Jill Shapiro

August 5-Ice Cream meeting at Bredenbeck’s Bakery & Ice Cream Parlor :
8126 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, 19118

This Weekend Only: Up to $1000 in Savings

Families new to Cultural Care Au Pair who apply from July 15th - July 20th using promotion code PCBR2010 are eligible to save up to $1000* by earning:

A $75 application fee waiver

One month of FREE childcare: the equivalent of a $550 program fee discount

Complimentary overseas connection service during the matching process (a $150 value)

A free Sony Blu-Ray disc player (valued at over $200) upon welcoming an au pair into your home by October 22, 2010

* Terms and conditions apply

Our July au pair of the month award goes to Olena…Congratulations!

Her host mom had high praise for her and wrote:

“Elena, our au pair surely deserves it. This month she accompanied Tessie on the piano (Tessie played violin) in Carnegie Hall! They played together to an audience of 400 plus people, and both did a phenomenal job. Elena has worked her heart out this month, like every month, not only doing all the normal things au pairs do, but she has practiced piano with Tessie over an hour each day, assiduously learned the piano part to all of Tessie’s violin pieces, taken her to countless music lessons and accompanied her on many concerts in addition to the Carnegie Hall appearance. She is a truly extraordinary au pair, and deserves every credit that we can give her! We feel extremely blessed to have her in our home.”

Olena will receive a $10 Starbucks gift card.

Congratulations, Dario, for being the June Au Pair of the month! You will receive a $10 Starbucks gift card.
His host mom had some wonderful things to say about him:

“He has taken wonderful care of 3 boys who adore him. He works hard, has a positive attitude and often goes beyond the call of duty. He recently attended the kids’ end of year performances on his personal time (not work time). He has gotten our 5 year old to eat vegetables. He has helped our 7 year old improve immensely in reading. And, finally, he has numerous baseball catches with the 9 year old upon request. He will be greatly missed.”

July 14- Pastorius park concert series
August 5-Ice Cream meeting at Bredenbeck’s Bakery & Ice Cream Parlor :
8126 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, 19118

Helen Cook, Local Coordinator in the Lehigh Valley, and the Furniss family, who host a male au pair for their 5 boys, recently sat down with WFMZ reporters. Check out the full story and video.

tax-information-finalHere is a useful sheet to answer any questions you may have regarding filing income taxes.

Please refer to this fact sheet for all of your health insurance questions.insurance_fact_sheet

Here is a reccent post on Big Tent from one of New Host Moms in California. She just welcomed her first au pair, a young woman from Norway, to care for 11.5 month old twins.

Kristen commented:

“My au pair just arrived from Norway on Friday night. We have some friends who are very clued in to the au pair scene since they’ve been through several in the last 4 or 5 years. At her suggestion, she directed me to www.greataupair.com. She said I can find an au pair through this website, sort of like the craigslisting of au pairs.

However, after trying without any luck of searching for a suitable match, and then once finding someone who might actually work, my concerns about experience, safety, psychological and criminal backgrounds started haunting me at night. I really feel that, for our first experience of bringing an au pair into our home, going through the agency really helped me figure out numerous things about our needs that I didn’t realize before. In fact, it helped me decipher what my parenting style is, the skill set our future au pair should bring with her, which cultures and personalities would work well with our family, and much much more. Although the fee is quite steep, bringing an au pair into your home is a MAJOR commitment. (The first night she was here, I couldn’t sleep knowing she was sleeping closer to my babies than I was! What if she is a bad seed after all?? What if she harms them?) Fortunately, the agency does actually earn their fee; among other things, they interview the au pair candidate as well as the host family in person, get criminal and medical background, facilitate the visas, and handle the travel from her home country to your airport. Are you prepared to get a criminal history from a foreign country where you are unfamiliar with language and local laws? We weren’t. Our time is more valuable that the hours of frustration that would cause us, and then who even knows if it would be truthful.

We too wanted to reduce our fees, but after some deep thought about the process, we felt that for the first year at least it is worthwhile to go through an agency. Perhaps you can find a 2nd year au pair yourself and then have the agency finalize her for you. Honestly, I must have read 200 or more applications for girls that met my general requirements. Once we went with the agency, I asked them to send me 3 or 4 applications from potential candidates to help me determine what we did want and what we didn’t in our au pair. We were surprised by our list of wants and needs when it came right down to it; much more precise than we originally thought we’d need. The agency then matched us with someone they thought would work, and we disagreed. They then sent us the application of the girl who spent the afternoon caring for my 11.5 month old twins, and we couldn’t be happier. She met our requirements perfectly and we are thrilled! In fact, she just told me how thrilled she is to be with us.

I do not have any association with any of the agencies other than being a recently satisifed customer. We went through Cultural Care.

I completely understand the need to be frugal, but I don’t think child care and adding a member to your household is one of those areas where cutting back gets you ahead of the game. Quality care and bringing a positive influence into your home is worth every penny. Perhaps you can cut coupons instead, make purchases off the classifieds, and cut back in other ways. But good luck!!”

Manayunk Sport & Social Club is now registering for spring sports such as volleyball, basketball, football, softball and soccer. Check out their website at www.manayunksportandsocial.com