In August 2012, Northern Illinois Couponing Moms was born on Facebook. It was both an exciting as well as a little scary day 🙂 The Facebook page grew and in October 2010 Northern Illinois Couponing Moms went live with a web page! Ok I thought yikes!!! An actual webpage and blog is a whole different ball game! People may actually read what I write! LOL
October 29, 2011 Northern Illinois Couponing Moms got our first publicity with an article in the Rockford Register Star! We got a block on the front page and coverage in the story! (see it here). To be 100% honest I was completely freaked out that Sunday morning! I was up at 4 am waiting for the paper to arrive (yeah it doesnt come until after 6!) My stomach was in knots. I was so nervous! Geezzz I thought! People are probably going to read the webpage now. Then I thought, oh no! What if they read the page and think, “this lady is nuts!” and never come back! I would be humiliated!
Well quite the opposite happened. People read and people stayed! Our site grew and to date we have had over 34000 hits on our web page ( in just over 3 months!)
Northern Illinois Couponing Moms ONLY exists BECAUSE OF ALL OF YOU! You keep coming back, you share our posts, you have talked with each other and you have shared your coupon successes!For that we are grateful!
So begins the growth!
This is our last post ON THIS PAGE! Bittersweet.
We are happy to announce that OUR NEW SITE IS UP AND RUNNING!!!!!!!!!!!! We have outgrown this space. It is time for our seedling to start to become a stronger place for readers to visit!
As with any new project there are still a few things we need to work out. Thanks for your patience 🙂
As we go through the rest of the week and weekend you may see things pop up that are new. We are going to try a few new things with posts as well. All to make the site better!
We are planning another giveaway soon! Bigger than what we have already done! Details later!
So goodbye to this page and we thank you for all you have given! To all of our readers…We thank you for allowing us to grow!
You can follow us now on our new site here! www.northernillinoiscouponing.com
YEA!!!!!!!!!!!
We are VERY VERY close to launching the new site!
I cant wait to show all of you!
Stay tuned for details !
(and dont worry. Posts that are sent to Facebook will link to the new site when we are up and running!)
On Feb 14,2008 at approximately 3 p.m.our Huskie family at Northern Illinois University was changed forever. A young man, Steven Kazmierczak, age 27, of Champaign, opened fire in Cole Hall killing 5 NIU students and injuring many others before he took his own life.
The fallen Huskies were:
Daniel Parmenter, age 20, last of Westchester, Ill.
Catalina Garcia, age 20, last of Cicero, Ill.
Ryanne Mace, age 19, last of Carpentersville, Ill.
Julianna Gehant (pronounced Ghee-hant), age 32, last of Mendota, Ill.
Gayle Dubowski, age 20, last of Carol Stream, Ill.
You can read about our fallen Huskies here
I walked onto campus that day approximately 5 minutes after the shooting. It was chaos. I had no idea what happened. I ran to my department chairs office and got a few details. I went to the classroom to find several students outside of the classroom door shaking with fear. I let them into the room and locked the door. I watched them go through every emotion in the book. I watched them huddle in the back of the room behind a table they overturned. I watched them cry, be angry and yes even be in denial. We had no cell service, the towers were flooded. They couldn’t call home and their parents couldn’t call them. We were able to get onto the internet and they signed into their email and sent emails to their families assuring them they were ok.We watched on line live CNN news feed and realized that CNN and other news stations had helicopters over our campus. Thankful for information but weird and scary just the same. That drove home just how horrible this was. This couldnt possibly happen HERE! Things like this only happen other places. But there was NIU all over the major news stations.
Then I watched our Huskie family start to recover. It took less than a day for makeshift memorials to pop up all over campus. I watched students reach out to each other on Facebook. I watched our family at Virginia Tech reach out to us. Facebook pages were started between VT and NIU. VT students provided support for NIU students.Students started making T shirts, talking about starting a scholarship fund, making red and black ribbons. Students, in their own way start healing. Campuses all over the US reached out to us. When students returned to campus they were greeted with red and black ribbons and signs of support from the DeKalb community. Memorials are now permanent at NIU
As faculty we struggled with returning to classes. What do we say to students? Do we deal with it head on or just ignore it and get back to class? We had meetings to discuss. We met with counselors ourselves to help with the grief and in hopes to better prepare us for returning to classes. Nothing could prepare us. As faculty we did the best we could when classes resumed. I watched as students jumped everytime a door closed hard. I watched them go through campus, not out in the open but from building to building as if hiding. I watched them try so hard to focus on their studies. I held them when they came to my office and cried. I watched the fear return every time a helicopter flew over campus.
Now four years later many who were freshman then are now seniors. We have graduated many. I have watched our Huskie community grow stronger. I have watched Facebook as every year, even if just for one day, Facebook profile pictures change to remember NIU on that day(yep and again this year 🙂 ). I watch as we continue FORWARD TOGETHER FORWARD.
NIU has always been a family. After Feb 14, 2008 we became a stronger family. Many students and faculty continue healing from this unthinkable event. We are healing. We will never be the same but we ARE HUSKIES! WE ARE NIU! Huskie strong!
Praying for peace though out the world. Praying for those students and faculty who still are not healed. Praying for the families of the victims and the shooter who may never recover.
Continuing FORWARD TOGETHER FORWARD!
 WE ARE NIU!
( this is a reset for me . You may or may not be able to print this again)
$2.00 off one Wisk 100 oz or larger
$1.00 off one New Schick Xtreme3 Eco 4 ct
Away from your computer? Here is a round up of what yo may have missed the last two days
Current Target deals for FREE or almost FREE
Target store coupons in the paper today
My coupon craziness for Sunday
Do you know about Recyclebank yet? I printed a $1/2 Bumble Bee tuna coupon!
Printable coupons
Nestle Valentine Friends (Facebook)
Donations!
Candy donation to Rock House Kids
Northern Illinois Couponing Moms 