About Vanessa

Reviewed on 9/22/2015

Dear potential family, My name is Lindsey, and I m writing this letter as an enthusiastic recommendation for Vanessa V, our son's nanny for over a year. The ONLY reason we had to say goodbye to Vanessa was because we somewhat unexpectedly relocated out of NYC to Chicago this summer. If it weren't for a new job for me we would be staying in NYC and our son would continue to spend his days with Vanessa, who he loves dearly. I worked initially as the VP of a large non-profit organization in Manhattan and now as the Head of School for a private school setting up to open in Chicago, and my husband works in finance, so our jobs called us to be out of pocket and away from him 5 days a week and some evenings. Vanessa is flexible, responsible and on-call for us, and she cared for him full-time. It is most important to me that he is cared for and loved and surrounded by people I trust and respect. And I found that in Vanessa. I consider her a friend and confidante, and she feels like part of the family! We originally hired Vanessa because of her extensive experience and knowledge working with kids and especially infants, as well as her excellent references (call any of them they are glowing!). And we hired her because of her positive energy, obvious joy working with kids, and natural connection with our son when they met during the interview process. All of these things ended up being instrumental in her work with him every day, but it is her love and care for him, and the love and joy he has when he saw her every morning that made hiring Vanessa the best decision for our family when I was going back to work after maternity leave. Vanessa started caring for him when he was 3 months old. As a first-time mom, it was really important to me that we hired someone who knew about infant care, breast and bottle-feeding, and especially baby sleep and play. Vanessa read books, made kind recommendations based on other kids she had cared for and what she read, and helped us get his napping, sleeping and eventually solid-food eating on a roll! He became a great and predictable sleeper under Vanessa s care, and after spending over a year with her day to day he s grown into an independent, funny, sweet 18-month old. Vanessa speaks Spanish with him during the day, and his first two words were in both languages he said dog in English and bottle in Spanish. Vanessa would take him to music and gym classes, the museum, parks, and set up playdates with other nannies she met through classes in the neighborhood. She s also an education student studying to be a teacher (she took night and online courses), and she volunteered with kids in the Bronx while living in NYC on weekends. Vanessa has a gift for working with kids and teaching, guiding and being a great role model for them. If I can be of any help in your nanny-search process or if I can answer any questions or provide more detail about our experience working with Vanessa. Thank you for reading and considering Vanessa. As you can see, we love her and want her to find a wonderful family to work with! My best, Lindsey