[getforfree]

Thanks for all your suggestions.
I already accepted the raise, I never thought of refusing it.

The giftcard thing is not a raise, its just an appresiation that one person gets every month (whoever scores the best performance). I won it this time, I might not win it next time, it is just one-time thing. I asked my coworker who won it the last time and she chose it to go to her paycheck, if she had to pay tax on it, she said yes, but she was not planning to buy something with those extra few dollars, she will add it to her cc payment, to pay it off faster. That bonus is just to motivate people to work harder.

I took this job because thats what was available for the night time, and I chose the one where I make more per hour. The more I make per hour, the less hours I would have to work to make the same amount of money. I don't plan to keep this job forever. Maybe untill my kids will go to school, I will get a ft job that pays more. When both kids will be in school, I won't need a babysitter, and me and dh can both have ft jobs. Then we'll deffinately won't qualify for anything. I think when I will get enough experience and will be confident that I can sell anything to anybody for the highest price possible, I might open my own business.

It's easier to be either poor or rich, but not in the middle, and untill you are ready to jump from one to the other, don't get in the middle, where you have to pay for everything yourself, and don't have enough money to pay it.

I don't want to switch fo interest-only payment on the house. Refinancing woul cost money, not out of pocket right away, but will be added to my loan, so it still costs money. Thats same like havin cc debt and paying minimum payment only every month. Plus interest-only plan is usually with flexible rate, and rates are going up now. My mortgage is about $190,000 that I have to pay off, plus pay lots of interest on it.