Letter From IRS

Today we had our monthly board meeting, and Arno came in with a sad look on his face & a sad tone in his voice. Earlier this week we had received a letter from the IRS. He starts reading it to us...

We got the 501(c)3 status! We are now officially a nonprofit organization! Now we can start going after lots of grants! YAY!!!

Can you tell I'm happy about this? This is a major milestone. We successfully jumped through the hoops, and now there's more paperwork to fill out. Well, there would have been more paperwork to fill out regardless, but having that official little number 501(c)3 and our code that goes with it, will help a lot.

Oh, yeah, the code - there were several strings of numbers, & we aren't sure which is the relevant one, but we'll figure it out, & we can give it to people and organizations who give us money. But most importantly, there are now organizations willing to consider giving us money which wouldn't even talk to us before.

*Happy Dance*, or as my husband said, "Party time!"

Giant Star Party

The Giant Star Party at the American West Heritage Center last week was a big success. Over 100 people came to the StarLab presentations, and a lot more were there for the various other activities. In my presentations, I pointed out where Neptune was (among other things) and suggested that the audience go ask the people with telescopes to find Neptune for them. I don't actually know if any of them did. The Glow-in-the-Dark tea party had leftovers, so I took some fruit and miniature muffins home. The muffins had little stylized icing meteors on them, which looked cool, and they were very yummy. A number of people took the flyers I had available, telling a little about the plans I have for Cache StarHouse, and the problems the Jr Engineering program is facing with budget cuts. Hopefully, someone will know someone who has access to some funding and can help us out.

Some of the schools here in Cache Valley are starting this week. If I knew the equipment was still going to be around, I would already be calling principals to schedule the planetarium. Hopefully, some funding will come through before the end of this month.