Taking the nanny on holiday

[2HotCrossBunnies]

I am just wondering whether anyone has done this and what the "norm" is? We are thinking about a quick week away for October half term and considering taking the nanny with us (it's our first nanny and we have previously done Mark Warner type holidays) to give us some flexibility and allow DH some guilt-free windsurfing time.

However it's proving expensive - is it ok for the nanny to share a room with at least 1 of the DC or should she have her own space? Also can you do a "deal" for the week pay-wise considering that we are paying for her to come with us?

Any thoughts/tips welcome. Thanks

You cannot NOT pay her if you go away on holiday.

I know it is different with Au Pairs, but if we have gone away without the au pair we have always paid them the usual money they would normally receive. It is not their holiday, but ours.

I do a lot of travelling with my family. Generally I share a room with one child or we have an apartment to ourselves and mum and dad have their own. For a week I get 900 pounds, that includes doing overnights. We don't ever have certain time off periods so sometimes I end up working the whole time, others I might work a bit less.

Having signing an agreement before going away I thought that was great but now, I would prefer to get my usual hours wage, then overnights and overtime on top of that. Just my perspective! Hope that makes sense?

Also, your nanny is available for you for the time you are going away, so really you should be paying her.

so 2hotx bunnies - what are you going to do?

pay nanny and give her time off?

pay nanny and make her do chores?

ask if she WANTS to go away with you, and obv pay her?

tbh I have never understood why parents want to take a nanny with them (unless skiing) as a holiday is meant to be a family time - ie parents spending time with children for 2 weeks

there are good mark warner holidays, as well as most hotels have kids club and do a creche/bs service in evenings so that parents can go out in evening/have 2 hrs to sunbathe in peace

course if my family wanted to go to the carribean OBV their nanny NEEDS to go as well

my family went to egypt recently so I dutifully offered my services
however they went down the mark warner route (spoilsports!!) so I said at home and my MB had left me a list of things to do + I cleaned the life out of the house over the course of 7 days

they had a lovely holiday, and although I did have work to do, I got paid as normal + I didn't have to get up early every morning for a whole week

I think that this is the easiest way really! just imagine how sparkly clean your house will be upon your return

and mummypoppins - stop letting the lazy freeloader walk all over you - GET RID OF HER!!

When i have gone away with my families it has been different each time.

Family A - decided a salary and we worked the hours out to fit that figure and i kept a log of the time asked to work, as expected the figure was increased a little but i typically worked 5pm to 11am for 4mo & 2yo doing tea, bath, bed, overnight with the 3 of us sleeping in the same room.

Family B - did 24hr days, no different from being at home, room service for tea/supper, children 1 & 3yo in with me.

Family C - did 7-9am, 2-10pm, they paid for ski hire, a refresher and ski pass.

Family D - 10am-3am then baby takken in with parent.

Each time the hours, salary, responsibilites and expectations have been set out ahead of time with 'on-site' adjustments as needed.

With the hours, i would say that they were over a 6 or even 7 day period, meaning sometimes care in the day or often just evening listening to allow you a relaxing dinner.

Maybe take her with you on an outing or 2 as a 'pal' not as an extra pair of hands.

missiesparkles - you sound a saint - a sparkly house eh?

not sure if any of the nannies I know, nor myself, would be happy cleaning employers house

childcare duties yes, so maybe re organise clothes drawers/clean kids bathrooms, bedrooms etc, but I certainly wouldnt clean their house

I am a nanny, not a cleaner

I have often had extra time off, and have NEVER gone in and done chores - I get 5 weeks paid holiday in contract, 2 weeks theirs, 2 weeks mine and a week at xmas, but often I will get 7/8 weeks paid holiday a year,as family go away for extra

tbh, dont think any of my friends have had to go in and done extra chores when family has been away for extra then in contract

but do agree with your reply to mummyp

ah but imananny you forget - I am employed as a nanny/housekeeper so it kind of is in my contract but I feel went over and above the call of duty

also why I feel so venomously against mummyps laughable excuse of a nanny/hk - seeing as I work so bloody hard!

I wouldn't ask my nanny to clean the house. That's just not on imo.

However I have asked our nanny to come in and spend an afternoon cooking and freezing food for the dcs when we were away. It makes things easier for her in the long run because all she has to do is take stuff out of the freezer and heat it up rather than cooking from scatch every day.

this is true, missiesparkles [ smile] had forgotten that!!

Random extra observation agreeing with others (and myself, what a surprise) - despite years of me trying to explain, every time we have one of those holiday-planning sessions dh still brightly suggests taking our nanny with us - every time .

(Similar to his blind spot about the school run - I'd take a pay cut to be able to keep doing the school run - he thinks this is evidence of pathological over-commitment.)

I'll forgive you this time my dear lol

however, I would like to add, if I was just employed as a nanny, I wouldn't clean like I did!

2HCB-We recently had a week away and paid our nanny ot stay at home and feed the dog twice a day.The freezer was already full (as I batch cook and she could burn water ).
It felt like a huge amount of money to be spending but we got a holiday on our own,nanny was happy-all was fine.

NAnnies are bloody expensive but if you get a good won-worth every penny.

I think it depends on the nanny TBH - I would go away with my family, share a room with the children, work whatever hours for my normal hourly rate. So long as I had a bit of breathing space I'd be happy. what drowninginlaundry describes sounds perfect to me but would not be for every nanny. But then I am easily pleased, especially where sun and sand is invovled!

I would say 2HotCrossBunnies ask your nanny if she would like to go, clearly laying out what is expected etc and if she doesn't want to them I feel you should pay her for your time away as it is only fair and get her to do other chores that she would normally do; maybe for the extra holiday she has taken (over her 2 weeks if I read properly) makes sure that is unpaid?

Hope this makes sense? Good luck which ever route you chose!

@ imananny - in reaction to 'to be fair hot x bunnie never said she wouldnt pay her nanny, just that she wanted to know the norm'
yes , she did say that, twice, before and after she was told it was not acceptable.

i suppose hcb, had you told us about your nanny's holiday situation you wouldnt have got so many shocked replies...

@ imananny - holiday IS family time, but it is also supposed to be a holiday. That is why some families prefer to have childcare. I am a stay at home mum, and without childcare a holiday for me is not a holiday, it's just a week identical to my week at home except somewhere hot without most of the facilities and props I have at home to make the week go smoothly. Also, shock horror, some parents may like to spend a couple of hours together as a couple on holiday, even go out to dinner together. I would much rather have a nanny I knew and trusted look after my children on holiday than have them in a Mark Warner creche, but that's just me.

i used to be a nanny my first job i used to go to south of france i had the kids 24-7 as parents rented diffent apartment for me and kids.we would be taken out for dinner every night.my second family i loved going with as i was there all the time but we all just mucked in there were 4 girls and quite often another family too.i babysat most nights but enjoyed joining in with family life,and the girls were left with me and did choose to stay with me sometimes in villa.i was paid normal salary and if i did babysitting for other family they paid me .but all in all i worked for this family for 8 yrs and i still love them all to bits,so if you have a good relationship with nanny talk to her she may want to go .at the time i was not married or had my own kids hope you come to some arrangments

@imananny - we have taken our nanny on hols with us because we would much rather have her as our form of childcare than creche type facility - our kids are now 4 and 2 -- and whilst the older one might start to enjoy it, i still think the 2 year old is too young. it's expensive taking her, but that is my preference - it doesn't mean we go on hols pretending we have no kids with us!! (our nanny's main tasks are preparing the kids meals and babysitting at night AFTER the kids have gone to bed).

Morning! Thank you for your replies over night. I think it is right to talk through the suggested holiday with the nanny and see what she thinks.
I was originally going for a hotel holiday but this seems to be very expensive (even b&b) and throws up the issue of the nanny sharing with one of the DC. So I'm changing tack and looking for villa/apartment. I guess if the nanny decides not to come then I will go back to the hotel option.
Drowninginlaudry - thanks for setting out how you arranged things with your nanny. That's along the lines I was thinking - she will prob have the children am or pm and have the other time free. Then we would prob want half of the week's evenings for babysitting. Anyhow will do some more research, ask the nanny what she wants and see where I get to!

Self-catering is definitely a more practical idea in these circumstances.

I think the only further relevant consideration there is the location of the villa/apt - as being isolated (without her own transport etc.) could be a disincentive for your nanny & make it more difficult for her "free" time really to feel like free time.

We did also (when my two were the ages of yours) take a nanny with us to a (quite isolated) villa in France, and it was lovely, and we all really enjoyed it, but it was definitely not as much of a holiday for her as the skiing holiday was for our current nanny.

Bink, I so love 'evidence of pathological over-commitment' that I have sent you an email about it.

bunny how old are your dcs? we have just been having this conversation about our holiday (dh wants to take nanny, i dont, much as i like her - purely because i feel bad enough about how little i see of ds when im working: i want to spend the holiday time with him).
but he's a baby, and i might feel different with older kids
friends of ours took their nanny skiing and it didnt exactly work out as planned - they had planned for nanny to look after their 2yo (too little to ski) while the older kids skiied with their parents. in the end the 2yo screamed blue murder every morning about being left so the mother ended up looking after the kids while the nanny had a lovely relaxing time skiing solo...
what are your children's expectations of this holiday? if they are old enough to look forward to spending time with you on holiday, they might resist being looked after by the nanny anyway
(this post is NOT btw meant as a criticism of anyone taking their nanny on holiday....)

Woodstock - my 2 are 3 and 1. Dc2 will be fine, he's very used to the nanny anyway. Dc1 might be more tricky but once I am "out of sight" he will prob just get on. Hopefully they will be having too much fun!! We did a Mark Warner trip to Dahab last Sept/Oct and whilst the baby was very happy the older one struggled with being left at the creche - even though it was just for a couple of hours in the morning. With a nanny they know well I hope they will be more settled. Plus it help having the help on travel days and over day naps when we want them out of the hot sun.
I have asked her tonight if she would like to come with us on a villa trip and got a very positive response!

glad you asked and got a postive response

drowninginlaundry and page - course i understand that parents want/need a holiday and time to relax - I LOVE children obviously doing the job that I do BUT when i go away on holiday with my hubby - prefer to go to child free hotels

i guess I see it strange as children will obv want to spend time with their parents rather than their nanny ( being that that they spend maybe 48weeks with nanny a year)

best solution does seem for parents to take nanny with you so children to know thair carer if young, rather than be dumped in a creche with strangers, and maybe pick a kids club hotel for 5+ and maybe nanny have them am and parents can relax, and nanny have pm off and parents play with them

not trying to make anyone feel guilty - other solution is to have a one week of family holiday and then a week just the parents and leave children at home with nanny - some of my famillies have done that - kids stay at mine and think its a major treat

in the end , it obviously depends how well mb/db and the nanny get on with each other, I would go away with my family that I work for, as they are just the best employers, who deserve a bit of time together with 3 kids under 5 1/2

I have to say I agree with imanannys last comment - if the appalling way my+I took horrible advantage of the cheap hotel bar in barbados is anything to go by, maybe its a good thing I stayed at home+cleaned!!

the cocktails were £1.85!!
and 95p at happy hour!!!

it would have been wrong not to!