Austin

IN THIS ISSUE:
Message from Kathy| Announcements | Calendar
MBF in the News | Tax Tips | Ask the Expert | Organizing Tips
MBF Superstars | What Clients are Saying | Serving the Community

A Message From Kathy

Seasons Greetings
No doubt you and your family are beginning to make plans for the holidays and you may be thinking about how to cut back your spending with an eye on current economic conditions. It may be the perfect opportunity to help teach the advantages of simplicity to our children.

My favorite gifts are always those which are homemade and carry with them the time and thoughtfulness of the gift-giver. My mother-in-law almost always crochets a special blanket or shawl, embroiders a stocking, etc. My children’s school policy does not allow individual gifts for teachers unless they are homemade so we get creative around how to make something special for their teachers. My best friend takes her four children to the dollar store so that they can spend their own money and buy something on their own for their siblings.

We usually do a thorough purging of our playroom in anticipation of new toys and donate gently used (or sometimes never used) toys to less fortunate children. For several Christmases, we have adopted a specific family to give to (you can request to adopt a family with children of similar ages as yours), and opted to shop for them in lieu of additional gifts for ours, choosing items that they themselves would love to receive (but forego). Set expectations ahead of time and have a discussion around why you are scaling back.

Most adults could not name specific gifts they received as readily as they could recall special memories, family rituals or traditions that were meaningful. Make a list of fun holiday events that you would like to do as a family in the month of December. Our family’s favorites include the live nativity at Park Hills Baptist, the Trail of Lights at Zilker Park, the Junior League’s Christmas Affair, holiday photos with Santa at the mall, Old Bethlehem in Burnet, caroling with friends, and white Christmases in Vail, Colorado (where we now have a new office to serve you while you are on vacation!).

Make these family events simple and less financially burdensome by changing catered dinners to potlucks and substituting department store gifts with homemade goodies! And don’t forget that we, at Mom’s Best Friend, have wonderfully creative “holiday elf” nannies that can help you with gift wrapping, shopping, party planning /serving/cooking, individual family childcare for parties or special events on-site childcare, and much more!

Happy Holidays from our family to yours,
Kathy Dupuy, Owner

Holiday Party

Need Ideas on how to recognize your nanny over the holidays?
There's no time like the holidays to show your nanny how much you appreciate him/her all year long. Let us show you some great ideas on ways to do just that!

Mom's Best Friend Opens An Office in Colorado!
The office opened their doors on November 5th to families in need of caregivers in the Vail/Beaver Creek area. If we can assist you there if you plan to vacation (or have a secondary home) in the Vail Valley, please contact Jill Smirl at 970.467.5437 or email jill.smirl@mbfagency.com. This is the first MBF franchise to open outside of Texas.

Holiday Elves are Back!
There aren't enough hours in the day to get everything done for the holidays! Our Holiday Elves help with gift wrapping, shopping for gifts, decorating the house, addressing and assembling holiday cards, shipping gifts, and so much more! We’ve even provided a handy To Do List to help you manage their time. You can get a step ahead this holiday season and finally enjoy a stress-free December! Elves are only $12/hr with an agency fee of $25 for 6 hours or less ($40 for more than 6 hours). Fill out this form to book your elf!

• November 24-28:Thanksgiving Holiday-Lake Travis ISD
• November 27-28: MBF Office CLOSED
• November 26-28: Thanksgiving Holiday – Austin ISD, Pflugerville ISD, Del Valle ISD, Drippings Springs ISD, Eanes ISD, RRISD, Lago Vista ISD, Manor ISD
• November 17: Student Holiday – Pflugerville ISD
• December 5: Mom's Best Friend Nanny Holiday Party
• December 18: Pflugerville ISD High School out early
• December 19: Student Holiday – Austin ISD, Pflugerville ISD District early release, Del Valle ISD-District Early Release Day, Eanes ISD Winter Break Begins
• December 22: Winter Break Begins – Austin ISD, Pflugerville ISD, Lake Travis ISD, Dripping Springs ISD, RRISD, Lago Vista ISD, Manor ISD
• December 24-26: MBF Office CLOSED
• January 1:MBF Office CLOSED

Press Release: Mom's Best Friend Expands to Vail / Beaver Creek, Colorado Area
Mom’s Best Friend, Texas' largest and most established sitter service and nanny agency, announces that they are opening a franchise office in Vail/Beaver Creek on November 5, 2008. This will be the first Colorado office for Mom’s Best Friend, who currently has existing Austin, Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston, and San Antonio Texas locations.
November 4, 2008

Helping her qualify for the loan is simply a matter of making sure she is paid in a legal, professional manner. That means setting up household employer tax IDs, withholding the proper amount of taxes from her pay, remitting those taxes quarterly and then preparing year-end tax documents.

If you’re currently meeting the state and federal requirements, she should have all the documentation creditors require. If not, she’ll have trouble qualifying for any kind of loan because creditors will view her as very high risk. However, please know that it’s a fairly easy fix. Services like ours can handle all the calculations, paperwork and filings on your behalf for a small quarterly fee.

In a matter of days, your employee can have all the detailed employment paperwork required to become creditworthy. As a bonus, by paying legally, you’ll be entitled to receive significant tax breaks on these childcare expenses.

Founded in 1992 — by household employers for household employers — Breedlove & Associates has served more than 13,000 clients and processed   more than $1.25 billion in household payroll.  By focusing on the unique needs of household employers, Breedlove & Associates’ expertise and efficiency has   been  recognized in The Wall Street Journal, Kiplinger’s, Business Week and SmartMoney.com.  For more information or a free phone consultation compliments of MBF Agency, call 1-888-273-3356 or visit www.breedlove-online.com.

Q: In this economy, money is tight and I am looking for some ways to cut back without sacrificing my ability to have in-home care.  Do you have any suggestions?

A: I understand your dilemma and want to offer some concrete, creative suggestions for ways to streamline your childcare expenses without having to seek alternative care.  In order to ensure that you have looked at all the different possibilities and opportunities around this important issue, here are 5 options to consider.

Nanny with a Child: Many wonderful, professional, highly experienced nannies eventually have their own children but still need to generate some income for their families.  They do not want to have to arrange (or pay) for care for their child but need to work.  These nannies can often be persuaded to work for less than they would typically demand if they do not have to cover the cost of their own childcare and can bring their child on the job.  Families with 1-2 children may enjoy the social interaction with another child and not mind the sacrifice of shared attention if they can save some on cost.

Maximizing Advantages: In times like these, our client families want to make sure that every hour they pay to have help is an hour well spent.  If you are like me, there are never enough hours in the day to get done what is needed.  You can make sure that you are spending your time in ways that are most advantageous for your family by ensuring that your caregiver is an extension of you while you are away.  Talk with her about taking on additional responsibilities, which may be outside of the realm of her immediate job description, to help your family (thus helping to solidify her job security as well).

Scaling Back Nanny Hours: Some employers have transitioned to options such as 4 day work weeks, working from home, and/or flex time.  If you and your spouse can stagger your schedules a bit, you may find some ways to cut back on the hours needed for care.  If you have an infant and can come home right as he/she is going down for a 3 hour nap and work 3 hours from home, you may realize some significant savings.  This is particularly a cost-savings when you are paying your nanny for overtime (more than 40 hours per week) as you will be cutting down on those hours paid at 1.5 times her normal rate.

Tax Credits/Work Benefits: Are you currently taking advantage of the child care tax credit, as well as any child care flexible spending reimbursement programs you or your spouse may have as a part of their benefits package?  Are you taking advantage of any corporate emergency backup child care programs that exist in either of your benefits’ plans which would require only a small co-pay (usually about $4 per hour) for care needed to fill in when your regular childcare arrangements are not available, school holidays, etc?

Sharing a Nanny:  Have you considered sharing a nanny with a neighbor, friend or associate?  You may discover that someone you know is also struggling with covering the cost of in-home care and may be willing to pool resources and share a caregiver.  The ratios typically still fall well under those of the average daycare, and thus you could still reap the benefits of more one-on-one time and attention, familiar home environment, extra household help, less commute time, less illness, etc.

At Mom’s Best Friend, we recognize the need to offer additional options in today’s economy and have implemented options to help ease the burden for our client families, such as an installment plan for placement fees.  Please ask your placement counselor how we can help you!

Kathy Dupuy, Owner

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity.... It turns problems into gifts, failures into success, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow.” - Melodie Beattie, author of Choices and The Language of Letting Go

When we are grateful we are more in touch with what “Enough” means. I mean Enough with a capital “E”… the sense of being abundant, satisfied, happy, peaceful, and content in all areas of your life. Enough means you know when to stop buying, eating, doing, and accumulating.

Did you know that Americans can choose from over 25,000 supermarket items, 200 kinds of cereal and 11,092 magazines? And you should see the array of salsa choices if you live in Texas! Even at times when we perceive our economy as down, we have an almost embarrassing abundance of riches. We have 24-hour stores and when we buy something we are urged to “supersize” and “collect all four.” We have on average much larger homes than ever before, but one out of eleven of us still rents a self-storage unit to hold our overflow of stuff.

Given this abundance, having a clear sense of Enough is crucial to getting control of both physical and mental clutter in your life. Sometimes I have worked with people whose “Enough meter” clearly needs to be recalibrated. They have too many toys for their children, too many clothes (many unworn with the tags still on them), too much food in the pantry, too many cosmetics, more books and magazines than could possibly ever be read, scattered unfinished projects of various kinds, rented storage units, too many activities and responsibilities, and a collection of other unused belongings that continues to accumulate despite the excess. Many times people with a faulty “Enough meter” have a body weight problem as well.

Gratitude is the first step to a cure… and is one of the best ways to recalibrate your “Enough meter.” Oprah and so many others have encouraged us to keep a Gratitude Journal, and for good reason. It really works! Writing down what you are grateful for each day (most experts suggest five things) is a way to focus your mind on what you have and get your mind off what you don’t have.

A spirit of gratitude will help you as you consider additional purchases for your home. On our website we have free Clutter Prevention Wallet Reminder Sleeves that you can use to hold your credit cards and remind you of the five important questions you should ask before purchasing something ( www.clutterdiet.com/wallet ). One of those questions is “WHY do I want to buy this?” If you’re buying something to fill the empty space or to feel better, or if you are actually out of touch with why, that is a signal that you may not be clear on what Enough means to you.

In our Clutter Diet program we talk about how getting organized is very much like losing weight, and in just the same way that you should push your plate away when you’re full, you can stop acquiring “stuff” and prevent clutter from getting in the door. Remember…you do Enough, you have Enough, and you are Enough. Happy Thanksgiving.

Lorie Marrero, www.clutterdiet.com

Austin Temporary Nanny Taiwan		Austin Long-Term Nanny Summer
Taiwan is a wonderful, talented nanny, who plays both the piano and the saxophone, and holds an Associate's Degree in Early Childhood Education. Tai loves taking care of children, and in addition to having worked as a teacher's assistant in a preschool class, she also has experience with both infants and toddlers. Most recently, Taiwan worked as a nanny for an MBF family that said, "I can’t say enough about how much we absolutely LOVE Tai! She has been the best nanny and we love her so much. Before my daughter’s birth, we decided to put her in school after she turned one and now are wishing we had put it off longer so we could keep Tai. She is so great with both of my children. Any family that employs Tai will be very lucky."		Described as a caring and loving nanny, Summer P is an amazing nanny that I am excited for you to meet! Summer has lots of great childcare experience. She has over 2 years of full time nanny experience and has also done a lot of temporary nannying. Summer has also worked as a swim coach and life gaurd. She has worked with all ages, from newborns to teenagers. One of the families Summer worked with had a 16-year-old and 10-year-old twins, 2 of which had special needs. Summer's references have told us that she is '"creative with playtime", "looks for ways to further [our child's] development", and is "very responsible and communicative." One reference said she is "really good at redirection and encouragement."

MBF is a lifesaver for families with “no family” in the area. Many, many thanks for all that you do!! --Kim Neil, Sitter Service Client

I was really pleased with MBF! I really appreciated how quickly you always got back to me. I just wanted to let you know that you guys are wonderful and I have recommended the agency to a lot of people. Thank you for everything!
--Kristen Lambert, Nanny

Mom's Best Friend worked hard to meet my needs in a time crunch. The customer service was high quality - this is a rarity nowadays. Every staff member was friendly, professional and knowledgeable. --Patsy Snider, Nanny Client

Mom's Best Friend will also be adopting The Nelson Cottage, one of The Settlement Home's group homes. If you are interested in contributing to those needs, please contact laura.patterson@momsbestfriend.com or you can contact The Settlement Home directly to contribute to the needs of another cottage.

Working Together for our Communities
We are reaching the end of our first year with our Charity Program, where we donate $25 of every membership, in all of our cities, to a local charity. We are so excited by how fantastic this is going! We've been able to donate thousands of dollars each month to charities across our cities, including Austin's own Settlement Home, Austin Children's Shelter and YoungLife of Austin. Thank you all for your continued support!