Anonymous wrote:20:07, yes, I would not hesitate to tell someone who had saved for 50 yrsts that it is ridiculous to take children under age 5 to ANY theme park.

+1

NP here.

I love Disney, we went every year when I was growing up (grandparents lived in Orlando) but PP is right, it is painfully expensive to visit these parks and they are not designed for toddlers. Save/wait until your kids are old enough to take advantage of the rides and old enough to remember the fun they have!

Anonymous wrote:20:07, yes, I would not hesitate to tell someone who had saved for 50 yrsts that it is ridiculous to take children under age 5 to ANY theme park.

You sound like a wonderful person, a wonderfully selfish person.

20:07, yes, I would not hesitate to tell someone who had saved for 50 yrsts that it is ridiculous to take children under age 5 to ANY theme park.

Anonymous wrote:Taking a 2 yr old and an infant to Disney World/land is just simply stupid!

Really? Would you tell that to the grandparents who saved up for a very long time to bring their entire family to Dsmey to celebrate their 50th anniversary. "Sorry, I know this is really important to you and I know I have sufficient full time childcare that I can bring with me, but this is all about me and i think it is really stupid."

Nice to know there are still some judgemental ppl on here. Such a relief.

Yes, we plan to take her on vacation this summer. But we will talk about which hours are work hours. We might like to have a few hours out without the kids, and I think we will also "schedule' her to help with kid wrangling at the beach. But we'll also give her free time so she can explore on her own. She seems excited about it.

Taking a 2 yr old and an infant to Disney World/land is just simply stupid!

Yes, AP goes on vacations too. We pay. She works a date night once or twice and maybe a full afternoon one day. We want her to enjoy herself too and we don't need her to work since we're there too.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes I do.

If she comes and I pay, it is a working week and she can take care of the kids. I would definitely have a planning meeting with her and outline your expectations of her while on vacation so nothing comes as a surprise.

+1 I haven't done it with my AP yet, but my sister brought hers to Disney and had a very hard time. Essentially, the AP wasn't very proactive and my sister had to ask her to do things that were otherwise normal aspects of her job (like running after the 2 year old who just took off while my sister held the baby and the AP just stood there). It was like with my sister around the AP either was afraid to take an independent act or she just assumed my sister would always take the lead with all actions associated with the children. It made the trip very stressful for my sister.

When the parent is there, the kid wants the parent to be the parent. If the au-pair plays mommy, the kid will just be confused.

I understand, but when the two year old has bolted off into a crowded Disney World and the single mom is giving the baby a bottle the Au pair shouldn't stand there and watch the two year old run into a crowd, but actually go after the child without being told to do so. I'm pretty sure the running 2 year old doesn't care which responsible adult should be protecting them from getting lost or any other possible harmful circumstances (holding hands in a parking lot, staying near them at the pool, paying attention and not texting while waiting for others on a ride, ....)

Just warning the OP that she should have a candid conversation about what is expected when she is on as the AP may not feel comfortable acting independently while the parent is present.

Why do you take a family vacation and use the AP. Whats the point of even taking the kids.

Anonymous wrote:i.e, going down to the USVI.

if so, and if it is not a "week off", would it be cool to ask her to watch the kids a few nights out of the week so we could go to dinner, etc?

the timeshare has 2 bedrooms, so I guess we have the kids with us in a bedroom and she can have her own. which is ok.

I want the au pair to feel like part of the family and to experience as much culture as possible. but I want to know what is the norm.

If it's not her week off, then it's completely fine to arrange the 45 hours/week there the same as you would at home, though of course nice to give more free time to the AP than usual so she can enjoy the exotic location on her own a bit (or with you all, but not working). And since it's your vacation, presumably you aren't working, so you won't need the AP for all 45 hours anyway. So dinners out seem exactly the reason you'd pay to have your AP come on the trip with you - you have her there for some babysitting, and she gets to experience a fun new location.

We have taken our AP to the beach with us and had her work some hours so that we could either work or go out a few nights, or just take a walk on the beach by ourselves here and there. It was not her vacation week, but we gave her a lot more time off than usual to explore. We also stuffed into one bedroom of the beach rental and gave her the other room.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes I do.

If she comes and I pay, it is a working week and she can take care of the kids. I would definitely have a planning meeting with her and outline your expectations of her while on vacation so nothing comes as a surprise.

+1 I haven't done it with my AP yet, but my sister brought hers to Disney and had a very hard time. Essentially, the AP wasn't very proactive and my sister had to ask her to do things that were otherwise normal aspects of her job (like running after the 2 year old who just took off while my sister held the baby and the AP just stood there). It was like with my sister around the AP either was afraid to take an independent act or she just assumed my sister would always take the lead with all actions associated with the children. It made the trip very stressful for my sister.

When the parent is there, the kid wants the parent to be the parent. If the au-pair plays mommy, the kid will just be confused.

Anonymous wrote:Yes I do.

If she comes and I pay, it is a working week and she can take care of the kids. I would definitely have a planning meeting with her and outline your expectations of her while on vacation so nothing comes as a surprise.

+1 I haven't done it with my AP yet, but my sister brought hers to Disney and had a very hard time. Essentially, the AP wasn't very proactive and my sister had to ask her to do things that were otherwise normal aspects of her job (like running after the 2 year old who just took off while my sister held the baby and the AP just stood there). It was like with my sister around the AP either was afraid to take an independent act or she just assumed my sister would always take the lead with all actions associated with the children. It made the trip very stressful for my sister.

Yes I do.

If she comes and I pay, it is a working week and she can take care of the kids. I would definitely have a planning meeting with her and outline your expectations of her while on vacation so nothing comes as a surprise.

i.e, going down to the USVI.

if so, and if it is not a "week off", would it be cool to ask her to watch the kids a few nights out of the week so we could go to dinner, etc?

the timeshare has 2 bedrooms, so I guess we have the kids with us in a bedroom and she can have her own. which is ok.

I want the au pair to feel like part of the family and to experience as much culture as possible. but I want to know what is the norm.