The day after Tax Day

Yeah, I've been busy this week — so busy that I didn't do my usual "taxes for freelancers" posts as Tax Day approached. See, this year I didn't get my taxes done several months early, like I have the past three years. Michael and I worked on our taxes (since we're filing jointly) Sunday night, and I mailed our Federal return (Colorado offers free online filing for state) on Tax Day.

Once again, we estimated our tax liability pretty closely. We got a little bit of a return from the Federal government, which we put towards our estimated payments. We owed the state a whopping $5, which I found immensely amusing.

I also mailed my first quarterly estimated tax payment for 2009. Ouch! January and February may have been slow, but since March was (and April is looking) more or less back to normal, I didn't reduce my estimated income. So a larger percentage of my income than usual (since I make four equal payments) went to paying estimated taxes for those months , and that hurt a bit.

It's a huge relief to have all of that behind me. There's no way I'll do them so late again — having at the back of my mind for three months weighed on me more than I realized. What about you? How did taxes go for you this year, and are you relieved that it's over?