August 2011

Is it fair to schedule an Au Pair for Late Night baby feedings?

by cv harquail August 31, 2011
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The help we need is the help we need. Depending on your situation as a host parent, you might need driving, or cooking help, or child-minding on weekends, or flexibility when a child is sick. We each ask our au pairs to help us with different childcare tasks. As long as the tasks are within […]

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Hurricanes? Emergencies?

by cv harquail August 26, 2011

Our Swedish au pair got off Skype with a friend back home in Stockholm last evening as we made dinner, looking rather gray and scared. She asked us to tell her which laws that had been changed now because of Hurricane Irene, and were we allowed to be walking around after dark.

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Host Parent Wish: That Rematch would fix things, not send problems to another family

by cv harquail August 25, 2011
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If host families could change the au pair ‘system’, there are many things we would improve. Chief among these would be how au pairing is advertised, how au pairs are recruited and interviewed, how au pairs fulfill education requirements, and most of all, how au pair rematches are handled. Rematch and transition processes are the […]

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Best Practices: Scheduling an Au Pair with a Stay-At-Home Mom

by cv harquail August 21, 2011
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We don’t really have a good term to describe moms who work in the home taking care of their home & family 24/7. Personally, I’m not a fan of the label “stay at home” mom, because it sounds like a command (Stay at home, mom!). And while work-at-home mom is descriptive– she’s a mom, working […]

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Tip for the Work-At-Home Parent with an Au Pair: Have Rules for Interruption

by cv harquail August 21, 2011

One of the hardest parts of  being a work-at-home parent is managing the interruptions. Not that we don’t love our kids, or want to see them and help them when they need us. But we need to be able to step into the “work mode” and stay there in order to get quality work done. […]

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Tip: Know When to Blame the System (part 1)

by cv harquail August 17, 2011
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Tonight I couldn’t sleep (feeling anxious about not posting on APM!) and so I tried to sneak downstairs so I could read the September issue of Vogue until I felt sleepy. Alas, no matter how softly I pressed my toes to the stairs, they groaned. They squeaked. They made so much noise that I could […]

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Struggling to Communicate With Host Dad

by cv harquail August 5, 2011

Every host parent has his or her own approach to interacting with their au pair. Our personalities affect some of this, but even more important is who has taken which role in the host parents – au pair relationship. When adults team up to become parents, homemakers and breadwinners, they divvy up these roles so […]

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