Any parents here use a full time nanny?

[highland145]

The worst part is women are naturally untrusting in nature combined with horrible self esteem. Toss in a busted up vagina for 6 or more weeks from child birth, a fuckload of hormones going gonzo after birth, and layer that in with a shitty self esteem and the untrusting thing and a simple smile at some young thing is grounds for divorce.

:$

Sums it up except I think they think it's grounds for a Lorena.

 

[Cookie]

I was a nanny one year in university for 3 spoiled kids. They were all a lot older, but had a nanny since birth. The deal included free room and board plus use of their jeep (plus free gas) for personal use as well as dropping off and picking up the girls.

In the beginning they paid me 500/month also, but because I was the last nanny (The youngest was in grade 6 at the time) they decided I didn't have to do as much and they stopped paying me. I didn't care, it was still a sweet deal. I had to spend maybe 30 min each morning dropping them off at school before I went to class, then pick them up and spend an hour or two making sure they did their homework and piano lesson practice.


My cousin and his wife also have a live-in nanny for their 3 young daughters. She’s from the Philippians and has been with them for a long time. I don’t know what he pays, but I know it’s less than what he would have to pay for daycare.

 

[Jeraden]

Here's the site I was looking at:
http://www.sittercity.com/

We have a full-time nanny at home for our now 7 month old son, and found her through that exact site - sittercity.

We had planned on putting ours into daycare, which goes about $800/month here. But he had some serious health complications/surgery soon after he was born, and daycare was not an option any longer. On sittercity, the more experienced nannies around here want at least $10/hour, which equates to like $2000/month (for 9.5 hours a day, which is a standard 8 hour work day for me plus my commute time). That was WAY out of our price range, so we had to look at some less experienced people on that site.
We've been through 3 different nannies now, but finally have one we really like, and are paying her $300/week (so about $1200/month or so). She also does some light housework, like laundry, dishes, vacuuming, etc.

For the most part its working out well. The first 2 nannies had severe reliability issues - like calling in the morning to say they overslept and will be late, making us in turn late for work waiting for them, or calling up the night before to say they can't make it - making us scramble to find someone else to watch him at the last moment. The current one has never been late, which is good. She does need vacation time here and there though, so we do have a backup person we drop him off at, who runs a small 4-child daycare from her home. The only big negative is cases where she'd be sick, or need extended time off - with daycare you are basically covered in those situations, with a nanny you aren't, so you should still find a backup for those times.

Our plan was to have him return to daycare after he was all recovered from his surgery, and technically he could go back now, but this is working out so well it seems worth the extra cost. Nice not having to drive extra out of our way to go to daycare. And the biggest plus, in the 7 months we've had him, he has not once had a cold or any kind of illness (well, aside from his surgery, but that wasn't illness related).

 

[Blackjack200]

The worst part is women are naturally untrusting in nature combined with horrible self esteem. Toss in a busted up vagina for 6 or more weeks from child birth, a fuckload of hormones going gonzo after birth, and layer that in with a shitty self esteem and the untrusting thing and a simple smile at some young thing is grounds for divorce.

:$

I just remember meeting one in a bar in my younger days. 'WTF is an "au pair"'? And she explained it to me. It seemed very weird to me, though it did kind of made sense. But this girl was not unattractive, and I immediatly wondered why the wife to agree to something like that. lol.

 

[manimal]

We absolutely depend on our nanny. We found her in Sittercity as well and has turned out very well. What I would try is to put up an ad. Then the really interested ones respond to you. We said from the getgo that we needed a home manager and not just a nanny. We pay a hair more-425 + SS/Taxes.

She cleans, takes care of our triplets, mows the lawn, goes to the grocery store for us. All in all its great. It is a little hard having someone in your home alot but I work like a crazy person as of late-GD economy-so the help for my wife has been great.

Dont get a nanny, get a home manager~!

 

[richardycc]

we had one for about 3 months, but it was getting expensive and we lost all privacy, so we ended and now just put my daughter in daycare. It was great when the nanny was around, we get to go out and do things like we didn't have the kid before, and she worked like 24hr, she even cooked for us. It was expensive, but if I divided the per day price we were paying by 24, it was nothing.

 

[RKS]

The worst part is women are naturally untrusting in nature combined with horrible self esteem. Toss in a busted up vagina for 6 or more weeks from child birth, a fuckload of hormones going gonzo after birth, and layer that in with a shitty self esteem and the untrusting thing and a simple smile at some young thing is grounds for divorce.

:$

lol,

I can't even begin to fathom the cost (financial and developmental) we have saved by having both set of parents living close by and always willing to watch the kids.

Currently my mom watches them 2 days/week, my MIL has them 2 as well and my wife is home at least 1 day/week. We did put them in pre-school for the social aspect and give the moms a break. Currently the parents even taxi them to various summer camps/swimming/soccer since we are at work.

Good luck with your search. I don't envy you guys in the least.

 

[BlahBlahYouToo]

go for it.
as a bonus, your kids will be fluent in spanish which we all know will be official language of the US by the time they're old enough to vote.

 

[Eug]

And I'm not so sure how cool my wife would be with some 19 year old cute little euro chick wondering around the house on nights and weekends when she's at work

 

[vi edit]

go for it.
as a bonus, your kids will be fluent in spanish which we all know will be official language of the US by the time they're old enough to vote.

Yeh, that's not the case where I live. It's all college grads, prior day care teachers, housewives looking for work, ect. All hablo engles.

I was doing some reading on au pair and it's articles like this that do sort of scare me away from the whole concept:
http://www.squidoo.com/how-to-save-money-on-an-au-pair-program-

It's honest in it's comments, good and bad. But there's just so many little details that add up. And the "agencies" just seem so skeezy to me. They are like the Amway of people trafficing or something.

As far as daycare and the whole sick thing goes...it's good and bad. My daughter was in there from about 12 weeks old and on...That first year was pretty bad. She was constantly dripping something from one or more holes at any given time. And we were always sick. But now over 3 years later she's got one hell of an immune system. Only time she's really even so much as shown a fever is when she was teething. She's got a few ear infections, but that's just a kid thing and happens regardless of who they are around.

I'm a believer in the early exposure..better long term immune system theory rather than coddle young and let them fight things off when they are older. But I don't really see it as important enough of a issue one way or the other to be a deciding factor.

I'm also concerned about socializing...but at least we have a ton of kids in the neighborhood and make sure we get out and play a lot. So there's some perks there if we go the stay at home route.

 

[HomeBrewerDude]

Were you happy with the choice? Did it work out well for you?

Hi vi edit,

Yeah we're seasoned Nanny employers. My wife and I both work normal hours with some travel. We have 3 boys (10, 6, 4).

When the middle kid was born we were more or less at the breakeven point for hiring a nanny instead of in-home or daycare services. With three, the savings were significant.

Pros:
mornings are easier
kids have a dependable regular person to have a relationship with
your values are more directly expressed (e.g., discipline philosophy)
your house and kids toys, your neighborhood

Cons:
scheduling (in case you need to hire 2 people)
covering sick days/holidays
no tax credit if you pay cash and no SS or Medicare
your house is seldom empty
no commuting

Our strategy for finding good help:
1) post at the local universities
2) ask for education majors, nursing students... any field that requires background checks.
3) interview lots, have them meet you and your kids; check references
4) when you find a good nanny, do what you need to keep him / her
5) male nannies sound weird at first, but our boys LOVED having a guy watching them....
6) look for nannies who have avid hobbies
7) make start and end times very firm; you don't want someone showing up late everyday
8) emphasize neatness. You don't want to come home to a wrecked house.


Other thoughts:
1) Consider hiring two college kids and ask them to schedule their classes to be complementary to each other. The incentive for them is to maximize their hours (about 20-30 each) by avoiding the situation where 3 nannies are needed to cover the work week.
2) Encourage your nanny to get the kids out of the house for things like swim lessons, dance, art, playdates, etc... this way you don't have to run around town in the evening and weekends to get those experiences for your child. You can maximize your together time with the family and still rest / relax a bit too.
3) schedule your family vacations early; pay your nanny 1/2 time for when you are gone