Maximize Your Fun While Maximizing Deductions This Tax Season!

(Staple Remover, Sortingwithstyle.com)

It's hard to believe that the month of January is quickly drawing to a close and before you know it, the tax filing deadline will soon be upon us. For many individuals and small businesses, the mere thought of taxes and the organization effort involved in preparing for meetings with bookkeeping and accounting professionals can be very overwhelming. Especially during this time of year, our individual and small business clients rely upon us to help them organize their paper and electronic records in time for the tax filing season.

For those who plan to go it alone this tax filing season, we'd like to provide some helpful suggestions to take some of the stress and drudgery out of the document organization aspect of the process. After all, the outcome of your tax filing to a large degree depends upon how well-organized you are. Instead of dreading the whole process related to taxes, we suggest that you ease into it by injecting a bit of flair into getting your documents organized. I know...flair and fun are words rarely seen associated with tax season!

One of our favorite resources is Sorting with Style, a really fun site founded by serial entrepreneur, Sayeh Pezeshki. Here you can find so many fun tools for dressing up and enhancing your workspace by bringing out more of your personality through your choice of everyday items and office supplies.

For example, instead of using plain old boring manila folders for organizing your W-2's &1099's try some of these super cute file folders - a set of six folders for $9.95 adds a lot of visual punch:

Keeping all of your receipts categorized and stored in one place is easier with this very stylish file tote-use the interior pockets to separate receipts into broad categories such as home improvement expenses, medical expenses, automobile expenses, tuition expenses, etc. - retail price $21.95:

If you're a few months behind on your credit card and bank statement reconciliation and you happen to notice a charge that you don't immediately recognize, flag it with a notation, research it and come back to it later with these adorable sticky notes - 4 pads with 25 sheets each for $9.95:

These paper clips not only serve a practical purpose, but they can also be an expression of your love for your pooch - a pack of 24 clips for $7.95:

Tax time can be and often is an incredibly stressful experience. Although you may not be able to control every single aspect of the outcome to the degree you would like, it's important to realize that you are in full control of your attitude and outlook in terms of how you prepare for it. By using some of the suggested tools in this post and others like them, you are at least guaranteed to have a bit more fun and hopefully as a result, you will find yourself feeling less stressed.