Being fair

Scheduling your Au Pair to be on duty when you are at home…

by cv harquail April 16, 2009

I got a bit of a chuckle when I saw this topic suggestion on the Skribit form: “Should you make your au pair work on weekends if both parents are at home doing nothing?” The topic suggestion was anonymous, but if I had to guess I’d say it was from an au pair. Why? Because […]

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Advice Wanted: How to manage too much “personal” use of family car

by cv harquail March 25, 2009

I need advice about car usage for our au pair. Our au pair has been with us for a little over 7 weeks now. She is doing a great job and has really blended well with our family. Part of her duties (driving) are to drop-off/pick-up our children from school 3 days a week & […]

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Using Your Car is a Privilege, not an Entitlement: Best practices

by cv harquail March 24, 2009

Second only to food as a ‘terrain of struggle’ is the shared family car. While the luckiest of us host families has an extra clunker or not-so-clunker available for the au pair to use as her own, many more host families have their au pair share the family car. And, some host families do not […]

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Advice Wanted: ‘Former’ Au Pair Has Outstayed Her Welcome. What to do?

by cv harquail March 10, 2009

Speaking of being taken advantage of and being too generous…. check out Cynthia’s situation….And offer her some advice!! Does anyone have experience when AP wants to spend the 13 month with you??? I can’t seem to get her to leave. She always says her plans have change or she is waiting for money, etc. LCC […]

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Advice Wanted: Au Pair changed her vacation… now what?

by cv harquail March 10, 2009

Moms- Big conversation going on today about Mary’s au pair…. Here’s the conversation so far…. Join in! Our au pair has been with us for 8 months. She transitioned from another family and has not been the greatest. She does the bare minimum and has left the children unsupervised. She doesn’t make good decisions and […]

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Sabotage your Au Pair’s Authority: 3 Easy Ways

by cv harquail March 8, 2009

It amazes me sometimes, the stories I hear about host parents’ bad behavior. I heard a story this week about an au pair who told her charge that he had lost the privilege of having ice cream after dinner, because he had refused to put away his toys at the end of a play date […]

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It’s YOUR vacation, not hers. Okay?

by cv harquail February 2, 2009

I had a long listen at a neighborhood party last week…one of my host mom friends had just come back from a family vacation to Disneyworld. Three kids, three adults, two bedrooms, 5 days. And for my friend, not a vacation at all. What went wrong? I’ll tell you what went wrong. My friend forgot […]

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Advice wanted: How to navigate the Au Pair rematch process?

by cv harquail December 12, 2008

Hey moms- We are in rematch and are having our Exit Interview this Saturday. Can anyone please share their experience and tell me what to expect? Our au pair has been with us for almost 4 months and we have struggled with this decision, but it is necessary to make it and move on. She […]

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Can This Relationship Be Saved?: Host Dad’s au pair is causing problems for me, in my house

by cv harquail November 20, 2008

Arguing, au pair advice, low cost childcare

Host moms–your advice is needed on this one– and it’s a pretty unique situation. There are THREE relationships — maybe even four– in this request for advice. Relationship 1: Between the writer and the au pair , Relationship 2: Between the au pair and the Host Dad, and Relationship 3: Between the writer and the […]

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When your Au Pair has a Fender-Bender — Who pays, and what, and how?

by cv harquail September 24, 2008

I have dreaded writing about au pairs and car accidents, because fear of accidents is one of the scariest things about having children, and even scarier when you are entrusting your children to someone else’s driving. Even the best of au pairs can have car accidents. (Heck, even the best of drivers can have accidents!) […]

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