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[quote=Anonymous]OP, I am glad you are so happy and that the new family feels like a better fit for you.  So much of the AP program is about fit.  As a long time HM (on 7 years of hosting), I have learned the truth of the motto "hire for attitude and outlook, train for skill," which I learned on aupairmom.  If I find an AP whose attitude and outlook fit with our expectations, it always turns out to be a great fit, even if the AP has a steeper learning curve on certain things.  So I am glad that things are starting off well for you.

Many experienced HMs offered some good advice to you on how to make this next match a more successful one for you, and I thought, given your experiences and how much you have shared, that I might offer one more piece of advice, in the interest of this all working out in the best way possible.

My advice is that New Englanders are MUCH more private that folks are in other parts of this country and around the world, and I am going to really encourage you to write a little less personal information on websites about your HF than you did about the previous one.  Why? Because the AP world is very small, and given the details you have already shared (Cambridge family, twin 8 yr old girls, just got a new AP), it's not impossible that other information you might end up sharing - such as if you don't end up approving of your HM's parenting, the way you did the previous one - could come back to her and to others you don't want to know.

Because here is the thing: I am sure I am not the only DCUM user who doesn't live in DC anymore.  I actually live in a town right next to Cambridge, and our au pair studies at Harvard Extension School in Cambridge and regularly hangs out with Cambridge APs.  She could well be reading about what you post on DCUM and ask her friends who is the new AP taking care of the 8 yr old twin girls.  I, too, could end up in conversation at the next au pair family function our cluster has with yours and meet a mom with 8 yr old twins (I also might have an 8 year old - our children might end up playing together at a park, you never know), and I could then feel like i need to tell her that her AP - if it turns out she shares that her AP is new and came from a family outside Philly - doesn't approve of her parenting style.  Do you see how this could be a bad thing?

The US may seem like a big huge place and the internet may seem anonymous, but with all of the private stuff you have shared, it just isn't.  So please - take this advice in the spirit it's being offered and  think about keeping things a little more private or at least not posting real details.

Anyway, good luck with the new family - I really hope it works out - and if and when my AP meets you and you end up coming over to our house for her birthday or something, I hope that I can see that you remain as happy in your new family as you are now.[/quote]

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