Educating Sweetpea

Sweetpea is 6 and finishing Kindergarten.  She has made great improvements this past year in sounding out letters and attempting to read words.  We are currently reading the Chronicles of Narnia (we have finished The Magician’s Nephew, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, and The Horse and His Boy, and we are currently reading Prince Caspian.)  She gets very excited when she spots words in the book that she can recognize.  Sweetpea was very distraught by the fact that Aslan died, which opened up the conversation of how Edmund deserved to die, and Aslan chose to die in his place.  It was so much fun to see her face light up and hear her exclaim, “Aslan is Jesus!”

This past Fall, Sweetpea participated as a “Small Paws” cheerleader.  She was very enthusiastic, and has great school spirit.  She practiced two afternoons per week, and cheered at five games at the school, a Phoenix Suns game, and the Glendale Hometown parade.  She keeps asking me when she can participate in track and field.  We cannot wait to see what other events and opportunities at the school she will choose to participate in as she grows.

Recently we celebrated Sweetpea’s sixth birthday.  We had a party at our house, inviting her entire class, and additional friends and family.  We had a special guest at the party, and she made sure to introduce the guest to all of her friends individually, including those who showed up later to the party.

She still struggles with comprehending the differences between a county, state and city; however, she is aware that we live in Phoenix and Arizona, Yaya and Grandpa Tony live in California, and Meemaw and Papa live in St. Louis.  She is very excited that Daddy is back living with us at home instead of in California.

ACSTO is an amazing organization that supports kids in Arizona who want a Christian education.  We have selected them as they partner with several local Christian schools, and we have heard many positive things about this organization being of high integrity and supporting all students in the application process.

Arizona has a tax law that allows tax payers to donate their tax liability (with dollar limits) to scholarship organizations for private education.  It is an amazing program that allows you, as a tax payer, to have some control over how you want your tax dollars spent.

If you have already paid your taxes (such as, deducted from your paycheck), you can donate to ACSTO and receive a dollar-for-dollar refund up to the amount of your tax liability.  If you haven’t paid your taxes, you can donate the amount you owe to ACSTO and reduce your liability to nothing!

If you donate by the end of the year, you can itemize the donation on your federal tax return.  Otherwise, you can still donate by April 15th for the previous tax year.

Watch the videos below to learn more, and let me know if you have any questions!

Click Here to Donate Your Tax Credit to ACSTO

(Select Sweetpea’s school, and provide her real name – if you need that info, please contact me!)

Sweetpea has almost finished her first semester of “big kid school.”  This past week was quite busy with a parade last Saturday, Christmas program on Thursday night, and her very first field trip Friday – to sing Christmas carols at a senior center.  She loves her school, teacher, and friends!

Psalm 98:4 (KJV) says: Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all the earth: make a loud noise, rejoice, and sing praise.

Well, if God loves, loud and joyful noise…

And here is her class spreading the joyful noise on their field trip.