I just wanted to comment on the FB friends... I know, I know, this is how young people talk today etc. but I do wonder about the social ramnifications of this. I often want to tell our AP to go out and experience life instead of through a screen. It is like that commmercial where the daughter has 500 FB friends and her "poor" parents only have 8 but she is sitting at home while the parents are going to a life concert.

Since AP is more than child care, we tend to get along better with girls that are social and have plans/friends etc. This is their chance to experience the USA but many do the exact same thing they did back home.

It's tough - you can make some of the suggestions that are offered here, but if an au pair doesn't really have the desire or gumption to get out there and make friends, there is not always a lot you can do about it. Our first AP spent all her time in her room and refused to go out, even to the cluster meetings. We went into rematch for childcare-related reasons, but it was all related; the AP wasn't happy, and a lot of that had to do with social life. We tried really hard to make suggestions (go to cluster meetings, call the APs on the list, we offered to host an AP get together and provide pizza and beer, sign up for classes, join a sports team, etc.) - AP just wouldn't do it.

Our second AP was very social, had a large group of AP friends, made other friends through sports teams and classes, and had an amazing year socially (and was also a fabulous AP). She made her friends very quickly (i.e. right away) - other APs she had met at training, at her first cluster meeting, and through Facebook groups. We didn't have to suggest any of it.

Our current AP is not very social; she doesn't want to hang out with other APs, didn't like anyone she met at her class, and her social life consists entirely of dating people she meets on online dating sites. So when she is in a steady relationship (dating the same person for a few weeks at a time is how I am defining that), she goes out all the time. When they break up, she's back to staying in her room all the time. But we can't do anything about it; she does not care for our suggestions, and since she eschews the AP community, she has avoided her greatest source of possible companions. Luckily, she is a great AP with our kids, and so we just have to acknowledge that she is her own person and can take care of her own happiness. We think she'd have a better year if she made great friends to have adventures with, but after all it is up to her.

We have a week or two of overlap between aupairs, and our aurpair that is leaving always shows the ropes around the neighborhood and going out with friends so that new aupair can have the same friends. It's worked well for us.

We have had APs who arrived with friends (from AP school or from home or FB "friends" who are local APs), and we have had APs who took a while. In our experience, you're right that those with good friends tend to be happier, but this doesn't have to mean many friends/social contacts. 2-3 good friends may be enough for someone's comfort.

Current AP needed a real push to go meet people. I asked LCC to ask the more social APs of the cluster to please call AP, and they did, and this helped. I stressed to AP how long and dark these winter days are so she needed to meet people right away, to get through them (we have noticed that APs tend to socialize in each others' homes when it's very cold), and she did respond to some of the calls and emails. Current AP now has maybe 5-6 good friends she can call for coffees and go away with on weekends. Last year's AP had only 2-3 close friends, but she was very active with them, and this was enough for her.

One word of caution for the AP who finds one best friend and that is it: It can be a problem if that AP friend goes home. This happened to us a few years ago - AP had one friend from her country, adn that was all she made. When that friend decided to go home, our AP decided to leave with her even though she had been doing a good job and was happy with us (still sends notes and letters, etc). She felt it was just too hard to start over making friends after haing been here 7 months.

We made some extra effort getting playdates together with friends kids who have au pairs at first. Our LLC also helped. It takes a couple weeks usually, but they only need one or two good friends to have a good year ahead of them.

If you haven't done so already, encourage her to attend any & all AP events. I put them on our family calendar marked with "AP gets car."

Also, our AP actually spent a lot of time in her room skyping and online . . . with other local APs. Why they didn't just meet up in person for coffee I'll never know but she was getting more peer contact than I realized at first.

Sign her up for classes where she can meet new people, have her call some Au Pairs from your neighboorhood, I guess she has a list from the agency.

Our au pair has been here a month and has only once gone out with her "buddy" that was assigned to her by the LCC. Otherwise, she's been either hanging out with us or in her room Skyping or watching movies. She's lovely and I don't mind her being with us at all, but I know she'll be happier if she has friends and gets out. Can anyone give me an idea of how long it took for your au pair to get a group of friends going? Should I worry about this or just see how it goes?