Work abroad as an Au Pair in Villeneuve-de-Marsan, Nouvelle-Aquitaine France for >1 year in Emma's family

Hi There!
We are the family and have moved to France on the 20th July this year! There is Ross (My Husband), Me (I’m Emz), Arthur (6) and Scarlett (3). We have lots of animals; we 2 basset hound puppies (Ella and Blue), a cat(Tiger) and two tortoises (Aslan and Seraphine). We also have chickens, peacocks and goats. We all like being outdoors a lot of the time but also sitting in and watching movies or playing games. We have a number of horses and two ponies. There is absolutely no need to get involved with the horses, and there are no horses for riding, but as we have a few of them it helps if you are not frightened of them! We breed jump racehorses and so in the Spring there should be a couple of foals arriving! Ross runs the stud and also trains riders in eventing, showjumping and dressage in the UK and in Europe. When the lockdown ends, we have a few friends who are professional eventers that will come and stay, with or without their horses. Emma has a consulting business and a tiny technology company. She works 4 days a week during the week. Our new home has not been lived in full time for 10 years and so we need to do a lot of tidying, unpack and see what is there. We also have a gite that we need to get ready to rent out to guests and a large garden that needs work so it is going to be fun! There is lots of space outside. we have managed to re do the walled garden with vegetable and fruit beds but its a work in progress! We have a number of volonteers from all over the world that come and help out from time to time.

We are looking for someone to live as a part of the family and to help out with general things but not the horses. To help us learn French and help us with French culture and understanding. We like to think we are good fun and there is always lots going on! It will be 5 hours per day Monday – Thursday, Friday babysitting (not to start off with it will be Friday am instead) and Sat am. Sundays will always be off, our current au pair prefers Saturday off and that is fine :-). If we are going horseracing and think you might like to come, or something else we will ask you and if that is not on one of the work days we will swap the days around to make it work.

Basically the help needed is to us a hand with Arthur and Scarlett when they are around either with or without us, they are in School during the week bar Wednesday. So help might be coming out in the garden to help with them and play with them while I am planting something, coming to the shops with us, getting breakfast ready, putting some washing in, tidying their rooms, helping with a form which needs translating, helping us with our French and so on. So a family helper. Scarlett and Arthur are great fun, Arthur likes tractors and dinosaurs and his pony Rachel; Scarlett likes princesses, unicorns, sports cars and her pony Charlie Magic. As we haven’t been out to dinner since Scarlett was born it would be nice if our au pair feels confident enough (and we do) to after a while be able to go out for dinner sometimes in the local town while they babysit. There is no driving required. In terms of getting about there are buses from the local town, a train station 20 minutes away, our current au pair uses blah blah cars and that seems to work well with us dropping her off at the correct point.

We live just outside (5km) the centre of Villeneuve de Marsan village/small town in Landes, we are 20 minutes from Mont de Marsan with its 120 hectare lake and about (I think) an hour or so from the beach. If you go to the visit lands site on the internet it will tell you all about our area. Mont de Marsan has excellent train connections everywhere.

With very best wishes,

Emma, Ross, Arthur and Scarlett x