IN THIS ISSUE:
Message from Kathy| Announcements | Calendar
MBF in the News | Client Corner | The Counselor's Column
Tax Tips From Breedlove and Assoicates | Ask the Expert
Living Order | MBF Superstars | What Clients are Saying
Serving the Community

A Message From Kathy
Welcome to our winter newsletter! Getting into the thick of the holiday season, it appears, as usual, the real craziness is set to begin. It’s never supposed to be this way. You vow at the beginning of each new year that you’re going to do things differently—you’ll finish your Christmas shopping by June, have holiday cards stamped and sealed in their envelopes by August, make this year’s Thanksgiving dinner a 30-minute meal. You may have done everything right coming into the season. So why are you still feeling its stress?

I know first hand that no matter how proactive one tries to be about the holidays, it's very hard to make sure everything is taken care of in advance. I suggest, however, we all take a breath. While most of us are careful to avoid being self-focused during the holidays, we may also end up erring on the other side, losing the joy of the season by putting way too much on our shoulders. We can all learn to ask for help more often, especially in busy times like these.

MBF is here to help you find space and sanity to really savor this holiday season with your family. We offer chefs and on-site childcare for parties, temporary nannies to care for your children while you take care of last-minute shopping and holiday elves to help you with all your cards, gifts and other seasonal demands.

No matter the pressures, we are here to help you find delight in the season. Let us know how we can support you.

Happy Holidays!
Kathy Dupuy, Owner and Founder

Book your Holiday Elf to help with shopping, gift wrapping, shipping, decorating and more!
A Holiday Elf is your solution for a stress-free Christmas!  We at Mom’s Best Friend understand there is so much to do and so little time. You can use the extra set of hands!  Our temporary services team is ready to send you support for shopping and gift wrapping, decorating your house, shipping packages, addressing and sending cards and more!  Our handy to do list will keep track of the tasks and needs between you and your elf.  Let Mom’s Best Friend help you experience a more cheerful Holiday season this year!

2008 Pricing Changes
Mom's Best Friend will be making several pricing changes for 2008. Please view the price list for all details, but a few notable items are (1) in order to continue attracting our fabulous temporary nannies (sitters), we will be changing the caregiver pay structure to begin increasing by $1 per hour after 1 chid rather than after 2, and (2) we will be changing our sitter agency fees to a convenient flat pricing structure.

"Book a Best Friend" Reminder Email
In order to have the most consistency and to be as successful as possible in booking you a sitter for date nights, meetings, social commitments, sporting events, etc., we recommend booking your sitter in the beginning of the week. If you'd like to opt in for a Monday reminder email, please email monica.alcantar@momsbestfriend.com with the subject line REMINDER.

Don't get caught without a sitter for your Holiday Functions!
Office and holiday party season is upon us, and New Years Eve is just around the corner!  Don’t get caught last minute without childcare when you need it the most.  Be prepared ahead of time by contacting your Placement Counselor to book a sitter now for your many functions. Save yourself last minute stress by booking early!

Annual Nanny Recognition Week Fall Festival was a great Success!
The Annual Nanny Recognition Week event was a wonderful success!!  Forty Mom’s Best Friend Nannies, lots of kids, and several of the families they loyally care for were in attendance.  The festivity was held on October25th at the Waterloo Ice House in West Austin.  We greatly appreciate all the families and nannies with Mom’s Best Friend and look forward to another amazing year together! Click here to view a collection of some of the Nannies and their charges.

2007 Austin Supernanny Announced
The 2007 Supernanny contest was inspiring! We had so many amazing nannies to choose from, and it was so difficult to narrow it down to the finalist and choose a winner. Mom's Best Friend owner and founder, Kathy Dupuy, announced and congratulated finalists Stephanie Daniel, Ashly Fontenot, and Karen Roddy, as well as our winner, Kathleen Atwell, at our Annual Nanny Recognition Week Event in late October. All the applicants were a great representation of the wonderful nanny professionals we have in the Austin area. Thank you to everyone that participated!

December 6: Annual Mom's Best Friend Nanny Holiday Party (remind your nannies to sign up by emailing laura.patterson@momsbestfriend.com)

December 21-January 7: School holidays -- book your sitters accordingly

December 31: New Year's Eve -- book your sitter early! (Holiday pricing applies)

January 1: 2008 Pricing goes into effect

Press Release: Mom's Best Friend Adopts BabbleSoft Software
October 15, 2007

Baby Insights, a superior alternative to pen and paper, can help ease the mind of a new parent leaving their baby in the care of a nanny. The goal of Baby insights is to help make better informed decisions for the infant through the maintained recorded information. 

Baby Say Cheese is an online photo album with milestones and a family tree. The ‘first crawl, first smile, and first word’ can easily be documented and the application is perfect for busy parents who don't have time to organize their baby's first year album pictures. The software applications are essentially a journal of the infant’s life with inputs by the family and the nanny.

Please take a full look at the BabbleSoft website for further information.

We often envision the holidays as the perfect time for families. But parents often say that this is the time their kids tantrum, act aggressively, or become obsessed with wanting toys. What's going on? Please take a look at the full article for a thorough explanation of how to simplify the holidays.

Q

A: No, MBF’s FEIN will not work.  To get your tax break, you need your own FEIN.  Here’s how it works.

A: I may have to revoke my “expert” status on this question since I’m not sure anyone can be a holiday expert. We all just do our best to take care of the people we love and care for while trying not to lose sight of the true meaning of the season. However, I do understand that having a few old tricks up your sleeve may help alleviate the season’s demands, and in my own experience I have found a couple of things to be useful.

Of course, do your best to be prepared with shopping, cards and any other holiday tasks as much as you can before Thanksgiving. I know many of you out there start buying gifts for next year the day after Christmas, and I certainly buy gifts year round, especially when I run across something I know someone special to me would like. I keep an appointed gift closet in my house to store presents for holidays—as well as for birthdays, weddings, graduations and so on—throughout the year.

I also make a comprehensive, evolving list of all the people to whom I’ll be giving gifts, taking special care not to forget my children’s teachers, the mailwoman, the newspaper delivery person and all the other very important—though too often unsung—people that we rely on. And since I do my best to purchase gifts that people actually want and need, I use this list to solicit gift suggestions and websites where I can find them directly from the gifts’ recipients.

I suggest getting children involved in the holiday as much as possible as well, not only to have extra helpers but also to instill the thoughtfulness toward others that is really at the heart of the season. I continue this discussion by offering holiday tips especially tailored to kids on my most recent blog on the MBF website.

Enjoy the holidays!
Kathy Dupuy, Owner and Founder

The first step is to educate yourself about which toys are being recalled. There is a complete list with photographs of each item to help with identification. Even if your children are older, please do look at this list and attend to any items you may have, because you may donate your toys later to a charity who may then accidentally give the dangerous toys to another child.

Once you’ve familiarized yourself with the recall list, you can begin your organizing process. Sort the toys into like categories, such as dolls, doll clothes, race cars, building blocks, and others. As you find recalled toys during your process, put them aside into a disposable container such as a box or bag.

Each recall announcement’s instructions usually say that you should return the toy to the store where it was purchased. However, if you don’t know or remember where the toy was purchased, you should dispose of it properly at a hazardous waste facility since lead can seep into the groundwater.

Once you have organized your toys into categories, you can find the best containers for them. As professional organizers, one of the mistakes we commonly see is people trying to store the toys in their original packaging. The packaging is typically designed for shipping and selling the product, not for storing it long-term. A better choice is something durable and easy to handle, like a clear container. You can also cut out a picture of the toy from the original box and tape it on the container to aid your child in staying organized.

Make it a point each year at this time to repeat the process and get ready for the new items the holiday will bring. If you need help, give us a call!

Lorie Marrero, 512.301.2426, www.livingorder.com

Austin SuperNanny Contest Finalists:
Karen, Kathleen (Winner), Stephanie and Ashly

Supernanny Winner: Kathleen Atwell
Kathleen has been a childcare professional for 16 years. Inspired by “The Sound of Music”, Kathleen always had a strong desire to work with children. In 1997, Kathleen was placed in a nanny position by Mom’s Best Friend and she is still employed by the Smalling family to this day. As her charges have grown, her schedule has been reduced, leaving room for Kathleen to begin working with two additional families part-time, and she even does temporary sitting for us as well! The Smalling family, whom she has worked for for the past ten years, raved, “We consider ourselves extremely lucky to have had her for these last ten years...Kathleen is a shining example of her profession.”

Supernanny Finalist: Stephanie Daniel
Stephanie’s first placement with Mom’s Best Friend was ten years ago, when she served as the Director of the Westwood Country Club’s onsite childcare center. She subsequently moved to California where she worked in a unique nanny-share situation involving four different families. She returned to Austin several years ago and took a position with twin toddler boys. When they began preschool in late 2005, Stephanie returned to Mom’s Best Friend where she was placed with the DiNovo family, her current employer.

Supernanny Finalist: Ashly Fontenot
Ashly feels that being a nanny is her calling. Eight years ago, she was placed through Mom’s Best Friend with the Brown family. As the kids have grown older, Ashly’s role has evolved into a nanny/home manager, taking care of household errands and duties while the children are in school. She also recently began taking child development courses in order to pursue her degree in Early Childhood Education.

Supernanny Finalist: Karen Roddy
Karen has been working with children since high school, starting as an entertainer for children’s parties, working in daycare centers while she earned her Bachelor’s degree in psychology, and as a career nanny since 2000. Karen doesn’t settle for watching one infant, she has had three separate positions with multiple newborns, one of whom she was with for four years. Karen’s has an infinite amount of patience and a passion for her career.

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What Clients are Saying

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• "Mom's Best Friend should be commended on their placement of our nanny." Jennifer H
• "I liked our sitter's soft, gentle, caring personaility. She even brought colors, coloring books and a jump rope for my daughter. She's a very lovely person." Shelly J
• "The staff at Mom's Best Friend were very nice and helpful and made me feel that they will always be there for me in any situation. They showed me respect. I selected MBF agency because they sounded like an honest and friendly agency to work for." Patricia L
• "My son actually cried when our sitter left! She was our first non-family member babysitter and the kids loved her like family. Thank you." Tracie G
• "Mom's Best Friend's process on selecting nannies is very in depth which I truly believe is very important. It helps to put the family's minds at ease." Gina S
• "Our sitter was absolutely wonderful! She was able to make this evening a great experience for my 2 year old and my 10 year old!" Julia H

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Serving the Community

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Mom's Best Friend Provides Childcare for Local Charity Event
"Thank you so much for providing free childcare at our October Just Between Friends event. The sale was a huge success, and a trailer full of wonderful children’s and maternity clothes, toys, books and furniture was given to the Adoption Coalition, as wel asl a portion of the proceeds. Hundreds of area foster and adoptive families will be blessed by the things donated, and were blessed by the sale itself. Foster and Adoptive families were given the chance to shop a special “presale”, and many got great bargains for their kids. Hundreds of Austin-area families not in the foster system benefited from the JBF Sale, buying and selling gently-used items to help with their family budgets. Thank you so much for your support!" --Jill Sayre, Just Between Friends, Austin

Settlement Home Holiday Needs
We love the holidays at MBF as we enjoy giving back to our community. This holiday season we will be volunteering with the girls at The Settlement Home, decorating gingerbread houses and spreading holiday joy! We will also be adopting a cottage of girls to buy gifts that Santa will be bringing to them!
Please view the Wish List if you would like to donate to The Settlement Home. The Settlement Home is always looking for clothing donations (for girls age 7 to 17) or any donations for their garage sale--the largest fundraiser of the year! This is a great way to get your kids involved in giving to others! If you want to drop off any gifts or donations at our office, we will be glad to deliver them. This is a wonderful way to get your kids involved in giving to others.

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