Keurig K-Cups Life Hack

We recently picked up the new Keurig 2.0, which was a huge step up from Mr. Coffee.  Love love love the convenience of the machine, but was disappointed to find it was super picky when it came to K-cups.

I knew that this particular model was more advanced and we wouldn't be able to fool it with some of those re-usable k-cup things that look like a tiny coffee filter.  So I was always very careful to make sure we only picked up the k-cups that had the Keurig logo on them, as directed.  Well, unfortunately we came across some that didn't work.  You can see in the picture below that we had 2 types of Green Mountain Coffee, both in Keurig approved k-cups, but the green one is solid green across the top, whereas the brown one has a white-ish/lavender ring around the brown.

We popped the green one in the coffee machine and got this message.

"...try one of the hundreds of packs with the Keurig logo"????  But we did?  So I called the number on the screen and was informed that some k-cups are produced without the white or off-white band around the cover and those do not work with the 2.0 machines.  The customer service rep I reached indicated that you could somehow tell by some marking on the outside of the boxes whether they would work or not, but I can honestly say that I've scoured boxes looking for something that says they are compatible, and haven't seen anything so far on any box I picked up at the grocery store.

Since this was our first issue, the rep nicely sent us replacement coffee for what we had purchased.  But for the future I developed this little hack so that even if I pick up the wrong kind of k-cup in the future, I won't have to make another trip back to the store (with screaming children) to return them.

Note - this only works if you have a used k-cup that had that special perimeter band on it.

For this project I just needed the dud k-cup, a used k-cup with necessary band, glue dots, and a utility knife.

Using a very sharp utility knife, cut around the hard plastic rim of the k-cup.  Don't bother trying to remove just the foil lid as those things are so flimsy that I imagine it would tear pretty quickly.  Instead make you incision just under the lip of the lid.

It gets a little messy when you get the whole lid cut off as some of the coffee will spill out on the counter.

Toss out the used k-cup.  Rinse and dry the chopped off lid.  Next you want to apply one of the glue dots to the backside of the lid.  You can get glue dots at a craft store, or I guess you could use something like double-sided foam tape.  It's really just for sticking the old lid to the top of the green k-cup, otherwise the lid will slide off before you can close the hatch.

Finally, stick the dummy k-cup lid on your non-functioning k-cup and close the hatch to brew your coffee.  Yeah!  No error messages this time.

 

As a side note, I suppose the reasoning for the white perimeter band is so the machine knows how to make whatever hot beverage you are wanting.  So if you were wanting tea, you would need a stick on top that was from another tea k-cup.  This system has served us very well as we primarily use the Keurig for coffee, so a replacement top from another type of coffee seems to brew the green-top coffee with no issues.

Our Chore Chart and Elementary School Commission System

Being done with school for the past 6 months has afforded me the chance to do more pleasure reading and catch up on non-fiction reading that I've been putting off.

Lately I finally read through Dave Ramsey's books, The Total Money Makeover and one of his newer books that he wrote with his daughter, Rachel Cruz - Smart Money, Smart Kids.  I've listened to Dave Ramsey's radio show for quite some time, so the theories weren't new to me, but it was nice to see everything laid out in the book with lots of personal stories to break up the information.

The Smart Money, Smart Kids book was really inspiring too.  I've long watched my two boys often acting as though they deserve to have things handed to them, and I wanted to change that.  It's funny that they could even act entitled to anything, when they've spent so many years of their lives having to hear that "it's not in the budget".  The book gave me lots of great ideas to start incorporating now when they're at the tender young ages of 6 and 8.

The most important idea, for me, in the book was teaching them that money comes from work.  There would be no "allowances", or entitlements.  Instead, we would offer them commission.  We put together a set of chores that could be done each week.  Some on a daily basis and others just 1-2 times per week, and each with a set price tag.  Each day when they completed a chore, they would mark it on the chart and at the end of the week they have to count up what commission they are owed (this is also great for helping them become better at counting money) and then they are paid in cash.

I took a couple pictures of the chart I created and then list of chores we make available, just give others some ideas of how to get started.  I created our chores and put them on magnetic business cards that I had cut in half.  I opted to use just plain paper for the chores themselves because it allowed the magnets to have enough power to stack/stick to each other, thus taking up less space on the fridge.  I made enough magnets for the maximum number of times that each chore could be done each week.

   

If you would like to use the chores I created, you can download the pdf that contains these 4 pages of the chores as seen above.

Then we picked up a dry erase board that measured 14 inches wide x 11 inches tall.  This actually worked out to be a perfect size because there was just enough room for each day to have a space that was exactly as wide as each chore magnet.  There certainly are lots of ways to put a chart together, but I will say after a few months of putting this in place it continues to go amazingly well.

 

We haven't had the most success so far with convincing them to spend, save and give.  My 8 year old does a great job of selecting something he wants to save up for (totally thought he would have been more of a spender than a saver), but then doesn't want to use one cent for anything other than saving up for his goal purchase.  He also doesn't seem to "in to" giving.  We've done a better job of demonstrating giving, by picking up some non-perishable foods to give to a food drive or donating out-grown clothing to the thrift store, but neither of them really want to part with the money they worked hard to earn.  I'm sure with gentle persuasion it will come.

It certainly has stopped a lot of crying and whining fits that used to result when they were denied something that they felt they really needed to have.  We had an instance of this about a month ago.  My 8 year old had seen a pair of shoes someone else got, and desperately wanted a pair.  I told him we had just bought him shoes and that we were not spending more money on shoes for him when he hadn't outgrown his and simply didn't need them.  He threw a momentary tantrum and then he decided he would print out a picture of the shoes he wanted, and would do extra chores to save up for them.  After a month of hard work, and with a generous holiday gift card, he was able to purchase the shoes himself.

There are a few things that money cannot buy, and one of them is the look of pure delight and satisfaction when his dedication has enabled him to purchase something he wants that we were not willing to provide for him.

Now I Remember Why I Hate Trying to Sell a Car

Selling a car can be a pain in the butt.  Not as stressful as buying/selling a house, but it's typically the next most expensive thing we seem to own and selling one is such a headache.

We recently listed our 2012 vehicle for sale.  Nobody seems to read the newspaper anymore so we are sort of forced to list it online as putting a sign on it will reach no-one (we live at the far end of a cul-de-sac).  Back in Maine we had more options aside from just Craigslist, we had the fabulous Uncle Henry's Swap/Sell Guide - best place to find the weirdest things.  So we cleaned her up, took some nice pictures, and then put together the most comprehensive description and put her out there on Craiglist in hopes someone would want to snatch her up immediately.

It's been a while since we listed a car for sale that was worth anything.  So I had pleasantly forgotten about all the scammers from Nigeria that start to roll in when you list a vehicle for more than $20K.  Last time we did this it was a truck.  We were contacted by the usually scammer, suggesting they had a buyer and would send us a cashier's check for more than our asking price.  We were then supposed to cash the check and the extra funds were to be paid to an auto shipper of the buyers choice.  I knew it sounded fishy, so I declined the deal.  A week later an envelope arrived with a huge cashier's check, and nothing else.  Apparently their broken English not only made it difficult to speak the language, but also to understand the word "NO!".  Out of curiosity I took the check to the bank.  I knew it couldn't be legit, but it sure did look real.  My credit union dug around and ultimately called Bank of America (who was supposedly the creator of the check) and discovered that the color of the check (I think it was blue) was wrong for BOA as their cashier's checks are green.  So the gist of the scam is that they send you this check, you cash the check and send on the funds for the shipping (if you're trusting soul) which is around $3000-$5000, and then the check never clears the bank (because it was fake) and you are now out the $3-$5K.

Well now they've advanced their technology.  Now the scammers are still at it with the same old scam, but try to lure you in by saying they can pay you via paypal; as if this is a safer transaction.  There have to be a ton of marine biologists working on off-shore rigs (thus unable to come to pick up the vehicle) and a whole bunch of really generous engineers who are on business trips to Boston and wanting to purchase the vehicle for a relative out of the goodness of their heart.  Unfortunately, for them, I'm not a sucker.

First, nobody calls you up, after seeing your vehicle listed with every detail imaginable, and asks what condition the vehicle is in... and then takes you at your word.  Second, nobody tells you that they have a buyer for your vehicle that is willing to pay exactly your asking price and a few thousand on top of that to have it shipped to them (because this is not a classic car we're talking about, it's a mass produced 2012 Dodge Journey!).  Third, if you select the name "Gary" as your uber American name, you best be able to pronounce it!!!  Fourth, if they want you to make a transaction via paypal this whole thing is fraught with trouble - 1. Someone has to pay the transaction fee, right?  Well don't you think that would be a large amount if the money transferred to another person was over $20,000?  I sure do.  So the fee to wire funds directly to a bank account would be much less expensive and if you suggest this as the only option you'll entertain, you won't hear from them again.  2.  They are wanting you to make the transaction via paypal and asking as though this offers some sort of safe-guarding for this transaction.  IT DOESN'T!  Paypal doesn't protect purchases of vehicles made off of Ebay, and I'm sure if I continued digging deeper I'd find a notation that indicates it doesn't protect vehicle purchases made anywhere.

The most recent phone calls I've received were a recording saying they were interested in my "classic car" listed online.  Classic?  A 2012 Dodge?  What?   Ugh.  This whole ordeal is enough to make you never want to do anything but buy a vehicle and drive it into the ground so you only have to deal with buying from someone and then carting it off to the junkyard in the end.  Clearly these soulless @$$-clowns are making money off people somewhere, otherwise they would have moved onto a new scam, so if you're looking to sell a car, be on the lookout.