Tag Archives: Au Pair in America San Antonio
Rock Climbing Fun
For our latest cluster meeting, we visited the rock climbing wall at Lifetime Fitness in San Antonio!! Most of us had never climbed before, but everybody did great!! 🙂
Agnes from Austria and Pui (Angela) from Thailand
Hana and Zuzana from Czech Republic
Hana and Agnes made it to the top (and so did several others) 🙂
Angela taking a break. Josefine from Sweden in the process of overcoming her fear of heights!!
Our Czech girls, Hana and Zuzana
Angela from Thailand, Josefine from Sweden, and Agnes from Austria
Travel Reminders
Au Pairs Traveling outside the United States
If you are planning to travel outside of the United States during your program term you must make sure you check with the embassy or consulate of the country being visited to find out if an additional visa is required. It is also important that you check the status of your J1 visa in your passport and the date of expiration. You must have your DS2019 signed by a member of staff in the Stamford office and returned before you depart for your trip. It must be an original signature for validation. The DS2019 should be mailed at least three weeks prior to the departure date for the trip. It should be mailed with the travel validation request form which can be found here: http://www.aupairinamerica.com/pdf/travform.pdf and a return self addressed stamped envelope and a check for $10 if you want it to be returned by 2 day UPS delivery.
NB: Make sure you have received your DS2019 before leaving for vacations such as cruises (where logistically it is very difficult for us to get the DS2019 to you after your departure). We want to make sure that no au pair gets stuck at a port of entry which can be a very stressful and unpleasant experience. Anything you can do to help us avoid this is greatly appreciated. Please note: au pairs should not be outside of the United States for longer than a 3 week period at any one time!!
We have some great travel tips for au pairs here: http://www.aupairinamerica.com/resources/travel_and_flights/travel_tips.asp
For au pairs planning for travel in the summer, please check out our TrekAmerica partnership, it offers wonderful group trips and a 20% discount for au pairs.
http://www.trekamerica.com/aupairinamerica/au-pair-travel-discounts.html
Have a great week everybody!
Tips to Feeling Happy
1. Get Dressed Up! “When you look good, you feel good,” is actually true. If you wake up feeling kind of down for no particular reason, putting on your favorite outfit can help you walk out the door feeling a lot more confident. You will get lots of compliments, too!
2. Stretch and Breathe! Anytime you want to calm your nerves and get a boost of endorphins, all you have to do is take a moment to stretch and breathe deeply for at least 5 minutes. You will feel calmer, centered, and ready to take on the world. It definitely works!
3. Make a Gratitude List! When you start feeling overwhelmed, stressed out, and overcome with the feeling that your life is completely unfair, an easy way to regain perspective is to make a list of everything you’re grateful for now! The list can include basic freedoms, small luxuries, and of course, the people who matter most to you.
4. Call Someone You Love! Chose the most supportive person you can think of. It could be your mom or a close friend. Know in advance who you can turn to in a crisis.
5. Get Some Sun! When sunlight hits your skin, it triggers the production of Vitamin D. Scientific studies have shown that a deficient amount of Vitamin D is directly related to a dip in mood for certain people. Put on some sunscreen and go outside, even on a winter day!
6. Exercise! Take a walk, ride a bike, go to the gym. You’ve probably heard of “runner’s high,” caused by the mood-boosting endorphins (aka “feel good hormones”) your brain naturally releases when you exert yourself.
7. Listen to Your Favorite Song! Have a go-to song that you listen to when you need a quick burst of energy is a great asset to your happy vault. Putting on your favorite song can trigger the brain to release large amounts of dopamine, a chemical that sends “feel good” signals to the rest of the body and plays a role in both motivation and addiction.
8. Do Something for Someone Else! When you give yourself to others you will feel the reward. Studies have reported more people participated in meaningful activities, the happier they were and the more purposeful their lives felt.
Sometimes the best way to BE HAPPY is to SMILE and go for it!
Taxes – Due April 15th!!
Au pairs who earned more than $3,950 in 2014 are responsible to file a federal tax return and pay an income tax.
Au Pair in America is not responsible for the interpretation of the information within this document, or any changes to IRS rules or forms that may occur. Neither Au Pair in America, nor its community counselors, can provide any official tax information, and we recommend that you contact a tax professional if you have any specific questions regarding these matters.
Taxes for income earned in 2014 are due to be filed on or before April 15th of this year.
Will I have to file taxes?
If you earned more than $3,950 in 2014, then yes!
When are the 2014 taxes due?
April 15th, 2015!
How to file taxes?
1. Get a Social Security Number or Tax ID Number:
http://www.aupairinamerica.com/resources/life_in_the_us/procedure_4.asp
http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Au-Pairs
2. Calculate how much you have earned during 2014.
Example: You were here for 31 weeks in 2014 and earned a weekly stipend of $195.75* for those 31 weeks. Your total earnings would be 31 x $195.75 = $6068.25 = $6068. (always round up to the nearest dollar amount) . *This rate will vary based upon when you arrived in 2014 and what program you were participating in when you earned the stipend – au pair, EduCare, extraordinaire. You would then subtract the personal exemption amount for 2014, ($3,950) from your income and would get a total of $2,118. This is your taxable income.
Once you determine your taxable income, you should then check the 2014 instruction booklet http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040nre.pdf (see link above), starting on page 23 to see how much tax you owe based on your taxable income. For the amount above, your tax would be $211.
3. Fill out 1040NR-EZ form
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1040nre.pdf
This is a link to instruction booklet http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040nre.pdf
Below are some helpful tips for filling out the 2014 tax form.
1. Enter the total amount you earned in 2014 on line 3, line 7, line 10 and line 12. This would be your weekly stipend multiplied by the number of weeks you were in the U.S. in 2014 and were paid the weekly stipend.
2. You should not have any itemized deductions, so the amount entered on line 11 would be ‘0’.
3. Enter the 2014 exemption amount of $3,950 on line 13.
4. Subtract the exemption amount ($3,950) from your income reported on line 12 and put on line 14. This is your taxable income.
5. Look up the taxable income amount in the tax tables which are included in the instructions (starting on page 23) to see the amount you will owe in taxes. Put this amount on line 15, line 17 and line 25 of form 1040NR-EZ. This would be the amount that you will pay to the IRS.
6. Don’t forget to sign the form at the bottom. – the form is not valid without your signature!
7. You must fill out the other side of the form (page 2)
8. Put your home country on line A
9. Lines C,D, and F should all say ‘no’
10. For section E put ‘J-1’
11. In section G, you should start with your arrival date in the U.S. (in 2013) and list any dates that you left the country for any trips (either your own vacation or your host family’s vacation). Then add up all the days that you were in the U.S. during 2014 and enter this number in section H.
12. If you filed a tax return in the previous year, answer ‘yes’ on line I and put the form number you filed (probably 1040-NR-EZ 2013)
If you have any questions, you can call the IRS directly at 1-800-829-1040
Filing a tax return and payments: Whether you are filing your taxes from the U.S. or back in
your home country, all tax returns and checks should be mailed to:
Internal Revenue Service
P.O. Box 1303
Charlotte, NC 28201 – 1303
U.S.A.
Can I mail my form and pay online?
YES — via….Debit card (flat rate less than $3) or Credit card (@ 1.87% of total tax amount) http://www.irs.gov/uac/Electronic-Payment-Options-Home-Page (NB: you still have to mail in your forms).
Child Passenger Safety Laws
Child passenger restraint requirements vary based on age, weight and height. Often, this happens in three stages: infants use rear-facing infant seats; toddlers use forward-facing child safety seats; and older children use booster seats.
Many laws require all children to ride in the rear seat whenever possible, and most states permit children over a particular age, height or weight to use an adult safety belt.
Learn More About Occupant Protection
Adult Seat Belt Laws: http://www.ghsa.org/html/stateinfo/laws/seatbelt_laws.html
Occupant Protection: http://www.ghsa.org/html/issues/occprotection/index.html
Best Practices for Children: http://www.ghsa.org/html/publications/opc.html
First offense fines for not complying with a state’s child passenger safety laws vary from $10 to $500. Some states also use driver’s license points as an additional penalty for noncompliance.
* All 50 states, the District of Columbia, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the Virgin Islands require child safety seats for infants and children fitting specific criteria.
* 48 states and the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico require booster seats or other appropriate devices for children who have outgrown their child safety seats but are still too small to use an adult seat belt safely.
* The only states lacking booster seat laws are Florida and South Dakota.
* 5 states (California, Florida, Louisiana, New Jersey and New York) have seat belt requirements for school buses. Texas requires them on buses purchased after September 2010.
Texas:
Child restraint required for children age: <7 and <57″
Adult safety belt: not permissible for children!
Maximum fine 1st offense: $25 minimum
Holiday in the Park
Our December cluster meeting took place at the theme park Six Flags Fiesta Texas, located by The Shops at La Cantera. The au pairs got to experience the magic of Holiday in the Park (the park had been transformed into a winter wonderland with thousands of twinkling lights, thrilling rides, good food, and spectacular shows).
Countries represented: South Africa, Austria, Colombia, France, Czech Republic, and Thailand
Thanksgiving Potluck/Movie Night!
For our Thanksgiving cluster meeting, we ate lots of good food (thank you so much to everybody who participated), shared different holiday traditions and experiences, and watched “Three Wishes for Cinderella” (Tři oříšky pro Popelku), which is a Czech/German fairy-tale film from 1973. The film has become a holiday classic in several European countries and is shown on TV around Christmas time every year in the Czech Republic, Germany, Slovakia, Switzerland, Norway, and sometimes Russia. It was wonderful to catch up with everybody!! 🙂
Countries represented: Czech Republic, Colombia, Costa Rica, and Austria 🙂
Elena from Costa Rica and Hana from Czech Republic received their Education Certificate after fulfilling the educational component of the program (6 credits or approx. 72 classroom hours at an accredited Post-secondary institution).
Thanksgiving!!
Thanksgiving is Thursday, November 27th. So what’s it all about? Thanksgiving can be traced back to 1863 when Lincoln became the first president to proclaim Thanksgiving Day. The holiday has been a fixture of late November ever since. The Pilgrims who sailed to this country aboard the Mayflower were originally members of the English Separatist Church. They had earlier fled their home in England and sailed to Holland (The Netherlands) to escape religious persecution. Seeking a better life, the Separatists negotiated with a London stock company to finance a pilgrimage to America.
The Pilgrims set ground at Plymouth Rock on December 11, 1620. Their first winter was devastating. They lost 46 of the original 102 who sailed on the Mayflower. But the harvest of 1621 was a bountiful one. And the remaining colonists decided to celebrate with a feast – including 91 native Americans who had helped the Pilgrims survive their first year. It is believed that the Pilgrims would not have made it through the year without the help of the native Americans. The feast was more of a traditional English harvest festival and lasted three days.
It was Sarah Josepha Hale, a magazine editor, whose efforts eventually led to what we recognize as Thanksgiving today. Hale wrote many editorials championing her cause in her Boston Ladies’ Magazine, and later, in Godey’s Lady’s Book. Finally, after a 40-year campaign of writing editorials and letters to governors and presidents, Hale’s obsession became a reality when, in 1863, President Lincoln proclaimed the last Thursday in November as a national day of Thanksgiving.
In 1941, Thanksgiving was finally sanctioned by Congress as a legal holiday, as the fourth Thursday in November.
To Learn more about the history and traditions of this holiday go to:
http://www.history.com/topics/thanksgiving/videos#history-of-the-thanksgiving-holiday
Find fun activities to do with the children here:
http://www.pinterest.com/aupairinamerica/fall-halloween-thanksgiving/
PurpleStride San Antonio
The Pancreatic Cancer Action Network is a nationwide network of people dedicated to working together to advance research, support patients and create hope for those affected by pancreatic cancer. Saturday, November 15th, Au Pair in America helped support this very important cause by volunteering in the Kids’ Purple Zone. Au pairs Elena from Costa Rica and Agnes from Austria showed up bright and early and did a great job on the kids’ faces. See below for pictures! 🙂
Elena and Agnes did a wonderful job!! 🙂
If you want to help support the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, click http://www.pancan.org/?utm_source=2014-event-template&utm_medium=purplestride-event&utm_campaign=events-aboutthecause