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Au Pair in America Host Families
APEX Host Families

For qualified childcarers.... meet our great APEX families

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Family 1

 

Dear Au Pair

 

Welcome to America and to our home.  We are thrilled that you are considering a year in our family.  We want you to feel comfortable and happy during your stay so we though a few details might help you with American life.

 

We have two children, aged 7 and 5.  They are adventurous, active and curious kids.  They love playing outside on the swings, climbing the jungle gym, riding their bikes, building forts, running races, playing soccer etc.  Inside they like cooking, dancing, doing puzzles, art projects, playing with legos, playing ‘make believe’.  The basic rule of thumb is they’ll try anything once.  On the quiet side they enjoy reading books, drawing and building with blocks.

 

Our son is an active boy.  He is on the go most of the day, asks lots of questions and wants to be included in everything.  He is curious and has an active imagination as well as being sympathetic with other people.  Something you can count on is that he likes to help whenever and wherever he can.  Our daughter is also curious but in a less demanding way.  She loves playing dress up and could spend hours drawing, painting or listening to music.  She can be extremely silly.  She enjoys projects such as cooking or journal writing. 

 

My husband and I enjoy sports like running, hiking, biking, sailing, kayaking, skiing, swimming and we try to do these things as much as we can.  When we take a vacation we like to take it somewhere we can do one or more of these activities.  Our apartment in Boston has 3 bedrooms and is right downtown.  From our apartment it is a 5-minute walk to the subway and buses.  We spend our time between here and Connecticut.  Our house there is in a small village about 1 hour from New York City and right on the water.  The ‘big’ kids are in school 5 days a week from 7:30am until 4pm.  There are also some after school activities 1 to 2 times a week.  In addition to doing drop off and pick up you will need to help get them ready some mornings and organize dinner and bedtime between 4 and 8pm. 

As our au pair you will have your own room and bathroom in the apartment and the house in Connecticut.  You will have a TV and access to the Internet to stay in touch with your family and friends.  Our experience with au pairs has been excellent.  We are honoured to host another au pair in our home and look forward to the exchange of ideas and customs that an au pair situation affords.  We believe it is fundamental to the education of our children that they understand and appreciate people of all cultures.

 

 

Family 2

 

Hi There!

 

Let us introduce our family to you. Our eldest is 11 months old, loves music, picture books and exploring everything in her environment.  She is crawling, pulling to stand and cruising.  She babbles and delights us with her sounds and smiles.  We can’t take her out without people stopping us to admire her beautiful face and long hair!

 

Our 7-year-old middle daughter is a sweetheart and loves to play with her toy horse and cars, enjoys puzzles and drawing.  She has a great sense of humor and smile that can light up a room.  She is smart, creative, determined and always sympathetic to others.  Our oldest daughter is 9 years old.  She is creative, studious, loves music and art, and loves to read.  A school bus picks her up at around 7:30am and drops her off around 4pm.  Her after school activities include dance and piano lessons.

 

We are both very hands-on parents with our kids and our home.  Both of us prepare meals, do the dishes, give the kids baths, change the baby’s diapers; drive the kids to their activities etc.  We feel it’s very important for children to have two parents who are ‘present’ and involved in their daily lives.  We eat dinner together most nights of the week and make a big deal out of celebrating big and little holidays.  We take a lot of photos and like to appreciate the moment as well as plan for the future.  We are an active family and believe in exercising our minds and our bodies and we try to limit television and computer time.  Our girls are involved in sports, arts, dance and music.  We do take a few family trips each year, the longest being a one to two week trip during the summer.  We would hope our au pair comes with us on this trip as it’s a very special and unique place.

 

We’re very fortunate to live in a spacious new home and in a beautiful and friendly neighborhood.  Our au pair will live in a lovely private bedroom and bathroom on the lower level of the house.  We live just a few minutes from the beach and are about 10 minutes from the train station. 

 

Through Au Pair in America we hope to locate a warm and caring au pair with an upbeat and positive attitude, maturity, good judgement and a willingness to help out.  The cross-cultural exchange and education is an integral benefit in our minds.  We feel it will be a very positive experience for our children to get to know someone from another country and culture.

 

We look forward to embarking on this adventure with you!

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Family 3

 

Our family is a warm and loving family of four.  We are looking to add a fifth member by having an au pair join us for a year.  We have two adorable girls.  Our oldest has a sunny disposition and is always smiling.  Our youngest is a happy child with a wonderful imagination.  We have been married for 15 years and are both very easy going and friendly people.  We work about 17 miles from our home.

 

The Washington D.C area is a dynamic and exciting place to be and there is always a lot to see and do.  Since DC is the nation’s capitol, there are always lots of special events going on.  There are a number of museums, theaters and monuments to explore.  We look forward to helping our au pair explore the area.  We are looking for someone who loves children and who will bring her creativity and sense of fun in caring for them with her to the United States.  We believe good communication is key and think that it is absolutely essential to the au pair/host family relationship.

 

We have had four au pairs.  Our current au pair is ending her time with our family in May.  She has been with us for 1 year.  It’s been a fun and interesting experience for all of us and while we will miss her, we are looking forward to having a new au pair join us.  We are looking for care for the girls primarily Monday to Thursday.  We generally leave for work at 7:30am and return at 6:00pm.  We would like you to watch the girls two Saturday nights a month to allow a night out for us.

 

We need someone who is comfortable driving the children to and from activities.  We live in a nice large house and you would have your own private bedroom.  Our neighbors are very friendly and we frequently have parties together.  There is a park within walking distance and several others close by.  Our home is a fun place to be.  We celebrate every holiday with decorations and special food, and birthdays are the biggest parties of all!  The girls enjoy a wide variety of activities such as arts and crafts, playing dress-up, dolls, riding bikes, playing at the playground and swimming.  We spend a lot of time together as a family.  It is important to us that we have dinner together every night to share experience from the day.  We like to go to the zoo and other fun places.  We also like to go to movies and out to dinner.

 

Our goal is to provide a nice home environment for someone who wants to care for our girls while experiencing life in America.  We look forward to meeting you!

 

 

Family 4

 

We have been happily married for 2 years.  We have one beautiful daughter who is 10 months and old and another on the way.  Our daughter is such a joy.  She is so full of life and a pure delight to be around.  If I had to pick one work to describe her it would be happy.  She seems to always have a smile on her face.  My husband recently had a change of career and currently works from home.  He does have to travel occasionally on business.  We make every opportunity to spend as much time as we can doing family activities.  Our family is blessed with a strong network of supportive family and friends.

 

An au pair would afford us the opportunity to spend more time developing our children’s individual interests, develop and support our own individual adult interests, handle necessary work and responsibilities outside of the home and to spend more couple time together.  We also welcome the chance to serve as a surrogate family for her while she is in the United States.  An ideal au pair with our family would possess integrity, good childcare experience, sound judgement, patience, a caring nature and an ability to handle both children at once.

 

The au pair’s role would include caring for the children (dressing, bathing, preparing nutritious meals), developing and continuing stimulating activities while at home with the children, maintaining a clean living space for them and contributing to the family cleaning responsibilities.

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Family 5

 

We have three young children.  We love being parents and they are the center of our lives right now.   We try and do as much as possible with them and maintain careers.  We live in a suburb of Chicago.  Trains can reach downtown.  As our au pairs you will have your own car to drive the kids around during the day and for you to use in the evenings.

 

Our goal for this coming year is to continue creating a structured environment for the kids.  They love to read, learn, cut, color and paint.  They need someone that is willing to spend time playing with them and helping them with crafts.  They like going outside (even in the winter).  Their favourite season is winter because of the snow.  All the kids attend some sort of schooling.  Since they are all there from Monday to Friday you will likely have to help to get them up, on school buses and driven to preschool.  Driving skills are important.  My husband works from home, which means he gets the kids up, dressed and fed before they head off to school.  Once he starts his workday he doesn’t usually interact with the au pair or the kids because he’s on the phone with clients or preparing to meet clients.  He also travels occasionally for short trips to meet with clients.

 

My job is very structures and requires almost no travel so once I’m home the au pair is off duty.  I go into work early and return home around 5:30pm.  I try to call the au pair if I’m running behind to let her know when I’ll be home.  As our au pair you’ll hardly work any weekends as we tend to use up your hours Monday to Friday but maybe this year with everyone in school Monday to Friday morning we may get a chance to have our au pair start work later (10:30 or so).

 

We’re pretty clean people and do our best to keep things tidy around the house.  As our au pair we would expect you to clean up your mess and get the kids to clean up their mess.  This would include getting them to make their beds, wiping the counters after you’ve made lunch and sweeping the crumbs off the floor after lunch.  It’s the same expectation we have for ourselves at breakfast and dinner and we would like to the same courtesy of the au pair at lunch.  The kids' intersts are pretty typical - right now both boys are very into cars and anything related to them.  Our daughter likes princess stuff and dressing up in dress-up jewelry.