It's been a while since I have mentioned Ebates on the blog, but my last two checks definitely reminded me that it is time to post about it again!

My last check from Ebates was $96.31, and the one before that was $103, so I have made more than $200 from Ebates on just my last two checks. Now, this might not sound like a lot of money to some folks, but when you are vegan on a budget or just a cheap vegan, every bit helps.

Plus, all I had to do to get this cash back was click the Ebates button in my toolbar before placing an order on various shopping sites. So, I was just going about my day buying vegan food or booking hotel rooms or ordering my supplements, and I got cash back for just clicking one extra button. It really is that easy -- and so worth it!

This is from the Make Money page and better explains how easy it is to make money with Ebates while making the online purchases you would be making anyways:

What it is: Ebates is an easy way to earn cash back for purchases you make online. By shopping online through Ebates, you can enjoy special discounts using coupon codes provided on the site, while also earning cold, hard cash every time you make a purchase at a participating online retailer. There is no membership fee and no mail-in rebate forms or other hoops to jump through --– you just shop online through Ebates and earn cash back.

How to Earn: Shop online at more than 1,500 retailers and earn cash back for every purchase. For example, at the time of this writing, Sephora shoppers receive 8% cash back, Target shoppers get 6% cash back, Best Buy customers receive 1% to 3.6% cash back and Drugstore.com shoppers get 6% cash back. You simply login to the Ebates website before you do the online shopping you would be doing anyways. You can even add your favorite stores to your profile to make it faster and more convenient to find the stores you regularly shop at online.

Rewards: Money! You can choose to either receive a check in the mail or a deposit in your PayPal account for whatever you have earned during each three-month earning period. You can also opt to have the money you earn donated to a charity or sent to a family member. The minimum payout per quarter is $5.01, so if you have earned less than that, they will just roll that over into the next earning period.

My Experience: This cash back program couldn’t be simpler. You sign up with just your email address, so it’s easy to get started and see if you like the program. I don’t do anything special; I just shop online like I normally would at retailers I would normally visit. You can track your earnings as you go along, which is nice. Then, every three months, you get paid whatever cash back you have earned (if there is $5.01 or more in your Ebates account at that time). I use this program, so I can verify that it is a legitimate way to earn cash back when shopping online. It’s also great to get to stack deals by using coupon codes and earning cash back on the same purchase.

Getting Started: Head over to the Ebates website to sign up. Once you are there, you will find all the information you need to start earning cash back every time you shop online.

I shop at Vitacost a lot. This is where I order all of my vegan supplements, as well as gluten-free foods, vegan food, and almost all of my vegan, cruelty-free, organic personal care products.

Shopping on Vitacost already saves me quite a bit of money every month, since I have found the prices to always be less than retail prices for vegan and organic goods in local stores. Plus, they have sales and promo codes all the time, which helps me save even more.

Then, on top of the discount prices, promo codes and sales, I also earn cash back from Ebates every time I place an order on Vitacost. It is as easy as clicking the Ebates button in my toolbar before I place my order. Seriously, I click one button, and I get cash back with every order. In fact, Ebates even reminds me to use the available coupons on Vitacost to make sure I am saving as much money as possible.

I use Ebates when I'm shopping elsewhere online as well, but I have found the combination of Vitacost and Ebates to be a particularly good way to save money on vegan, organic and gluten-free products. So, this is one money-saving tip that I use all the time and that I totally recommend!

You can sign up for Ebates here and for Vitacost here.

This post contains affiliate links.

I just sauntered over to Swagbucks to see what I could get with the points I've been racking up lately. I was very pleasantly surprised to see that I had a little more than 4,000 points in my account, which meant I had enough to get $25 -- cash -- sent straight over to my PayPal account -- with enough left over to still pick up a free Amazon gift card or a free Starbucks gift card.

Nice!

So...that reminded me that I have not reminded y'all about this super-easy point earning program lately.

If you are not familiar with Swagbucks, it is a very easy-to-use program where you earn points for doing stuff you are already doing online (searching for stuff, shopping, printing coupons, etc.). You can also earn points for referring your friends so that they can earn cash and prizes too! You then redeem those points for cash in your PayPal account (like I just did) or for gift cards to sites and stores like Amazon, Starbucks, Whole Foods, Home Depot, Fandango and Target.

Or, if you are feeling particularly giving, you can also now make donations to organizations like the Humane Society.

I don't have a lot of time to spend on online programs where you earn cash and prizes, so I am pretty selective when it comes to which ones I actually use on a regular basis. Swagbucks is one of them and has been for years. I love this incredibly easy way to earn cash, gift cards and prizes.

If you aren't signed up for Swagbucks yet, it only takes a minute, and you can start earning points right away -- so head on over to their website now!

If you are interested in other ways to earn cash, prizes and whatnot online, you might also want to check out the Make Money page.

If you plan on doing any online holiday shopping this year, sign up for Ebates to get cash back on your purchases at 1,600 online retailers. And we aren't talking about stores you have never heard of -- you can earn cash back when shopping online at Lowe's, Sephora, Nordstroms, Sears, Kohl's, Amazon and more.

Your email is all you need to sign up for an Ebates account, and you even get a free gift card after you make your first $25 purchase.

Once you sign up, just stop by the Ebates site each time you shop online to find more than 1,000 stores where you can earn cash back on every purchase.

It's super simple and definitely worth it!

What it is: MyPoints is a simple point-earning program that can take up as little - or as much - time as you would like. You can just read emails for five points each, or you can do all of your online shopping through the site to earn points for every dollar you spend. You can also play free games and take surveys to make money in your spare time. Once you have enough points, you can redeem them for cash, travel miles or gift cards.

How to Earn: Read emails, print coupons, shop online, take surveys, play games, book travel, search the Web

Rewards: Cash deposited in PayPal account, Visa prepaid card, travel miles, donate to charities, Facebook credits, gift cards to tons of stores (sent in the mail), including REI.com, Sears, Target, JC Penney, Starbucks, West Elm, Lowe’s, Home Depot, GameStop, iTunes, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, Williams-Sonoma, gas stations, movie ticket sellers

My Experience: At the time of this writing, I have redeemed enough points for about $300 in gift cards and have enough points for another $100 gift card (and would still have some left over). When I first signed up for MyPoints, I completed surveys, did some of my online shopping through the site and read the five-point emails. At this point, I rarely remember to sign in to the site before shopping online and only have time to read the emails (I do not do the surveys and such). So you can see that it is quite easy to earn points with very little effort, since I still have earned more than enough for another $100 gift card (you just won't earn them as quickly if you are as lazy about it as I am).

Getting Started: Follow the link below and sign up for free!

Even if you've only stopped by the CVC blog a couple of times, you probably already know how much I love SwagBucks.

Of all the point-earning programs out there, this is the one that I use most every day, and I earn lots of points just by doing the normal stuff I would do anyways - like printing coupons and searching the Web.

I then trade those points for cash (deposited in my PayPal account) or gift cards to places like Amazon and Starbucks.

Well, if you haven't been convinced by my previous posts about SwagBucks and haven't yet signed up, now is a good time to change that!

Next week, SwagBucks will be celebrating its 5th birthday, and that means chances to get extra Swag Bucks with Swag Codes -- and a chance to win $1,000!

To get in on the celebration, head over to SwagBucks and sign up for your free membership!

I just got 50 SwagBucks for my birthday!

If you've been here before, you know I love me some SwagBucks. And now I love them even more after getting my birthday gift of 50 SwagBucks in my email inbox!

This simple point-earning program is one of my faves and is an easy way to earn cash and prizes with no effort at all. Although there are lots of ways to earn SwagBucks -- like taking polls, printing coupons, completing offers and whatnot -- I simply earn them by using the Swagbucks toolbar to do most of my online searching.

Since I'm a freelance writer, I search the Internet all day while I work, look for deals to share with y'all, shop and check things out. I earn plenty of points to get free Amazon gift cards on a regular basis, which I then use to buy gifts, get office supplies or shop for vegan groceries and supplements on Amazon.

If you aren't into gift cards, you can also trade your points for prizes or for cash deposited in your PayPal account.

There are lots of point-earning programs that are worth checking out, but this one is so easy to use -- and I can get gift cards so quickly -- that this is one of the few that I use on a daily basis.

If you like taking polls or just want to earn points for online searches (like I do), check out SwagBucks and start working towards your first gift card, cash deposit or prize today!

You can read my original posting about earning points at SwagBucks here.

You can also check out other ways to earn points or make extra money on my Make Money page.

I mentioned last week that I just ordered a Kindle Fire and would be writing a post about how I got it absolutely free once it had arrived. Well, it has arrived!

It actually got here a couple of days ago, but I wanted to play with it a bit before writing this so that I could also at least make a short comment on whether or not I think it was a good buy. I mean, free is free – and that is always awesome – but there is no point in making an effort to get something for free, if it doesn’t really work out to be worth the effort.

So, let’s start with that quick comment: Yep, I love it! I’ve already loaded it with e-books, watched a few movies on Netflix, played some games, checked my email, surfed the Web, shopped online and checked my PayPal balance. That is pretty much everything I was hoping to be able to do with it, and it worked like a charm.

Now, let’s get to the good part and why you are really here, since I know you really want to hear how I got my Kindle Fire free.

Okay, remember all those point-earning programs I’ve been chatting about for the last couple of months? Well, Amazon gift cards are just one of the many things you can get when you turn those points in for cash, gift cards or prizes. Since I use multiple point-earning programs, I checked out each one to see which gift cards they offered in common. It turns out that most of them offer Amazon gift cards, which worked out perfectly for me, since I wanted to go for a Kindle Fire.

Kindles are eligible for Amazon’s free Super Saver Shipping, but I opted for a slightly faster shipping method, so I needed to cover the cost of the product, shipping and tax. Since the Kindle Fire is $199.99, this came out to a total of $217.71, which means I needed to earn at least $220 in free Amazon gift cards from my points programs.

Here is the breakdown of how I did it:

I started out with three $25 Amazon gift cards from Chase Bank, which were acquired using their old points program (before they changed things up). Since I had just received these, my goal was to earn enough with other points programs to get free gift cards to cover the other $145 I needed for the Kindle.

MyPoints: Turned in 15,000 points for two $50 Amazon gift cards (It is 7,500 points for one gift card).

SwagBucks: Turned in 4,050 points for nine $5 gift cards (450 points per $5 gift card).

So that’s:

Chase points program: $75.00

MyPoints points program: $100.00

SwagBucks points program: $45.00

Total: $220.00

Now, I imagine you would like to know how exactly I earned these points. It couldn’t have been easier…I just did online searches and printed coupons through SwagBucks, and printed coupons, read emails and took surveys through MyPoints. You can also earn points faster by shopping online and taking advantage of other point-earning opportunities.

I think it’s important to note that, while you can earn points by shopping and doing other things that cost money, I did not do that. You do not have to buy things to earn points quickly through these programs.

I chose to use MyPoints and SwagBucks to earn points, since I already use them every day, but you also could use Viggle, where you earn points for watching TV and can currently get a $25 Amazon gift card for 62,500 points, or whichever other points program works best for you. I have about 89,000 points on Viggle right now, so I’m still deciding which awesome gift card to go for on there. I might go for that Amazon card to get Kindle accessories!

For me, SwagBucks is the fastest way to earn gift cards really easily. Of course, I'm a writer, so I'm always searching for something online, which is why a program like this (where you earn points for searching online) is a perfect choice for me. If you like taking surveys or shopping online, MyPoints might be the one for you. If you like watching TV, you might want to check out Viggle.

Take a look at my Make Money page to find other programs where you can easily and quickly earn cash, gift cards and prizes.

If you are not familiar with SwagBucks, head over to my original post to learn about this point-earning program that allows you to earn cash, gift cards and prizes.

If you do not have a SwagBucks account, but would like to start earning points today (by doing simple things like searching the Internet and taking daily polls), you can sign up by clicking on the "Sign Up" button on the image above, or just click here.

If you already have a SwagBucks account, bookmark this post so that you can come back regularly to check for Swag Codes, which are a great way to earn SwagBucks even faster. To check for Swag Codes, simply click on the "Swag Codes" button on the image above.

And don't forget -- searching and shopping through SwagBucks on Mega SwagBucks Fridays (every Friday for members right now), allows you to earn even more bucks!

To find out about other money-making programs I have personally tested, head over to the Make Money page.

What it is: Surveys on the Go is an iPhone app that allows you to earn money by taking surveys.

How to Earn: Take surveys

Rewards: Cash paid via PayPal (You can request a payout once your account reaches $10.00.)

My Experience: I am new to this app, but I signed up and checked it out before adding it here. Signing up was simple, and I earned $1.25 just for completing the initial surveys that create your profile for future survey selection. Online reviews report that this program does payout, so it looks like this might be a good way to earn some extra cash while watching TV, or waiting for appointments and such.

Getting Started: Visit the Surveys on the Go website, or get the app in the App Store on your phone.

For other ways easy ways to make extra money, visit the Make Money page.

Back in 2008, I wrote an article for Yahoo! about easy ways to save money and increase the balance in your savings account when living paycheck to paycheck. At the time of that writing, I certainly was hoping that we would have seen far more significant economic improvement by now; however, that is largely not the case.

Folks are still losing their homes to foreclosure, people are still struggling to find full-time employment, and way too many people still can't afford things as basic and important as health insurance.

Since I normally blog about ways to save money using coupons, making DIY personal care or cleaning products, buying in bulk and using point programs for gift cards to your favorite stores, I figured this might be a good time to revisit these 15 tips that are not directly tied to grocery shopping or giving up your favorite deep conditioner.

Click the link below to read the full article:

How to Increase Savings when Living Paycheck to Paycheck:  Fifteen Ways to Increase Your Savings Account Balance when You're Broke

What do you do to increase the balance in your savings account while sticking to your budget?

If you've got a money-saving tip to share, consider leaving a comment to help others save!

(You can also tweet this post or like it on Facebook to share these tips with your friends and followers.)