we celebrated National Cheesecake Day. We love Cheesecake Factory cheesecake and buying a cheesecake from CF would have been the preferred way to celebrate the day. However, in the interest of wanting to save about $50.00, I decided to make a cheesecake at home. I use my springform pan so seldom that the girls didn't know what it was when I got it out to make the cheesecake. I think I should be making cheesecake more often :). I used the cheesecake recipe that's located on the inside container of a Philadelphia Cream Cheese brick (and it's also on Kraft's website). The recipe does not yield as rich of a cheesecake as some recipes do, but the cheesecake is easy to make and definitely good tasting.
One of the kids told me about National Guacamole Day on July 31st and a promotion that Chipotle was doing in honor of it- free guac! I looked up information about the day and it turns out the celebration that day was for National Avocado Day, not National Guacamole Day (the latter is in September) but the end was the same- Chipotle was in fact, giving out free guacamole. We decided to take advantage of it- the promotion required placing an order online to get the free guac. Chipotle's website was having all sorts of problems when I tried to place an online order. I called our local Chipotle, explained the website problems, and the person I talked to said that I could come into the store to order and I'd get the free guac. So, that's what I did.
We had fun celebrating these made up national food days. We missed National Ice Cream Day this year and whole host of others. Maybe next year...
Sales tax free- YES!! I never get tired of seeing $0.00 in receipts' tax columns during the sales tax free weekend. Here was an online order that I did over the weekend.
I think I posted this in my post on our trip to Canada but I'm posting it here too. Such a treat to be shopping tax free and eating a chocolate bar with hazelnuts in it.
This is our Wal-Mart receipt. It looks like we bought a couple of items that didn't qualify as tax free.
As for celebrating certain days, I don't have any pictures of the cookies that we made to celebrate National Chocolate Chip or the free guacamole. My word will have to suffice as proof :).
I did take a couple of pictures of the cheesecake that the girls and I made for National Cheesecake Day. I don't make cheesecakes often so a picture or two is order to document the event.
Although good plain, the addition of fresh whipped cream, a homemade chocolate sauce and some M & M's increased the yum factor of the cheesecake (for me anyway!!).
Alyssa and I were in Canada for most of the tax free weekend but we were still able to do some school shopping for her. We shopped online (and didn't have to pay sales tax) at Kohl's, JC Penney and Nordstrom. Alyssa is not super keen on shopping in stores so online shopping was probably preferable to her. Donnie and the teens did some shopping (in Ohio) as well. Donnie and Abby went to the Dayton mall on Saturday and on Sunday, Donnie, Abby and Jacob all went to the nearest outlet mall to us. They (the teens and Donnie) didn't buy too much but they all got a few things.
Alyssa and I arrived home from Canada by 4:00 pm on Sunday. The sales tax free holiday ended Sunday at midnight so we only had Sunday evening left to purchase school supplies tax free. After dinner, the girls and Donnie and I went to Wal-Mart to go school supply shopping. Picking out new school supplies is one bright spot in the killjoy that is a new school year starting. And so, the girls, despite the crowds in Wal-mart, undertook their mission to procure school supplies with, if not glee, at least a grim satisfaction that their school year would start with folders, notebooks, binders in colors and designs that they picked out and that would look good for at least a few weeks into the school year :).
That was our sales tax free weekend. I would be remiss to add that as much legitimate griping about taxes that I do (it doesn't take too much effort to find news articles that relay astonishing government waste/ fraud/ abuse in social services/ projects for which tax dollars are spent), I'm not ready to go off the grid. Some amount of taxes are legitimate and necessary. Also, after spending time in Canada, especially during the Ohio Sales Tax Free weekend, I'm aware of just how much worse we could be taxed. In Ontario, the sales tax is an astonishing 13%. Talk about unlucky 13.... Also, gasoline is taxed so high that in Ontario, when Alyssa and I were there, gas was about $5/ gallon. Canadians buy their gas by the liter but it's not difficult to do the math to convert it to gallon prices. I gassed up in Ohio both ways (the other two states that we drive in to get to Canada and then back home- PA and NY have high (for the States) gas taxes so I always fill up in Ohio, lol) and paid less than $3/ gallon.
Besides taking financial advantage of the little break that The State bestowed upon us, we've celebrated a few random days here and there. We celebrated National Chocolate Chip Day back in May- that is not to be confused with National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day (August 4th) which, alas, we didn't celebrate. While there are any number of ways to celebrate chocolate chips, mixing them with butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, salt, and baking soda, forming small balls with the ingredients and baking said ingredients was as good a way as any we could think of to celebrate the day. Yes, we made chocolate chip cookies.
More recently, we celebrated National Cheesecake Day. We love Cheesecake Factory cheesecake and buying a cheesecake from CF would have been the preferred way to celebrate the day. However, in the interest of wanting to save about $50.00, I decided to make a cheesecake at home. I use my springform pan so seldom that the girls didn't know what it was when I got it out to make the cheesecake. I think I should be making cheesecake more often :). I used the cheesecake recipe that's located on the inside container of a Philadelphia Cream Cheese brick (and it's also on Kraft's website). The recipe does not yield as rich of a cheesecake as some recipes do, but the cheesecake is easy to make and definitely good tasting.
One of the kids told me about National Guacamole Day on July 31st and a promotion that Chipotle was doing in honor of it- free guac! I looked up information about the day and it turns out the celebration that day was for National Avocado Day, not National Guacamole Day (the latter is in September) but the end was the same- Chipotle was in fact, giving out free guacamole. We decided to take advantage of it- the promotion required placing an order online to get the free guac. Chipotle's website was having all sorts of problems when I tried to place an online order. I called our local Chipotle, explained the website problems, and the person I talked to said that I could come into the store to order and I'd get the free guac. So, that's what I did.
We had fun celebrating these made up national food days. We missed National Ice Cream Day this year and whole host of others. Maybe next year...
Sales tax free- YES!! I never get tired of seeing $0.00 in receipts' tax columns during the sales tax free weekend. Here was an online order that I did over the weekend.
I think I posted this in my post on our trip to Canada but I'm posting it here too. Such a treat to be shopping tax free and eating a chocolate bar with hazelnuts in it.
I did take a couple of pictures of the cheesecake that the girls and I made for National Cheesecake Day. I don't make cheesecakes often so a picture or two is order to document the event.
Although good plain, the addition of fresh whipped cream, a homemade chocolate sauce and some M & M's increased the yum factor of the cheesecake (for me anyway!!).
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