The Owens-DuPree family has earned Cultural Care’s 2017 Host Family of the Year award, and we could not be more excited! Their Brazilian au pair Andressa, who joined the family in August, submitted the following essay about her time with her two host dads and their babies. The five of them are quite the team.
Listen to why Andressa nominated her family for Host Family of the Year.
My first week here, I knew I could call this place home. We had such a great connection that we were teasing each other during the first week. In my first week, they took me to a Brazilian store and asked me to buy everything that I loved and that they should try, and we bought supplies to make dishes at home as well. We had Brazilian food for 3 or 4 nights. Patrick spent hours cooking different dishes and trying to make me feel welcome and at home.
We do many things together, we go to the movies, we attend concerts. Once they asked the neighbors to babysit so we could go to Six Flags together. We go hiking and do all sorts of fun stuff. I can talk about anything with them. I feel like they’re my friends because I can open myself about any topic and we will laugh about it together. We would stay up talking about all sorts of things until 1 or 2 am or even watching shows on TV.
My babies are the sweetest ones. Every day my when I go to the nursery and they welcome me with the warmest smiles and clapping my day starts wonderfully.
Andressa felt so welcomed by her host dads from the moment she arrived
Once I had such a strong cramps, and Patrick and Tim didn’t really know how to help me. Patrick called the neighbor and asked her what could he do to help me. She said: “Give her lots of hugs and chocolate.” So he went to the store, bought chocolate ice cream, rented movies, made brownies and gave me a blanket telling me to lay down on the couch. Tim tried to help me by giving me heating pads. They know how to be lovely and sweet in their very own way.
Andressa and her host babies
Tim and I share a taste for coffee so he would bring me Starbucks coffee every morning and now he makes a personalized coffee for me every single day. He puts my favorite chocolate under my door during the night. I can’t explain how sweet I think that is.
Recently we went to Disney. That was the best trip we’ve done together. We had so much fun—it was amazing. They bought me a special breakfast at Cinderella’s castle with all the princesses from Disney. There were even days that one of them would stay in the hotel with the babies so I could have more fun on the adult parks.
The proud winners of Cultural Care Au Pair’s Host Family of the Year Award
I love them, and I’m thankful of having them in my life because they are the type of people that hug me when I need a hug and give me support and caring. Once I was sad about myself and Patrick said: “We don’t like when you say this about yourself. We love you the way you are.” They are not perfect people but I learned that when you love someone, you love everything about them and overcome any problem that you might have.
I will miss each one of them so much when I leave but I’m sure that our friendship won’t have an end. I’ll do my best to keep in contact and still be part of their lives. The precious moments and times we lived together will be forever in my heart.
Click here to read about the 2017 Au Pair of the Year award winner.