<p>This is so beautifully well said! That those "lines evaporate or maybe never existed! Love that!</p>
<p>There have been activities that our kiddo2 has dropped–which I was sorry about because I saw some talent–and I think kiddo2 was feeling the “pressure” of the school organized things because some kids where just better at it than kiddo2…and even though we tried to encourage iddo2 to do it for the pleasure, some things fell by the wayside. Maybe later in life kiddo2 will pick them up again.</p>
<p>Pepper–the good part about apps and college admissions is that your student will be judged based on students in the same school with the same opportunities–which is why the hs profile is so helpful.</p>
<p>Amanda–I hear ya about taxes etc–we havent’ started them -yet did some year end giving and summing up some things in prep for the tax returns. They are cumberson with self employed stuff etc. So hopefully we can get out act together soon so I can do that FAFSA. I have to also call the finaid office of our kiddo1’s chosen school and will do that in the next few weeks. I need to have some stuff in hand before I can for an intellignet question haha</p>
<p>MissyPie–thanks for that post…NOT good news for those of us self employed, itemized deduction types who also need to do FAFSA, huh…
wonder what that means for FAFSA and FinAid??</p>
<p>Oh amanda, it’s good to vent! Life is so weird-it’s bad enough having to file all these forms but then the powers that be (I wonder where all these geniuses went to college ) change or don’t change things at the last minute. Tax season ought to be even MORE FUN than usual this year. If the forms are delayed that is going to delay the FAFSA, wouldn’t it?</p>
<p>My H is tough to get info out of as well-not anything sinister (at least I hope not) but he just has accounts all over the place and I need to pin him down on where is what. I don’t envy anyone having to fill out these stupid forms with a business thrown in on top of it. What a mess.</p>
<p>This girl breaking your son’s heart really makes me sad. Taking a break right before Christmas seems all to common. Remember though you are the adult here even though if it were me I would be just as much on the warpath!</p>
<p>The job-well that stinks. I am sorry you are out of work. It sounds like you had the straw that broke your back given to you today.</p>
<p>Yes, self-employed boat too. FAFSA at least doesn’t go into much detail and I can enter estimates and revise later but 5 out of 7 schools want it done by Feb, one states 2/1 deadline and the others are 2/15. Can you/do you put estimates in Profile as well if you have to meet deadlines?</p>
<p>I keep waiting for some CCer (who is maybe a tax acountant) to post about whether the IRS delays will delay/affect FAFSA but I haven’t seen anything so far. If the site is open and doesn’t have any special messages, then it seems like everything is on schedule.</p>
<p>amandak: Yes! You can put estimates in Profile to meet deadlines. S2 had one school with a 1/1 deadline for the Profile. I did it last week (as closely as I could approximate right now) and filed it. If the real thing turns out to be significantly different, I’ll have to update, I guess. I need to have the FAFSA done for a couple of schools but know that I’ll probably still be working with estimates. The only thing better than doing these gosh-darned forms once is getting to do them twice!</p>
<p>You know, sometimes, it isn’t the straw, it’s the bricks just breaking your back. Must be hormones, but I just want to cry today. OK, there I did. Everytime we do the taxes (which is meaning, when I do the taxes and my husband paces around and gets all grumbly), it seems like we either get swiped by an unknown tax (last yr it was something that NY hits LLCs that commute into the city - Unincorporated Business Tax and a Metropolitan Commuter Tax) or estimates are sadly off so we are stuck with having to piece together last yrs 4Q estimates, this years 1Q estimates and the whammy tax which we weren’t expecting right after Christmas - from the vapors that are the “savings” acct. Then filling out these fin aid forms seems to calculate us in a much more rosy picture as if I could sell my house and live in a shoe. Frankly, I should have never stayed home with the kids for as long as I have, basically seems to negate my diplomas (lesson to my dds). Thanks for letting me vent, I needed that.</p>
<p>Yeah, I’m feeling the financial bricks today, too. Equity parter, firm didn’t make budget. Means that all staff and employees got 100% of what they were supposed to make but the partners didn’t…but yet the IRS will still get a giant chunk. And yes, also a bit of “what was I thinking” on D’s school, finance-wise.</p>
<p>^ A-K I hear ya—
the finaid forms do paint a crazy rosey picture -
I stayed at home to raise our kids- when we considered wht another salary would bring in, and then subtracted the taxes as well as expenses for commuting etc, daycare etc…It wasn’t worth it and I wanted to eb home with our kids.
Sure it meant making concessions and not doing certain things etc and my varied diplomas are undervalued now…I do wonder what the future will bring when the kids are out of the nest and what a fill time job will look for me…in the end I have been glad to be with them- on occassion kiddo2 has commented that they cannot imagine how things would get done had I kept a full time job as well. I am really impressed by families/moms who do both -and do it well. Maybe I need a lesson in organization! ;)</p>
<p>I think DH is feeling those bricks too–its just that time of year–
Maybe time for more soups for dinner?</p>
<p>amandakayak, I’m thinking of a Cake Boss episode where the birthday girl insisted that Buddy the Baker skate out onto the (roller) rink to deliver the cake. So surely there is a spot for someone to deliver custom gingerbread houses on ice skates? But seriously, I hope that the romantic and tax and financial angst gets better soon.</p>
<p>kathiep, I adored “The House of Eliott”. Or was that two l’s and one t? Such a pity that the series was never completed. </p>
<p>D2 goes back to school tomorrow, D1 has another week off.</p>
<p>Was anyone else so completely overwhelmed when they realized just how much time filling out these finaid forms actually took? I really didn’t expect it. And, there are so many! For the first time, I see the DISadvantages of applying to many schools (14!) Three of Ds schools have their own finaid “supplements” or completely different forms. Add to that the FAFSA, Profile and CalGrant (for us California residents).</p>
<p>And, whose bright idea was it to ask for 2010 information by January 15th? Why should we have to estimate our 2010 taxes when they could wait another couple of weeks and get the real data?</p>
<p>H did profile a couple of months ago and is kinds stressed right now with other obligations so I will probably tackle FAFSA. SO not looking forward to it. </p>
<p>Amanda - sometimes a good cry is what we need to release some tension. </p>
<p>Laugh of the day - My company closes between xmas and new years every year. So after a week and a half off I dutifully got up at 4am to get to work by 5:30. Back entrance was closed which didn’t surprise me too much, figured they might be short guards or hadn’t gotten back into the swing of opening it after shutdown. After driving to front entrance and seeing very empty parking lot, not completely empty there is always someone there I checked my watch to make sure I was not early. Nope. I started to here the Twilight Zone theme playing in my head. I work at a manufacturing facility with a large number of union employees and started thinking that maybe there was some kind of work stopage. Go into work and none of the other engineers in my group are in yet, usually there are 9 or 10 in at 5:30. I power up my laptop and get to work writing a memo, checked my calendar for correct date and saw that today was a holiday at my work. They must have needed to give it off to get up to the agreed upon number of days off. arrgghhh I so did not want to wake up at 4am today. oh well, looks like I was the only one out of 4,000 employees who did not know. So I stayed a few hours to finish a report and avoid fighting rush hour traffic going back through the city.</p>
<p>We are currently legal residents of a low tuition state so right now, if we didn’t have any merit aid, that would be low cost. However, dd has already received merit aid at a number of schools that makes her COA less than state school and for anyone who is having that issue, I do know that there are a number of smaller LACs and even some larger ones that have later deadlines and did offer my d merit aid. Now let me say this about d= she had good scores but not like what seems to be usual here on CC- just 30 ACT. She also had a 3.94 uw and 4.11 weighted. SHe had only one AP before this year and did have 2 Dual Enrollment classes which she received A’s. So she wasn’t like many of the wonder kids here. I have been very pleasantly surprised how much merit aid she has received. In the school that has so far announced awards (three haven’t done so yet since they announce later, and two others have notification dates for acceptance in mid March with scholarships announced later), her best award was 80% of tuition. SInce the private school had lower tuition than most already, the leftover tuition is slightly less than state tuition would be. I think the room and board is similar if not lower.</p>
<p>I am so confused with all this that I forgot she even did get another scholarship so we are only waiting for two who award later plus the two who she has applied to and is waiting for both a decision and any merit awards.</p>
<p>The last link talks about a link between the 2009 1040 and the FAFSA form.</p>
<p>Bottom line fill out the FAFSA with estimates, do not leave any lines blank, and when the tax return is filed you can go in an amend the estimated form.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the good info and for bringing me down off that proverbial ledge. I WISH my ds had thought of a nice LAC but alas…we did add two schools known for great/sometimes exceptional merit aid, but haven’t seen anything yet. I really could deliver cakes on ice skates, that sounds fun. My SiL came over New Yrs and told me how the educational system is unsustainable and how it will evolve into a apprenticeship system like Europe (?) and conventional colleges as we know them with dorms and 4-yr programs will disappear. (btw my SiL makes my brain get all fuzzy, she is one of those techno-new-age-organic-dot.com types that make their own clothes and talks in riddles) So, what if this time, she is right on the money - maybe I should just save my money and invest in llamas.</p>
<p>Another fun family conversation, ds wants to know if I smoked pot in college. :)</p>
<p>dignified1: What took a long time for me was accumulating the information necessary to run turbotax so that I could get estimated 1040 numbers for 2010 and tracking down investment balances, etc. I’ve only done the profile, haven’t tackled the FAFSA yet, so that is my next hurdle. The Profile form itself didn’t take me long to fill out, but getting the stuff together was time consuming.</p>
<p>amandak: I, too, have been out of the workforce too long. I had planned to go back to work once I had everyone in school, but am now homeschooling my daughter (who has special needs), so that has been delayed. It seems that now my degree and certification are so old that I might have trouble getting back into my field. We could really use the income, so now I’m wishing I had been able to go back to work sooner.</p>
<p>mamom: I would not have been thinking it was funny at all if I had gotten up at 4AM to find out that it was a day off. You took that much better than I would have!!</p>
<p>If you have the Profile complete, FAFSA is easy. I keep going into Profile and chickening out. Just pressed the FAFSA submit so at least that one is done. Well, the estimates that is! Kind of woke my son up to how critical his merit app for Michigan is.</p>
) change or don’t change things at the last minute. Tax season ought to be even MORE FUN than usual this year. If the forms are delayed that is going to delay the FAFSA, wouldn’t it?</p>