Au Pairs?

energyzer

Does anyone have experience with hiring an Au Pair?  I'm expecting twins in June and also have an almost 3 year old.  I'm thinking about the Au Pair route for childcare but would love to hear about anyone's experience - good, bad, indifferent.  If you looked into it but didn't do it, why not? 

Thanks!!

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a friend of mine has one...well, she's on her 2nd now. The first one could only stay a year.  It was VERY Hard on them all (kids, parents) when the first had to leave.  it really tore them apart.

the 2nd has been OK... personally- i could NEVER have this particular girl in my house - she is from a Latin country (i forget which) and i know there they dress more provacative- but this girl wears thongs that stick out of her pants, super tight clothing, etc.  Every guy (including my DH) thinks it's very strange that the woman living in their house dresses like this... and they all make comments about the husband b/c of it.

i could never have another person- let alone a young woman- living in my home... but apparently some people don't mind it.

other than the clothing issues- this Aupair has been really risky with her spare time- meeting men from the internet- traveling to other states to meet them IRL - not knowing anythign about them, ect- making the host family worry about her as they would if it was their own child- yet, it's a 24 y/o woman, so they can't tell her she's not allowed, ya know?

The first girl they had was wonderful- and she is hoping she can get her back .i think it's hit or miss.

ES-6-26

We have a 16 month old and 2 month old twins... and couldn't live without our Au Pair! ?Angela arrived from the Netherlands when the babies were 5 weeks old, and just a week after we both lost our jobs. ?Now, you would think "oh, so you don't need the Au Pair - you can stay home now and watch them" - - NO! ?It's so hard for two adults to watch two babies and a toddler! ?But between the three of us, the kids are all happy and well cared for, and me and my husband have a few uninterrupted hours each day to look for jobs and talk on the phone to prospective employers.

We used Au Pair Care, but there are several government certified agencies out there. ?This program appealed to me because they have a format similar to online dating - you enter your criteria and look at photos/profiles and then contact those that are interesting. ?(Some programs send you the profiles of people and you have to pick one or eliminate them before getting another).

?Angela has excellent English, she is wonderful with both the babies and with Rowan, and she's very friendly. ?She's quite mature for 19 years old (we originally wanted someone older, 23-26, but once we talked to her, we felt comfortable bringing her into our house). ?We also thought we'd want to have her on a differnet floor of our house - DH needs to build a room and bathroom in the basement - but she's in the guest room next to our room and is quiet and so close to the babies room that it's been nice to have her there.

So - she's been here less than a month, but so far, we'd recommend the program to anyone considering it. ?Of course it's luck of the draw, and you get what you find, but if you have good research skills you should be OK. ?We chose Angela because the Netherlands culture is similar to our own (beliefs, liberalness, family lifestyle, foods) - and because she really seemed outgoing when we talked to her... and she was very responsive to our emails. ?Other girls (from Ukraine, Brazil, Czech, and Thailand) weren't as easy to talk to and their cultures didn't "jive" with our family life.

We are already considering hiring someone else next year - Angela is going to move back to the Netherlands and go to school for Child Psychology, so we don't think she'd do much more than a six-month extension.

If you're comfortable having someone live in your house (we didn't think we were but it has been good so far) - and if you have the space for it (it wouldn't work if your house were crowded, too many people underfood) - and if you can make the commitment - I say go for it!

khertzig

I looked in to it briefly, but elected to go with a nanny...primarily because most au pairs are only required to work 40 hours as part of their contract.  So while they are at your house all the time, they are really are only working 40 hours a week.  So at that point, I didn't think it was worth the sacrifices we would have to make to our privacy and family time to have someone live with us, especially if they wouldn't be working more than a nanny.  That said, I do know that some of these au pairs truly become part of the family and pitch in to help around the house - but that is a luck of the draw type thing.  On the plus side, I think the benefit to having an au pair is that they are traditionally much cheaper than a nanny because you are paying their living expenses.