I am feeling optimistic today. We are at the start of a payperiod and we have everything set out to be taken car of. My husband's boss finally got all the information together to turn into HR to show that we need to be paid backpay (about $900) and be brought to our correct salary. We plan on using this money to fund the $1k emergency fund. I don't even have to remind my husband of this, he's completely on board. Yeah!

Also, I took the test today to be a census worker and scored 28/28. Yeah! I was told that if there is work in my area, there is a good chance I'll be called with that score. This seems like the perfect set up for a stay-at-home mom with young kids - temporary part time and flexible schedule with good pay. $17.50 an hour! It could be any range of work offered (depending on demand), up to 10 weeks of 20-40 hours, which adds up. At the minimum, if offered a job, I would go to about 40 hours of paid training ($700) and then not get much actual work. Also, if I don't like it or it isn't working as I'd like, I can quit at any time. Fingers crossed that this works out! One of their fliers mention making $3500 in 10 weeks; if that were to work out, that's almost 10% of what we owe on credit cards/overdraft! How awesome that would be! So, yeah, I'm feeling optimistic.

Lastly, I am trying out the once-a-month freezer cooking and will evaluate for myself how that affects my food budget and stress each night at home. So far, with sales and couponing, I don't think I'll spend much more than my budget for the payperiod to hopefully have quite a few meals for the month. I think I'll probably end up ahead. We'll see.

Yeah! My simple calculations using the IRS withholding calculator last October, it was estimated that we should get a $173 refund. I'm not sure what I put in wrong, but I'm ok if we only owe $7. It's not completely done and filed yet, because I have estimated my student loan interest paid on one of my loans. I have not been able to access the 1098-E for it yet. This is such a relief; much better than last year! I think I may still look over the discrepancy and see if I can see why it was so off.

Also, while doing the taxes I noticed a discrepancy between my husband's salary and his paycheck (gross pay). It's funny, because it's the same issue we had right after his pay raise! In October 2008, my husband got a raise, but his check was about $28 less than we should have been getting per paycheck. We finally got a check in December for backpay of $89 and a promise to get it fixed. Well, with the new year(2009), I think I adjusted our tax withholdings or messed with our 401k or something that I never noticed that they never did fix that payroll problem! SO, my husband is going to talk to HR tomorrow about it. (He forgot the paystubs today.) Anyway, I figure they owe us about $775 in back pay! Yeah! That'll go a long way in funding our $1,000 starter EF fund!