And so it begins............

Alas, it is January and Tax Season is upon us. When I was a kid, I used to hate January because that was when I didn't have parents anymore. They would dash off to do taxes and we wouldn't see them but for a few moments at night. I swore I would NEVER be a tax accountant when I grew up.

When I was about 23 I was a stay at home mom with 3 kids 3 and under and needed to make money that didn't mean I needed a babysitter. Mom and dad invited Gene and I to come do tax returns through their office. So we did. I didn't want my kids being raised by babysitters, so we traded nights doing taxes. Gene went out on Tuesdays and Thursdays and I did them Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Then we hired a babysitter on Saturday. And we have stuck to this for 31 years of raising kids! Now Chelsea is 17, but we still do it, so one of us is home every night!

I found out I was pretty good at doing taxes! I enjoyed helping people keep from paying so much to the IRS, especially when the laws were there to help them keep from doing that! So it began. For 16 years we worked for them. We got our first computer in 1984 and it was my job to learn to run it! It was a dual floppy, 5 1/2 inch, drive. By 1990 we were up to a 80 MB hard drive and I didn't think we would ever ever fill that! I spent most of my time keying in everyone else's returns that had been entered on data sheets.

In 1999 my mom was forced into retirement by MS and Gene and I bought the business from my parents. We also made the leap to actually doing the returns right on the computer, minus the data sheets. This was such a leap! At first Gene and I shared a laptop ( for about 3 years) and then we bought a new one. Now Gene and I can be found most nights playing away or working on our own individual laptops!

This year marks the 28th year we have been preparing taxes! I can't believe it! I found out that I actually do like doing taxes, although I don't always like the hours doing it! We are kind of like farmers. It is feast or famine. We have to "make Hay" while the sunshines, in other words, when we are in tax season it is long days and sometimes long nights. But the plus side is that when tax season is over, my time is mine to do with what I want, like play in my garden, scrapbook, camp, or whatever! Besides, it helps the winters go faster and since I am not a fan of winter, that is okay with me!

So if you live in Southeastern Idaho and need a good accountant, I can do that!

Chris