Taxes are Done!

I have been working on getting all our tax information gathered and entered into Turbo Tax. I finally finished this morning. We had no idea what to expect since this is our first year to file a full year in Alabama. Because we have 7 deductions we do not have any Federal taxes taken out of my husband's check. State will not let you do that so we had to give them money all year knowing they would be sending it back. We are getting back $2722.00 from Federal and $1342.00 from State. Yipee!!! On top of this we will get the rebate check Bush is sending out.

I don't know what exactly we will do with the money. Three kids are going in braces in a month- two full and one in an expander. Our part is $7900.00 and I have $5000.00 that was already set aside to pay that. So, that leaves $2900.00 we can set aside and not worry about any monthly portion to save. We need to replace the fence around the garden area in our back yard. It was built in 1993 with an arbor gate and all. I really like having it because it is a nice garden area. We have been getting a lot of birds lately landing on the top of the arbor. But, the wood is all about to rot and needs to be replaced. We also have our oldest going to college in the fall. She is staying home and has received a full scholorship, but somehow I am sure we will have expenses. One thing that I would really like to do is put something aside so that we could go skiing in the winter. We went in 2000 and now we would not have to carry baby carriers and toddlers. I think it would be much more enjoyable now that everyone can walk.