If you live in Phoenix year round or are coming to get out of the snow and ice for a few weeks, make the most of your time here. Spring is a beautiful time to visit Phoenix so here’s a fun list of things to do.

Arabian Horse Show Feb 14-24 at Westworld in Scottsdale-Since 1955, the Arabian Horse Show is the largest event of it’s kind in the world and has grown from 50 horses to 2400, bringing the top owners, trainers and breeders from around the world. A win in Scottsdale means lots of attention in the breeding barns.

Phoenix Spring Training For the fans, Spring Training means great games, great players, jumbo hot dogs, cheap tickets, and the opportunity to get up close and personal with the athletes. Scottsdale is home to the San Francisco Giants, Colorado Rockies, and Arizona Diamondbacks. Cactus League Spring Training The Angels will host the Chicago Cubs at Diablo Stadium in Tempe for their Spring Training and the Angels take on the Texas Rangers. Camelback Ranch in Glendale is hosting the White Sox and Dodgers and the Peoria Complex is hosting the Mariners and the Padres. The Surprise Stadium is the home of the Texas Rangers and the Kansas City Royals.

Kayaking on  Tempe Town lake This is an urban lake just North of ASU and the Mill Avenue district in Tempe. They also have rowboats and paddle boats. The lake is just two miles long and there’s lots of skateboarding, biking, walking and horseback riding paths.

Arizona Science Center This fun interactive museum is great for ages 2 through adults. I brought my two year old granddaughter and my out of town company there and she kept busy for hours, but we had fun learning too!

Take a hike! Our family hiked in the Superstitions and my eight year old son said: “Oh, this is the desert!” It’s high desert and much more beautiful than in the alley, asd stunning in the Spring and the rock formations and Spring flowers are fabulous! Another short but fun hike is the Hieroglyphic Trail in the superstitions.

The Musical Instrument Museum in North Scottsdale is one of a kind, with instruments from all over the world, and has an interactive room where you can try out some instruments yourself.

Destination Station at the Arizona Museum of natural history runs through March 24 and is an interactive exhibit showing the inside of America’s orbiting lab and revealing the vast array of science and research being done in low earth orbit.

Arizona SCITECH festival 2013 Spearheaded by ASU, U of A, and the Arizona Science Center, this festival is a celebration of science, technology, engineering and math has expos, workshops, and tours in neighborhoods throughout Phoenix  for ages 3 to 103 now through March 17th.

If you’re staying at one of our charming Phoenix resorts, call for one of our trusted nannies to entertain the children while you enjoy a quiet dinner.

Beth

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We’ve been to the moon and back, but we’re still cleaning the way we did 100 years ago, and those habits are hard to change. We think it’s not clean unless we get that chemical smell, but what no one told us is that there are no regulations for cleaning products. Good mothers use  Johnson and Johnson baby shampoo, we thought. They just came out with this concession, to remove all toxins by 2015.

The famous ’10 Americans’ study in 2004 of 10 umbilical cords, tested for 413 toxins and environmental pollutants. The chilling test results showed that the 10 cord blood samples contained 287 toxins and chemical pollutants, 200 on average per baby, including 212 industrial chemicals that were banned 30 years ago! The chemicals included waste products coming out of incinerators and smokestacks, and ingredients from pesticides, like flame retardants, teflon chemicals and pesticides.
Of these chemicals

  • 134 are linked to Cancer
  • 151 are associated with Birth Defects
  • 154 cause Hormone Disruption
  • 186 cause Infertility
  • 130 are Immune System Toxicants
  • 158 are Neurotoxins such as lead, PCBs, and mercury that can have far-reaching effects on developing children’s intelligence and coordination.

Leading researchers believe industrial chemicals have brought a silent pandemic in children.

In November 2012, a new policy statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics outlines the harmful effects on children and makes recommendations on how to reduce exposure. A new report this week stated that ADHD is on the rise. One in five children have autism, ADHD, ADD, or allergies, 7.3 million American couples have trouble getting pregnant or carrying to term, up 20% in the past 10 years. Cancer is on the rise.

Chemicals are taken in via inhalation, ingestion and absorption. Cleaning sprays can be inhaled, a crib or high chair cleaned with lysol can be ingested or absorbed through the skin. Safe levels of chemicals over a long period of time equals a level that is too high. Nearly all traditional cleaning products have chemicals that are bad for humans and for the earth. Find your favorite cleaning product in this list.

What can we do?
We can’t avoid all exposure. Some people just love their cleaning products. This is a challenge for many. I shared this with my 93 year old mother who still cleans her own windows, and she just laughed, “I’ve been using amonia and window cleaner all my life and I’m not dead yet!”

The average home has 62 toxic chemicals.  Eighty-five percent of housekeepers die within one year of retirement. And when these toxins are used, it’s putting more chemicals into the environment.

Make your own green cleaning recipes. 

Work with your nanny or domestic staff to  mix up simple green cleaning recipies using vinegar, lemon, borax, liquid soap, olive oil.

Don’t use aerosols
They are easier to inhale and the particles are smaller. The particles go deeper into your lungs. Some aerosol particles stay in the air for up to two days and a baby can ingest it. A trigger spray is better.

Use gloves
Your skin is one big absorbing sponge.

Think about ingestion.
Did you use fabric softener on that baby blanket? Then baby sucks on the blanket. Nervous system disorders are linked to  dryer sheets.

Beware of flame retardants
Hidden hazards tested 20 popular new foam baby products for toxic flame retardants linked to serious health problems

No one is using disinfectants properly.
Beth Bittenbender of Pure Strategies spoke to the DEMA Domestic Estate managers Convention last September, explaining that, “For a disinfectant like lysol to work properly, the surface needs to be cleaned first, then sprayed with the Lysol and allowed to sit for 10 minutes, then wipped off. But who takes the time to do this? This procedure  can kill 99.9% of germs. However that .1% may adapt and become a superbug.”

Great tools to use:

  • Microfiber rags and water give better results than chemicals.  Cotton is food for germs.
  • Use a sealed HEPTA vacuum for allergies.
  • Electrolyzed water changes the PH of water. Electrolyzed water was discovered over 150 years ago. Table salt and tap water are infused with electricity into water, and it cleans and disinfects and degreases food, tables, counters and sinks. Electric tea pot sizes are available as well as wall mounted units at Pure Strategies
  • Liquid Ozone (O3) kills bacteria 3,000 times faster than bleach.
  • Dry Steam Vapor is a high heat, low moisture process using minerals and can be used as a pesticide against any insect from bedbugs to scorpins.
  • Increase your indoor air quality with plants, especially in the nursery. Plants pull toxins out of the air.
  • Install self cleaning surfaces, called nano-coating. Chandelliers and windows can be coated so they can be cleaned with a dry rag.
  • UV lights can be installed in the HVAC systems to kill microbes.

These products can be used with pets,  animals, in pools and hot tubs.

Do what you can and don’t worry about the rest.
My daughter-in-law showed me all the toxins in toothpaste, so I quit using it. My two year old granddaughter looked at me  a couple weeks later and said, “Grandma, your teeth look yucky!” so now I’m back to poisoning myself at least once a day.

Knowledge is power

  • Your goal is not to get rid of all germs. Desensitizing children to germs, makes them less able to fight back normal levels of infection.
  • Don’t feel overwhelmed, start small.
  • Reduce your chemical footprint. When getting rid of your old cleaning compounds, bring them to a city recycling event like  the one in Tempe April 20 

Here are some other programs we found:
City of Scottsdale Hazardous Waste Options
City of Phoenix Hazardous Waste Schedule
City of Chandler Hazardous Waste Schedule
City of Gilbert hazardous Waste Schedule
City of Mesa toxic waste recycling
City of Peoria hazardous waste recycling
Fountain Hills hazardous waste recycling
Carefree hazardous waste recycling
Cave Creek hazardous waste recycling

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On Saturday November 3, Caring Nannies held it’s four hour Nanny Boot Camp.

This free course is designed for all nannies placed or being placed through Caring Nannies, and empowers them with greater skills and professionalism and gives families a higher level of care and service. Caring Nannies offers three training events per year, and we require our nannies to attend two.

Nanny Boot Camp is an ongoing event and our goal is to see every nanny have a chance to attend. It covers communication, boundaries, constructing a Working Agreement, developing a weekly Play Plan, using the Nanny Log, improving children’s behavior, consistency, age appropriate activities, child health and safety, discipline techniques, establishing routines, defining your role. We teach using role-playing, discussing typical scenarios that come up and the ethical way to handle them, practice writing out a typical curriculum for several ages, conflict resolution, developing a resume and portfolio, and interview success.

Comments from attendees included these: “Thank you for the time, caring and thoughtfulness that went into your Nanny Boot Camp today. You have helped all of us to step up a notch in our chosen profession. I value that you understand our genuine service and love for the children and families we serve while we carry on that service in a pretty hidden manner and are often not openly valued. I believe we all get that, and recognition, and appreciation are not our motives…. was kinda fun to hear that you ‘get it’.”

“Thank you for helping us serve that much better.”

“It’s great to hear from other nannies and real experiences. I appreciate your kind support to us. Your continued education and conferences equals professional nannies!” and “You’re making us feel valued as nannies. We nannies work pretty much alone and without support.”
We applaud the nannies who gave up their Saturday morning to increase their skills, and connect with us and others in their profession! These are people who keep on learning, growing and stretching to be the best of the best! Thank you for coming! We know there were many others who wanted to come but had problems with  scheduling, and we’ll host another class early next year.

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The murder of 2 children in NYC by their babysitter/nanny has  everyone  horrified and distraught—especially  parents who have hired childcare for their family. It has every nanny agency owner –almost all of whom are parents—grappling to understand what could have gone so wrong. How did a seemingly capable caregiver go from loving nanny to murderer? Believe me, I have been reading  every shred of news I can find to try and understand how this tragedy could have ever happened.
Those of us owners who belong to an organization called APNA (the  Association of Premier Nanny Agencies) subscribe to the highest level of screening practices. I know we are all wondering, if this woman had come to us, would we have picked up something about her which would have eliminated her from placement. The truth is without all the facts of the case, we don’t know.
Here’s what we do know. Careful screening of caregivers by professionals does help weed out people who should not be taking care of children. Real background  checks—not the cheap ones provided by online sites—are part of the process. But in this case, the woman probably had no prior record. It does appear, however, that her life was unraveling and she was becoming  psychologically untethered.
This case is a statistical anomaly. There are thousands upon thousands of wonderful nannies providing excellent care for children and allowing parents to go to work knowing that their children are in loving hands. But just one case like this is one too many.  No one wants to be that anomaly.  When the facts emerge about this woman, I hope we have some take away that will make us  better at what we try to do best– protect the  safety and welfare of children.
 

One Response to Traged

Judi Merlin says:

  1.  

    Thank you for speaking to eloquently for all of us in the nanny agency business. We are all grieving for this family.
    These heartfelt comments were posted by Barbara Kline, owner of White House Nannies and one of our affiliate APNA Nanny Agencies in Washington DC, who we were just with at the 2102 APNA convention two weeks ago. Her thoughts resonate with our hearts, as we grieve with this family that has suffered such an unimaginable loss.
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Jessica was downstairs with the children, ages 11 months and 2.5, when she heard an alarm go off upstairs once, then twice. She called 9-11 and police came and apprehended an intruder. Avery accidentally locked herself outside while the boys 2 and 4 were inside. She contacted the Grandma who lived nearby, who had a spare key. Kelly, one of our star nannies, noticed a man in the playground who didn’t seem to belong to the group and she called 911. The man was picked up, a registered child molester.

We don’t normally get tornadoes, hurricanes or flash floods in Phoenix but we have had dust storms, power outages and Arizona does have some slight earthquakes. You buy fire insurance and auto insurance, but have you discussed emergency situations with your nanny before they occur? What are your directives in the following situations: a stranger knocking at the door, power outage, car accident, flat tire, running out of gas, the alarm going off,  a runaway pet or  a child needing stitches?

Here are a some tips to insure your priorities are followed.

1. At your next monthly meeting, outline some possible scenarios and steps of action with your nanny
2. Consider getting CPR training yourself. When your nanny’s expires may be a great time to go together or simply review a youtube video.
3. Post a fire evacuation map with 2 ways to exit and a safe meeting spot outside the house. Nanny can practice Stop! Drop! Roll! with the children and crawling through the house in case of smoke.
4. Pool Safety. Fence the pool. No running around the pool. No children allowed outside without an adult.

Community Emergency. Carla, one of our veteran nannies, takes community preparedness classes and tells us the most important consideration is water. Electricity is what pumps the water when the generators go out, so on a long extended power outage there will be no water to flush the toilets, wash, cook or drink. We do have loss of power in Arizona occasionally. Think through all the scenarios if you have an extended outage. Don Sherman, a local Gilbert resident has free readiness workshops regularly. Check out his website, www.iwillprepare.com. Carla takes his workshops and is prepared to eat out of the refrigerator and then start canning what’s in her freezer.

Here’s what’s most important:

1. Water. Have a gallon of water per day per person for a period of two weeks. Have 5 gallon jugs stored.
2. Light. What will you do if the electricity goes out for an extended period of time? Do you have candles, and a way to light them? Candles can be set in a sink and burn safely. If you store batteries, recycle them periodically. Candles also bring a sense of warmth and comfort.
3. Food. Have canned food in the house that everyone will eat, like tuna, canned fruit, and cold cereal that the children will eat without milk.
4. Comfort food. Protein bars, hard candy (chocolate melts).
5. Fuel. A way to cook your food and a barbecue grill. Restaurants won’t have electricity and stores may be out of supplies and electricity. Their registers won’t run.  Have an extra propane tank or charcoal-plus extra  to boil water. Carla has almost 300# in her garage. You can get it on sale during holidays like 4th of July.
6. Fires. What will you do if the firefighter comes to your door and says “Get out! Your neighbor’s house is on fire.” Have a 72 hour kit, for food, medications, water, change of clothes, small first aid kit, a copy of important and irreplaceable documents and a current photo of you and everyone in the family in a ziplock bag.

This weekend, we’re conducting our Nanny Boot Camp covering the following topics. If your nanny hasn’t attended this 4 hour training session encourage her to get signed up. We have a few spaces left. Here’s the link 

Curriculum Planning & Scheduling
Child Development-Ages & Stages
Discipline & Building Self-esteem in Children
Physical Care & Safety
Nanny/Family Relationships
Professionalism: Ethics, Respect, and Responsibility
Situational Role Playing
Domestic Duties

Beth Weise 

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NATIONAL NANNY RECOGNITION WEEK IS SEPTEMBER 23 TO 29 and we wanted to do something special for all of our amazing nannies!

I just spent 60+ hours with my busy and entertaining 2.5 year old grandaughter while her parents attended a wedding in San Francisco. The last day, I was truly looking forward to that two hour nap time break, but she just would not nap at all. It happens some times. It was a very special and fun packed, memorable weekend, with bike rides to the park, swimming, library story hour, but it was intense! I am used to having more ‘space’, more time to do my own thing.

I now have a much greater appreciation of what our nannies do day in and day out!

Do you have a wonderful, loving creative, patient nanny in your life who loves your kids like they were her own, builds forts with them in the living room, gets them to eat their brocolli, and comes up with amazing crafts and art projects? Has she taught them manners, to pick up their toys, potty trained them, made up songs with them?

Tell us about your WONDERFUL NANNY in a short essay–just a few paragraphs, and photos if possible, telling us how she has made your family life richer, easier and happier, and made a lasting impact on your family, and she’ll be entered into our contest! The winning nanny will receive a $50 cash gift as well as a free ticket to our 2013 National Nanny Training Day. Three runner-ups will receive tickets to the Conference.

The best hours of our week are doing follow up calls and hearing all the great stories of the difference our nannies have made in your lives, so lets all take this opportunity given to us by National Nanny Recognition

Week 2013to let our nannies know how much we appreciate them!

Check out the rules below and then tell us about your nanny! Send them to me at beth@acaringnanny.com.

Rules:
The Nanny needs to have been placed by Caring Nannies, and the essays and photos can be used by Caring Nannies. The deadline for submission is September 20.

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It can be difficult to find someone to nanny for just three hours a day from 2:30-5:30 pm, plus you have to worry about all those random no-school days or sick days.Caring Nannies generally asks for a 20 hr per week minimum because we want to make it a win–win solution for both parties. Our goal is a nanny who stays long term, because we don’t want people coming in and out of your child’s life.

Is an After School Nanny the Answer?
After school nannies are some of our hardest working employees. They pick up children, often from different schools, tidy up, keep the laundry going, run errands, grocery shop, prepare nutritious snacks, supervise homework, monitor online school progress, ferry children to after school activities or appointments, or shop for that weekend birthday party gift

How about a split shift nanny?
Some families want the nanny to come before and after school, which is problematic because it doubles the driving for your caregiver, and the morning shift is commonly only two hours long. We don’t recommend this scenario, because we want nannies have a four hour minimum each time they come to the home. All our requirements are geared to promote longevity in the relationship. If a split-shift is agreeable to the nanny, we recommend reimbursing her for mileage (55.5 per mile) for two of the trips, or using a family car.

What could a full-time Nanny/Manager Do?
Many of our families utilize a third solution, keeping their nanny full time and expanding her duties to include housekeeping, personal assisting or other home management chores. Part-time pay is generally higher than full time so for just a little more, you can have the advantage of full coverage. If you have a home business, she can sort mail, take on more of an assistant role, send out shipping, fill in for your school volunteer assignments or charities, and organize home or office, scrapbook, make travel arrangements, set appointments, pet and house sit when you’re out of town, deal with vendors, or cook dinner for the family. The key is to find out what she’s great at, then utilize her creative talents to make your life easier. You can pay a lower hourly rate, since she is full time, and she’ll tend to stay longer. You win because when you arrive home, all the pressing needs of the day will have been attended to and you need only enjoy the children and your peaceful and organized home.

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Caring Nannies Recently held a cutting edge one day training event in Paradise Valley with 37 nannies in attendance, greatly exceeding our expectations! We were expecting 8 but hoping for 20!  Nannies who had never experienced training geared to the private home environment were delighted and encouraged.

 Why do we need to train nannies? Doesn’t a good nanny already have the skills she needs to work successfully with children?

There is no other job as important as raising a child, your own or someone elses, and the informal home environment lends itself to parents and nannies thinking that ongoing training isn’t needed. It just comes naturally, right? However, research shows that nannies become skilled professionals when experience and a warm engaging personality is combined with knowleldge of how a child develops physically, socially, intellectually and emotionally plus creative ideas to make it happen.

The event was open to nannies throughout the community and many of the parents graciously paid the registration fee.

As in any profession, there is always more to learn, and it’s motivating to receive the appreciation for their critical impact in their unique role. The opportunity to network with  others in their field and exchange contact information is encouraging. Nannying can be isolating with no peers to talk to during the day.

With Kathy Rowe from Music Together, in a very hands on fun session, we experienced  how to incorporate music into the day–a huge brain boost to children. Jeremy King from Az Tutor and Life Coach laid out how to effectively develop responsibility and self-motivation, a seasoned Newborn Specialist explained the keys to babies and toddlers taking naps and sleeping through the night. Martha Rockwell, professional career coach and owner of A+Resumes, gave tips on how to find our dream jobs, and a panel of expert Home Managers discussed how to move from Nanny to Nanny Manager.

Breakfast and lunch were included as well as a goodie bag including a kid’s cook book. Fun prizes were raffled off including a large basket of essential safety devices from Childproofers USA, an hour of professional career and resume counseling from Martha, a make-over from Dephane Marcel from Salon Moda Fina in Scottsdale, and a Monster Repellant Spray from Fairytale Wishes. Lice Doctors generously sponsored our lunch.

The event was sponsored by Nanny Biz Reviews and was held in conjunction with National Week of the Young Child. Caring Nannies is tremendously encouraged by the success of this years training and is already at work planning our next training event this fall. At Caring Nannies, we are asking our caregivers to commit to two out of three training events per year, because we have experiencd the difference training makes.

Beth Weise
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Originally from Costa Rica, Reyna has 23 years of experience as a nanny and housekeeper in the US. Her references describe her as being terrific with infants and toddlers, honest, and the most hard working person they know!  One former family tells us: “She’s very kind and always goes out of her way to make sure everything is to our satisfaction. She is just a really good, trustworthy person. She always goes above and beyond.” Another family tells us: “Reyna is very upbeat, very bubbly, and really enjoys being around them. But when she is here cleaning for us, she is just very focused and organized, and all about getting the job done. She is comfortable with travel and is bilingual, important qualities for the family that hired her this summer as their nanny/home manager in Chandler with a new baby and a busy toddler. They tell us: “Just don’t let anyone steal her away from us!”

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       Lora and Lucia Enjoy a Quiet Moment

A regular employee / employer relationship can get complicated under normal circumstances, but if you’ve ever been a nanny or if you’ve employed a nanny, you know that it’s different from any other employee/employer relationship. A nanny may spend more time with the children and other members of their immediate family than the parents do. Usually, the children adore their nanny and in turn the nanny loves the children and develops a wonderful bond with them. That’s what parents want–the peace of mind knowing that their children are cared for and truly loved.
 It’s easy for the family to grow close to their nanny, since they are trusting her with their precious little ones, and over time, the nanny naturally begins to feel like part of the family. The nanny’s goals should be for her to make the family and children feel comfortable, to feel she’s part of the family and not just considered an employee. Both need each and rely on each other. It is fine to be close, but the key is not to get too close. This relationship especially requires healthy boundaries. However, that is easier said than done. There’s an invisible line that gets blurred along the way. How can we head off these problems?
1. BE RESPECTFUL. The nanny must respect the family as her employer and the family should respect her limits as the nanny. There must be a degree

of emotional detachment, of not taking things personally.

2. DON’T SHARE TOO MUCH. It’s important for both the nanny and the employers to understand that neither are each other’s therapists. Both parties need to remember not to divulge too much information, especially personal information to each other. That doesn’t mean they can’t support each other. If something major is taking place within the family, like a divorce, or a death, of course the nanny will know and is affected by it and will help the family and especially the children get through it. However, it is wise not to discuss the following personal matters with your nanny:
a) Marital Problems
b) Financial Issues
c) Sex
d) Problems with a former Nanny
The nanny’s observations and opinions regarding such personal issues within the household should be kept to a minimum. The employer sets the example for what’s acceptable to share and what should remain off-limits. Unless it directly affects the nanny’s job, she really doesn’t need to know. Likewise, when it comes to a nanny’s personal life, the family shouldn’t ask personal questions that don’t pertain to her nanny responsibilities. This helps in preserving the separation between her personal life and her job.
3. SET BOUNDARIES FROM THE START. Although it is not easy, both the family and the nanny should strive to maintain the types of relationships that would be appropriate at an outside-of-the-home workplace. Since that invisible line easily gets blurred, define boundaries from the start, including them in the written Working Agrement. This helps everyone become comfortable with what is and is not appropriate. The result is a healthy and long-term relationship that is beneficial to all, especially the children. We realize this is harder than it seems. The relationship between Moms and their nannies is a veritable mine field, and even Moms who are head of HR stuggle with these issues, because, “She is home with my baby all day and I don’t want to rock the boat–it’s really not that important.” But it is important and it is harder than you’d  think. So remember that you can call our office any time with concerns or questions, or just to vent!:)
Jenny Riojas

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