Wow, that was the fastest we've ever gotten back our tax refund. We sent it in on the 15th at 2 a.m. and it was deposited into our account yesterday, so 12 days. We got back $1349, but as I stated last night, most of that is going to be eaten up with truck repairs. At least $1000 of it. On the bright side, we won't have to shuffle money around from the EF and then reimburse it since it is now sitting in the checking account.

I still feel cruddy today. I really wish this would stop. It took me until 12:30 to get out of bed today. I don't have the stamina to cook dinner so we are getting take away.

Since MIL is buying fast food for herself and SIL almost every day of the week, she has said we can get one meal out for the family every week for us on her. So this will be that meal. We may not take her up on it every week, but it nice to have that as an option on a week where I feel so icky.

DH got the taxes done and submitted and we will be getting back a little over $1300. I don't know the exact amount since Dh did the final bit. We did do deductions because it meant a slightly higher return, but this will probably be the last year we have such major medical expenses as to put us high enough to do that with the new taxing structure. If DH gets the raise to stay here, we will be upping our 401K percentage to 7% so that our higher tax bracket will not mess things up for next year. I don't want to end up paying ever. I'd rather just a small refund.

I do have my total out of pocket medical expenses for last year and it is $28,248.75. I believe that is more than in 2017. If things go the way they are looking our medical spending should be greatly reduced this year. Our charitable giving (tithing) was only $5800, but we didn't start doing that until about mid-year, when DH got hired on permanently instead of through the temp company.

So DH's work is just waiting on a signature or two to get him that raise if they want to keep him here. If they do get it, it will be a raise in net income of $15,700 a year. It is not as much as up there is offering, but after air fare and having to pay Cobra for two months, the difference would only be $3000 to $4000, because a lot more would be lost to taxes from being in a higher tax bracket. That is an awfully big change in our lives for only $3 to $4K. Without the raise it is worth it. With it? Not so much. The second year it would be $6K extra because it would be without the Cobra.

Current job has better insurance and better 401K matching, which makes the trade off for up there less appealing. I am hoping they come through for him. They need to do it soon though as DH would need to make the decision and let them know up there if he's not coming so they can get someone else in place.

Current job implied they are planning to move him up into a better position when someone retires in December, also. So...there is potential for advancement, which there never was up there. And with that movement would come another raise, it is assumed, since there would be more responsibilities and a change in title.

With the raise it would take us 13 months to pay off the loan and we could still get our gym membership back. Then it would take us 8 months after that to get our 3 months expenses emergency fund. After that I want to take a small break and go on a vacation with my husband, no kids. We would take one month's worth of what we would have been putting into the EF and go on a short cruise, 3 to 4 days, booking last minute for a deal. We can plan our time for when work is at a lull. We don't care to where as long as it is on the west coast out of Seattle. We likely won't even leave the ship. It has been 8 years since we have been on a vacation and we've never been on a cruise.

Then we would start saving towards the 6 months emergency fund and a down payment on a house at the same time, with an uptick in our 401K percentage.

But until there is signed paperwork in his hands, there is no decision to be made and all of the above is simple dreaming. Except the taxes part.

DH's boss told him that if he gets called in during his week of jury duty he can work on the weekend and come in after jury duty if he wants to to get as many hours as he can. If he worked for them directly, instead of through the job recruiter, they actually still pay you for the week.

I told him to call the job recruiter and see if they offer something similar, because that would make things easier. But even if they don't, he can still get some work in, so it won't be a no pay week. We think he should be able to manage 30 hours. 30 hours of pay I can work with. Even 20. Just losing that full check would have been too much.

It's also possible they won't call him in for some of the days. They have you call in each morning to see if you are needed that day. If he only gets called in for 3 days, then he can get a full five days of work in. Best case scenario. Well, best case would actually be if they don't need him at all, but I don't know how likely that is.

DD has a cold. I hope she is better by her surgery on the 9th or we will have to postpone it. She has a pre-op appointment on Tuesday so I guess we will see if she needs to go on antibiotics then. It's not like we can wait until she's well. She's never well.

If it does get postponed that'll put us closer to when we get our tax refund. DH did finish the taxes the other night. I just hope it doesn't get audited or something. We claimed $21,000 in medical expenses and that might be a red flag. I do have all the receipts. We might have even spent more, but that was all I had the receipts for. We also never got the HSA people to issue a corrected form, so I'm just kind of hoping we slide under the radar with that. We should be getting $8000 something back.

Once we get the $8K back, I feel like we'll have some breathing room. DH has been given a new project, so he's still employed for a couple more months. Hopefully by the time June 6th arrives, they will offer him a direct job. They do like him and like his work. There are people that are going to be retiring within the next year or two, but I don't know how soon.

If not, then slope work is picking up again. If he goes back up there it is a lot more money and we could sure use it to get back to a place where I feel financially secure again and I can finish paying Mom back. I think as it is, I am going to give her $1000 out of the tax refund. Unless the surgery costs are just too high. We'll see.

A summons for DH to do jury duty came in the mail today. It is only for a week, but right now we really can't afford to lose a week's income. We are still in recovery from all the unemployment and with the upcoming medical bills we will have for my daughter's surgery and my son's wisdom teeth it is going to be tight enough. If we lose that week of wages we will be struggling really hard. We will try to get him excused based on financial hardship.

I have set up the appointment for the consult and the x-ray for DS's wisdom teeth. The consult is $90 and the x-ray is $96. I also set up for him to get impressions done at the dentist for a mouth guard. He has been grinding his teeth and it is starting to cause some damage and worse, cause pain. The mouth guard will cost around $500. Life without dental is fun, not that dental would pay for much of it anyway. I am not sure how much the wisdom tooth removal will be but I imagine around $1000 to $1500.

DH needs to get our taxes done so we can get our refund and have a little breathing room again. He's been working so much overtime he hasn't had a chance to do it. He's got it half done, he just needs a chunk of time to finish. Hopefully he can get to it this week. This is the first time in years we haven't had our taxes done by early February.

I really need to put my head down and get some writing done. I have kind of been in the wrong head space, but I think I just need to set a goal of 1000 words a day and start churning it out. It doesn't have to be good, but I have to get back into the practice of doing it and then worry about making it good. Writer's block can be such a bear.

We are having an issue with our taxes in regards to our HSA. We maxed it out in the first half of the year and spent it in the first half of the year on medical costs. But then DH got a job with medical insurance after that that did not have an HSA. So now they are saying that we can only claim part of that based on the months we had our own self-payed insurance, not the fact that we used it all during the time we had one.

We can't just put the money back because the government counts that as putting in additional money, not returning it to the fund. We don't have the money, regardless, because we spent it on medical bills. The people at the credit union where we have our HSA have no idea what to do to fix it. They assume there should be some paperwork, but they don't know what is is and have never had this issue come up before.

We really can't afford to go see a tax professional as we are barely keeping our heads above water right now due to medical costs, so I was hoping one of you here that is one could tell us what form we need to fix this and possibly where it is located? DH is looking for info on the IRS Website, but you all know that that is like looking for a needle in a haystack, assuming you even have the right haystack to begin with.

I am probably going to earn around $500 to $600 this year through youtube and adsense which is considered self-employment. If I put all of that money into an IRA will I still have to pay any taxes? I am still trying to figure out how the whole self-employment thing works.

DH did our taxes today and we will be getting back $9043.02. Most of this is due to medical expenses. This will be a welcome boon to our bank account and should cover about 2 months of living expenses. DH only gets unemployment until the middle of March and then it ends. I never imagined he'd be unemployed this long.

The interview he had earlier did not pan out. He was too over-qualified and it was an entry level position. He said he would work it no matter what it was, but that's not what they wanted. It is frustrating.

He put in for some upcoming stuff at Hanford, so maybe something there will pan out. At this point I don't care where we have to move, though I'm not thrilled about some of the possibilities.

It feels like everything is grinding so slowly. I just want to get back to some kind of normal life where we don't have this hanging over us anymore.

After today's transfer we are down to just over $35,000 in savings. Today's transfer will pay for all of February's expenses with a little left over towards March. I try to make only one transfer a month.

I am going to try to belt-tighten some more, but it is getting hard to find places to do so. I don't want to cut out all fresh fruits and vegetables for canned, but I may have to until it is warm enough to grow lettuce and spinach. I'm making bread and rolls now and that is helping a bit. We were spending a lot on that. I always forget how expensive it is in comparison to making it and with the Kitchen-Aid it is not hard at all to make it.

Oh, my goodness that freaking helicopter just flew too close to the house. I don't think that was the Med-Evac as it is still flying around and didn't land. Med-Evac is supposed to fly above a certain height and is supposed to circle around and come in over the freeway, not the neighborhoods. This was so low it shook the house, the windows were rattling, things fell on the floor. I wonder if there is a man-hunt going on? Excuse me while I go double check that the doors are locked.

Oh, it's back... Dang, that helicopter barely cleared the neighbor's ham operator antenna. It's not Medi-Evac, no cross on it. I can't tell if it is a police chopper or a news media one. If it is news media I am going to be peeved. I can't see any markings, but they are shining a spotlight. Man, I hope I don't lose any rabbits. I've had low-flying helicopters freak them out enough that one broke her back and died. I can hear the tom turkey freaking out. *sighs*

So anyway, I'm just not sure what other cuts to make right now. I hate to take away the kids' allowances as they work really hard with the animals. They both know it might be coming, though.

Well, maybe I am just going to have to try to cut the food budget even further. I can manage with only oranges for fresh fruit. We can give up the more expensive spinach and eat more cabbage. I wish healthy food wasn't so expensive. At least I don't have to worry about buying meat, though.

I might have to cut back on my physical therapy, but it is being so effective right now, I would hate to do that. Might finally give up the DVD's on Netflix. I hate to, it's our only entertainment, but if we do, we do. That's the way the ball bounces.

I am so frustrated with DH's work. We still haven't received his W-2 form. Which, you know, means at this point they're breaking the law. I want to get the taxes done so we can get our refund back. I don't know what the hold up is. It's the only thing we are waiting on. They've been a day late in the past, but never this many days late. I hope it's not lost in the mail.

Well, it looks like DH will be able to get 4 extra days this hitch to make up for the 4 days he will miss by staying over for DD's graduation. There is plenty of work for him to do. It all hinges on whether or not they can find a bed for him at work for those 4 days. I really hope so, because to not have to scramble and cut back and take money from other savings categories to cover this would be very nice.

He will know sometime tomorrow. I was not looking forward to depleting the January Money Fund, which was what I would have to do if he can't get the extra time at work.

Househopeful asked what the January Money Fund is about. Every year over the Christmas holidays, DH's work shuts down for a couple of weeks. So he has to go his usual 2 weeks off from a regular 2 on/2 off shift, plus 2 more weeks off. So he ends up with 4 weeks off in a row with no pay. Now we are used to budgeting for the 2 weeks off and we stretch the money to cover the whole 4 week cycle. But when those four weeks off come up (be it in January or December, we never really know until closer to time), that gives us four weeks we have to stretch money over, which is a lot harder.

This year I started saving for that time period quite early. When we were paying off debt and the mortgage I generally didn't start saving for it until September or October, but now I can save all year for it. Usually we can count on DH's Christmas bonus to help some, but last year most of that went to fixing the leaking moon roofs in the van. So I don't want to depend on the Christmas bonus for anything, because who knows what might come up. So hence this fund.

Plus we still don't know what our tax situation is going to be for next year. Since we only lived in the house we sold 1 out of the last 5 years before it sold, we may have to pay some taxes on the sale. Maybe not, but we won't know for sure how much of the remodel and repairs and improvement we can deduct until we get all the tax paperwork.

I am thinking it will probably all be a wash, but if it is not, we won't owe more than we generally get back, which is around $7000 due to our medical costs. It'll be a bummer if we don't get a refund, because I usually use the money to bump up the Emergency Fund and in the past to pay down debt, but now to save for a down payment on our upcoming farm purchase. But we should at least walk away without having to pay out, which is better than having to pay in by a long shot.

I really do think it is criminal of them to tax our house sale this way, though. We lived in that house for many, many years, and it was our only house. The money that is in savings from the sale is intended for our next home and that should be allowed to be kept. It used to be you could keep it if you rolled it over into a new home, but not anymore. And it's not like it was a huge sale or anything. We're not talking about a $300K plus house here. Or even a $150K house.

Well, this turned into a rant. I guess things have just been on my mind a lot lately.

As a quick update on my daughter, she finally, after 10.5 weeks has stopped bleeding. She's still in a lot of pain though. They are testing her for a clotting disorder and a bleeding disorder. We should find out in the next day or three. She is having nosebleeds, unexplained bruising, and severe cramping in her calves as well. She's still anemic. Please continue to pray for her.

I went down to the credit union and made sure there wasn't a hold on the money deposited to my account from the house sale. I transferred enough money from the savings to the checking account and then went onto the website I pay the van loan on and paid it off. Yay! No more consumer debt!

Now all I have to do is wait for the title of the van to come and then I can go down and change our insurance. We won't have to carry as much now that it is owned by us. Of course we still have to carry liability, uninsured motorists, and medical and I wouldn't want to go with out that, but we don't have to carry comprehensive anymore.

If we get into an accident that is our fault and totals our vehicle we have enough in savings that we could go and buy a used car outright or fix most of the damage. But that is highly unlikely given DH hasn't been in an accident since 1995 and I haven't been in one since 1988. We are very cautious drivers. If we get hit it will likely be the other person's fault.

I do still need to pay the guy who remodeled the house, but I am not sure what is going on there. They have declared bankruptcy and it sounds like they want me to hold onto the money until after everything has run its course. I have only gotten this second hand from Mom, though, so tonight I will find out for sure. If that is the case then I will send the money to my online account which earns more interest. I really don't like the idea of holding onto it, as I'd rather have it taken care of.

I have a question about the house sale, maybe MonkeyMama might know. Do we need to do anything to declare it? Does it go on income tax for next year? Is there some sort of form we have to fill out and send in? The title company was kind of vague about it and while I did ask them, all I got out of them is that it has to be reported but not how. We are nowhere near the capital gains threshold.

Our income tax refund came. It actually came on the 25th, but since I have never had a refund come on any day but a Friday before, I didn't bother checking for it until today. So here is the new Emergency Fund Balance.

$12,075.00 Beginning EF Balance
+_2,000.00 From Income Tax Refund
---------------------
$14,075.00 New EF Balance

My goal for the year is to get the EF to $15,000. So now just $925 to go. $15K is both my main goal and my next mini-goal. $15K is the most minimal of expenses to survive for 3 months with no pay. It's not a comfortable 3 months, but between that and unemployment we could survive on it.

The goal after hitting $15K will be $21,000, which would be 3 months of very comfortable living or 4 months of tight living. But I imagine that will take another year and a half to two years of savings to get to. It'd be faster, but we have some college to cash flow.

DH finished and sent off our taxes tonight. We will be getting back $7133. And before anyone goes saying that that is too high and we shouldn't withhold so much money so we can have more money during the year, there is nothing we can do about this. The majority of it is from our medical being reimbursed and most of the rest is from the ridiculous amount of money that was taken out of DH's bonus.

Some of this money is earmarked for college (both DH's and DD's), but I will take and throw $1000 in the Emergency Fund when we get it back. And I would like to be able to pay for my daughter to take driver's training. I also believe there is a program now where a fifteen-year-old can get his permit before 15 1/2 with taking driver's training. DS will be 15 next month. So if we could take them to the same driving school and they could take it together that would be really good. I'd also like to get glasses and eye exams for everyone. But otherwise, yeah, most of it is for college.

DD has decided she wants to go to the technical college. She wants to learn how to do medical billing and coding and maybe some other administration things. Considering that more and more people are going to the doctor because of having forced insurance, it'll be a field with good growth and more importantly it will be a field where she can earn enough money to support herself on. It's also one that doesn't involve many other people and is often work from home even. With her extreme anxiety that would be very good for her.

She may still just take a year off and work before going to college. I am just glad we have a plan now.

It looks like we will get the refund in three to four weeks.

It was good to finally get to payday. This year I am going to start much earlier on saving for the shut down that occurs every December at DH's work. As in, this paycheck. And in April when things cycle around so that we'll have an extra paycheck, I will put a good chunk of it into that fund as well. It was nice to be able to get through that time period without touching the Emergency Fund and I am glad we did not rely on the Christmas Bonus as that went to pay for the car roof repair and Christmas. There was nothing of it left for living expenses.

The paycheck is about $100 less for this pay period than it has been due to the new 401K withdrawal. Not too big of an amount to absorb easily. We'll see how it goes for the whole month before we decide to up it a percent, though.

Payday Report:

$800.00 to Van Loan (including extra)
_400.00 to Mom's utilities
__24.28 Electricity (old house)
__75.65 Internet
__48.60 Phone (old house)
__46.00 Security Monitoring (old house)
__41.94 Garbage (two months)
__13.75 Medical
__29.85 Medical
__66.61 Medical
_100.00 Allowances (two weeks, 2 kids)
_100.00 Cash for Week
_178.00 Emergency Fund
_100.00 Property Tax Fund
_100.00 December Money Fund
_100.00 Propane Fund (old house)
---------------
2224.68

The Propane Fund now sits at $700. The December Money Fund is at $233.55.

$250.00 AMEX
$400.00 to Mom for her utilities
__46.00 Salmon and canning jars
$100.00 Emergency Fund
__29.06 Power Old House
__47.92 Phone Old House
__75.65 Internet
__45.30 Life Insurance DH
__44.66 Life Insurance Me
__74.41 Car Insurance
__48.75 Old House Insurance
__41.66 Security Old House
$186.00 Storage
$100.00 Property Tax Fund
$100.00 Propane Fund
$450.00 December Money Fund
---------------
$1789.41 Total Money Out

I do have a few other things that will be coming out of this paycheck, but they aren't due for a while so I will likely lump them in with next week's payday report unless I get the bills before next Friday. I will be buying the kids winter coats and umbrellas. I will be buying hay. I've got a couple of medical/dental bills to round up, too.

$757.82 Van loan (plus extra)
_283.13 groceries
__50.00 gas
_204.00 for strawberries for the year
_140.52 Sleep doctor
__48.60 Phone (old house)
__88.15 Internet
___9.80 Book of stamps
_120.00 Physical therapy
_100.00 Emergency Fund
_100.00 Propane Fund
_100.00 Property Tax Fund
__19.00 Dues Fund
-------------
2021.02 Total Money Out

I also spent $48.03 on rabbit feed and supplies.

I didn't do my payday report last week so this will just be a combined report for the two paydays.

$1500.00 BoA VISA
_1000.00 Loan to Mom
__400.00 Mom's Utilities
__200.00 Emergency Fund
___19.00 Dues Fund
___60.91 Electric (Old House 2 months)
___48.60 Phone (Old House)
__160.80 Internet (2 months)
___68.56 Garbage
__757.82 Van Loan (plus extra to principal)
__100.00 Property Tax Fund
__239.32 Propane
__100.00 College Fund
__100.00 Vacation Fund
__100.00 Christmas Fund
__100.00 Moving Fund
__100.00 Appliance Fund
__500.00 Building Supplies
___90.00 Allowances (2 weeks)
--------------
$5546.01

I did some bulk grocery shopping in the last two weeks, spenging $526.31. We've spent $100 on eating out or takeaway. I spent $204 on prescription medications and $45.21 on OTC allergy meds. I also paid a medical bill, a physical therapy session and dental bill for a total of $341.47. And that should get me up to date for the month.

$500.00 Property Tax Fund
__38.00 HoA Dues Fund
_300.00 Vacation Fund
_300.00 Appliance Fund (New Fund, not counting freezer)
2267.00 January 2015 Money Fund
1130.00 College Fund
_300.00 Aquaponics Fund
__72.00 Water/Sewer Holding Fund
_100.00 Laptop Holding Fund
_300.00 Christmas Fund
----------
4007.00 Total in Temporary Funds

$323.41 AMEX
_500.00 Mortgage
_100.00 Emergency Fund
__19.00 HoA Dues Fund
__75.65 Internet
__72.00 Water/Sewer Holding Tank
_225.00 Monthly Chiropractic Plan
_100.00 Property Tax Fund
_113.22 Propane Fund
_100.00 Laptop Holding Tank
_100.00 College Fund
_100.00 Vacation Fund
_100.00 Christmas Fund
_100.00 Appliance Fund
_100.00 Moving Fund
_100.00 Aquaponics Fund
_100.00 January Money Fund
_334.60 Dentist
_104.02 Medical
_168.00 Storage
__45.30 Life Insurance DH
__41.88 Life Insurance Me
__69.89 Car Insurance
__47.17 House Insurance
__41.16 Security System (Old House)
----------
$2356.89 Total Money Out

I will be having a car payment coming out of this paycheck, but it isn't due until the 19th so the money is being set aside. I will list it when I pay it.

I was actually surprised at how quickly the tax refund came. We were way behind on getting it sent off this year, but it came 8 days after we sent it in. Total this year was $6236.41. It would have been $60 higher if we hadn't done it online. But it cost $30 to do it online and we chose to pay for it from our bank account instead of with a credit card, not realizing until it was too late that it cost an additional $30 to do that, which is a major rip off in my opinion, but DH didn't read the fine print until too late. Oh, well, what is done is done.

I sent $1236.41 to the Emergency Fund.

$8531.50 Beginning EF Balance
+1236.41 Amount Added
-----------
$9767.91 New EF Balance

I also sent $1000 to the January Money Fund.

$1000.00 Amount Added
+_167.00 Beginning JM Fund Balance
------------
$1167.00 New JM Fund Balance

I added $1000 to the Appliance Fund.

$1000.00 Amount Added
+_200.00 Beginning Appliance Fund Balance
-----------
$1200.00 New Appliance Fund Balance

I set aside $1500 to pay for DH's sleep study and the remaining $1500 will go to pay for materials to build our green house and duck house.

We did not qualify for the child tax credits this year, DH worked too much overtime and it bumped us up, and our daughter is 17 this year anyway, but we were able to deduct the full amount for our HSA since we maxed it again this year. Without that our refund would have been much lower.

I think I am going to try to get the Emergency Fund to $10,000 by the end of the month. I think I can do it. I got our safe driver's refund check to cash, our AMEX check to cash, a $16 check for rabbitry sales to cash, $100 to come out of this coming week's paycheck and two more $10 auto deposits. I basically need to come up with about $30 to hit it and there are already 7 ones in the coin jar. I can do that.

Once the EF is at $10,000, then I am going to change my focus a bit. I will still deposit $100 a month to the EF, but the $10 weekly deposits, the refunds that come in, the rabbitry money, and the coin jar money are going to be used to build up the moving fund account. Right now there is only $600 in that account and $300 of that is going to have to go to the HoA for their extremely ridiculous new rule of paying the HoA $300 to transfer ownership of a property in the development to a new owner.

Even though we plan on renting a U-Haul to move, I know we'll need it out for a week so we don't have to rush things. I also need to pay for a piano mover to move the piano. And I'm pretty sure we'll need to pay for a few meals out while the kitchen is in transition. So I'd like to get that fund up quite a bit higher than it is. Maybe $1500 or so.

As soon as DH gets home we are buying our chest freezer with the Appliance Fund Money. I am going to get the biggest one they have at 24.6 cubic feet. That way we will have plenty of space for rabbit meat, a steer, half a hog, and a couple of lambs. Then the small chest freezer we currently have will be for chicken, turkey, and duck meat and the freezer under the fridge can go strictly for frozen fruits and whatever vegetables are not canned.

$8235.09 Beginning EF Balance
+_100.00 Amount Added
----------
$8335.09 Ending EF Balance

Funds Update

$400.00 Property Tax Fund
__19.00 Dues Fund
$200.00 Propane Fund
$100.00 Vacation Fund
$100.00 Appliance Fund
$167.00 January Money Fund 2015
$500.00 Moving Fund
$930.00 College Fund
$100.00 Aquaponics Fund
$100.00 Christmas Fund
-------------
2616.00 Total Money in Funds (Excluding EF)

$1000.00 to Mom
__144.00 Water/sewer Old House (2 months)
__600.00 Mortgage Old House
__100.00 Property Tax Fund
__100.00 Emergency Fund
___19.00 Dues Fund (HoA Old House)
___90.00 Physical Therapy
+_100.00 Cash for Week
-------------
$2153.00 Total Money Out

I've also got to pay the kids' allowances for the last two weeks and buy groceries. I don't need to get that much. Milk, potatoes, lettuce, kale, chard, parsley, salmon, cod or snapper depending on what is in, deli meat, turnips, maybe a winter squash, and cabbage. I think I want some pears, too, but it will depend on how they look. I still have some apples and oranges, a couple of bananas, and a very unusual for me out of season imported watermelon, so not doing bad on the fruit front.

I need to pick up some black oil sunflower seeds for sprouting with the barley fodder, for the rabbits and some new chew blocks to hang from their chew toys. I am glad they are refillable. I also need to pick up some locking hardware for the 2 outdoor rabbit hutches that never had it put on and two feed cups. I have plenty of extra water bottles. We will be using the outdoor hutches when we bring the new rabbits home. They will be in quarantine for 4 weeks before I put them in with the other rabbits to make sure they have no illnesses.

I am going to risk breeding Piper with the red buck after he settles in simply because I don't want to wait a month. I want our first batch of spring bunnies by the end of March/beginning of April. I will breed them outside in one of the rabbit tractors (movable pens) to minimize exposure.

Piper is our best doe so she'll be the odd one out. The others I will pair up so I am having two does having litters at the same time. When Kalia is old enough to breed she will be paired with Piper. Then when the two red doe kits grow up I will pair one with Piper and one with Kalia, because end game is to have two unrelated litters growing out at the same time so if someone wants breeding stock that is not related I will always have that option for selling.

Okay, that kind of went off on a tangent.

So this morning I figured out that if I pay $680 a month on the mortgage it will be paid off this year. If I pay $2000 out of our income tax refund and pay $690 a month it will be paid off in October. This is assuming I make a payment March 1 as I don't expect to see the tax refund before the end of March.

We could actually pay off the entire mortgage with our tax refund and still have some left over. (Don't judge the big tax refund. We are getting it because of our HSA being maxed out this year.) Except I want to put $2000 into the college/tuition fund as well as pay $2000 on the mortgage. And put a substantial chunk of it into the Aquaponics Fund.

Does anyone know if a portion of high school tuition is deductible like college tuition is? I know we won't be able to deduct it until next year, but it would be good to know now. My daughter will be enrolling in an online high school to finish her senior year and we'll be paying between $690 and $1445 depending on how many credits transfer. I think 17 will transfer but they won't know until they get her transcript.

Also, can you deduct tuition or college expenses for more than one person or is it a set amount per year regardless of how many people in your family are going?

$300.00 Property Tax Fund
$200.00 Propane Fund
$100.00 Vacation Fund
$100.00 Appliance Fund
__95.00 January 2015 Money Fund
$500.00 Moving Fund
2100.00 College Fund
$100.00 Aquaponics Fund
__72.00 Water/Sewer Fund
1000.00 Laptop Fund
$100.00 Christmas Fund
----------------
$4667.00 Total Funds Money