Thanks to The Nanny Diaries, which at press time holds at No. 4 after 10 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list, interest in nannies -- and the families on whose behalf they toil -- has skyrocketed. Readers nationwide are gleefully devouring the dirt on the decidedly non-nurturing parenting styles of the novel's Mr. and Mrs. X and the upscale Manhattan circles through which they swirl. Working nannies are equally intrigued by the book, though you won't find them lost in its chapters at the beach this summer. They'll be too busy slathering their charges with sunscreen, coaxing the snarls out from their hair and soothing the sting of their sunburn, kissing boo-boos and getting more than just their feet wet during Mom 'n' tot swim sessions at the pool.

Nanny Sightings

Once you start to notice nannies, you see them everywhere. Certain benches at Rittenhouse Square attract nannies, much like the goat statue they encircle beckons the little ones whom the nannies supervise. Kids run and shout under the watchful eye of their caregivers, who relish the opportunity to shoot the breeze with their associates.

It's the same at parks, play groups and other kid-friendly environments throughout the region. So says North Philly native Susanna N., a working nanny with 19 years' experience caring for the children of Society Hill and Queen Village families.

"Nannies know other nannies, that's for sure," she says. "You take the kids to the park and you get to know the other nannies, as well as a few of the mothers, and you look forward to that interaction the same way the kids look forward to interacting with their friends. Parks and the like are like a nanny network."

"Nannying can be a very isolating job," says Debbie White, a just-retired "live-out" nanny (one who reports to work each day instead of living with the family) with 13 years of professional child care under her belt. "Like any job, it's good to get together with people who do the same thing you do. A nanny can always spot another nanny," she says. "We just know."

"I would never nanny in a household where I had to just sit in the house with the baby or kids all day," she says. "I like it when the kids and I can go out and take part in activities, go to the pool at the country club, or play group or whatever the plan may be."

White, who nannied across the bridge in Camden County, brings a decidedly suburban perspective to the role. Sidewalks take a back seat to highways in the 'burbs, where a nanny without a car can be as housebound as a finch with clipped wings.

Prosperous Pockets

Through his company America's Nannies, Bob Mark, president and founder, has been matching live-in nannies with families nationwide since 1984.

"In Philly, we primarily place in Chestnut Hill, the Main Line and parts of Bucks County," says Mark, who says that the top salary range for live-in nannies in the area is in the $500 to $600 per week range, including room and board, with entry-level nannies starting at $350 to $400 per week.

Wendy Sachs, president and founder of The Philadelphia Nanny Network Inc., reports a higher demand for live-in nannies, noting that "today's working moms and dads really need a live-in nanny who can work 11 or 12 hours a day."

According to Sachs, nannies are in demand in Philadelphia in neighborhoods such as Rittenhouse Square, Society Hill and Chestnut Hill, as well as on the Main Line and in parts of Delaware and Bucks counties. Sachs reports average weekly salaries (based on a five-day work week) of $400 to $500 for live-ins, and between $500 and $550 for live-outs. ŒLive-ins will work 11 or 12 hours a day, and live-outs generally between eight and 10," she says.

On the Books or Under the Table?

Since attorney general nominees Zoe Baird and Kimba Wood made headlines in 1993 for hiring undocumented immigrants to care for their kids, parents who employ child-care providers are generally more conscious of the legalities surrounding compensation and related issues. So are their nannies.

America's Nannies requires its families to provide a minimum of six paid holidays and one week of paid vacation. "Many families will participate in some form of subsidy for health-insurance coverage, although many still don't," says Mark. He notes that nannies can -- and do -- refuse interviews with families whose profile does not meet their insurance or other specifications.

While The Philadelphia Nanny Network requests that families provide benefits including salary, room and board for live-ins, paid vacation and health insurance, "unfortunately, we can't be responsible for enforcing the law when it comes to the issue of compensation," says Sachs.

Susanna, who requested that her name not be used for this article, is more concerned with her families staying in the city than whether her pay is on or off the books. "There is nothing worse than taking a position, working hard to get the relationship moving smoothly, bonding with the children, establishing a routine and finding out three or four months into it that the family is planning on moving to the suburbs. I learned quickly to add it to the list of questions I ask families when I am considering a position."

A city nanny through and through, Susanna suggests that, regardless of location or compensation method, the role of the nanny remains constant. And with that role can come challenges and hazards worthy of the next best-selling nanny tell-all.

Say What?

Every nanny has experienced or heard of at least one on-the-job horror story. The specifics range from the bizarre to the heartbreaking and everywhere in between. Mark recalls a multi-nannied Chestnut Hill couple with a pronounced aversion to spending quality time with the kiddies:

"A husband and wife insist on hiring two live-in nannies. Why? They did not want to spend one minute more than they absolutely had to with their kids. They worked these nannies like dogs, had zero respect for them as professionals, and provided them with a completely unsafe vehicle to transport the kids around in. It was a very bad situation, and after a few weeks we pulled the nannies out of there and told the couple there was no way we would work with them again."

Susanna has no personal horror stories ("I've worked for great families," she says), but she says one nanny friend, who also lives in Philadelphia, recently endured an unexpected at-home visit from her former employer, an irate stay-at-home mom seemingly bent out of shape by the prospect of a day alone with the kids.

"The nanny was not earning enough with this particular family to meet her financial needs. She talked it over with her employer and informed her that she was going to begin seeking another position and would be using her for a reference. The discussion ended on a good note, and the nanny started interviewing. She found a position she was interested in and provided her employer as a reference. The woman badmouthed the nanny when she was called for a reference, giving out information that was completely false and very damaging. The nanny provided many other references when she learned what had happened and was hired for the position regardless. The day after the nanny gave her notice, the same woman who had badmouthed her to her new employer showed up in the street outside the nanny's home, pounding on the door, yelling things like why wasn't she coming to work for her that day like always and causing a major scene by shouting, carrying on and so on, making it clear she expected Œher' nanny to report to her house as usual."

"I have heard everything," says Sachs, "which is not surprising. Nannies really get an inside glimpse into people's lives."

Sachs says one nanny quit a position because the father was verbally and emotionally abusive to his children. "We discovered that he was in anger management [classes] and counseling, but regardless, the nanny was very uncomfortable in that situation, and so she pulled out." In another case, says Sachs, a nanny left a position because she suspected the husband was abusing the wife.

And then there's the professional athlete with a thing about his live-in nanny eating food in the house on weekends. "Here's a well-known Philadelphia basketball player who decides he doesn't want the nanny eating in the house on weekends, when, as per her contract, she's not working," says Mark, "which is ridiculous, because she's a live-in nanny -- she lives in the house. Can you imagine anything so petty? When we explained to him that this was not an acceptable request, he turned his lawyer on us. I told his lawyer to go ahead and sue, because we'd be happy to provide the nanny's statement to Sports Illustrated, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The New York Times, and that his client should try to get some more endorsement deals afterward. The upshot was that the athlete apologized to the nanny -- who, by the way, was doing a great job with the kids and for the family -- gave her a raise, and everything went extremely smoothly for the duration of her contract."

Nanny, I Think You Move Me...

"I've heard of fathers hitting on the nanny many, many times," says Mark. "We also had a situation where the nanny was being hit on by a bisexual mother -- that one's not so common. And here's one I've only encountered once: The guy making passes at the nanny with the wife' s permission. She didn't want to be bothered and thought the nanny was a good option for him. Stuff like this is completely out of line, of course, and we got the nannies out of those positions as soon as they reported it to us."

Such a Big Homesick

Au pairs are young (if you're 27, you're already too ancient to be one) women and men from other countries who provide a year's worth of child care for American families in return for room and board, a stipend, the opportunity to sharpen their English language skills and soak up American culture along with taking six hours of credits earned at an accredited college or university. The experience can be wonderful for au pair and American hosts alike.

"I got so much more than I expected with my American family," reports Irmgaard (not her real name), who journeyed from Lithuania to Chestnut Hill to care for a 2-year-old.

"My family really went out of their way to explain the culture and work with me on my English," she says. "When I came to America, I had such a big homesick. My family helped me adjust, to feel at home."

Unfortunately, sometimes au pairs bring more than just a big homesick to their tour of the States. Cheryl, a West Philly mother of two who asked that her last name not be used, should know. She'd had a great experience with her first au pair and enthusiastically welcomed the family's second, an 18-year-old Austrian woman named Nicole.

Au Pair, You Move Me...

Cheryl's story: "My husband I both worked, and our kids were young, about 4 and 5 1/2 or so when Nicole arrived in October. She was good with the kids, we liked her, the kids liked her, and she liked us, and everything was working out. About four or five months later, I started to wonder."

Specifically, she wondered why her husband was so attentive to the au pair. "He was 39 and this was a young kid of 18 from a completely different culture. It wasn't like they had a lot in common besides the kids," she says.

"He was a consultant and was between assignments around this time, and I was working every day. When I asked him if anything was going on, he denied it, but I felt our relationship was not good at this point and I pushed for marriage counseling. Later, when I found out the extent and length of their affair, I realized that while he and I were at counseling sessions, where he would pretend that our marriage was great, and that I must be crazy for even asking if anything was going on, Nicole was happily watching our kids, acting or maybe even believing, that everything was just wonderful and perfectly normal."

Sickeningly, says Cheryl, her kids even once walked in on the au pair and their father intimately entwined in their parents' bed. Her daughter, wise beyond her years at not yet 6 years old, later told Cheryl that she didn't want to tell because she knew that what she and her brother had seen would "make Mommy sad."

Cheryl's husband finally came clean after Nicole had returned to Austria. He and Cheryl immediately split up and later divorced. He is now married to Nicole.

Cheryl was stunned when her former au pair sent the kids birthday presents from overseas, even sending cheery Christmas cards to Cheryl and friends of the family.

"It was like there was total disconnect there," recalls Cheryl. "She seemed to have no concept about the ramifications of what she and my husband had done to my kids, to me, to our family. For that matter, neither did he."

Suddenly single, with no option but to continue working, and with two pre-schoolers at home, Cheryl needed child-care help more than ever. She found it, and more, with the male and female au pairs who worked with her children in the years that followed.

"Some of my friends thought I was crazy for ever trusting another au pair, but I am so glad I did. Believe it or not, with the exception of Nicole and a male au pair from Ireland (who smoked in the house and was too fond of partying on South Street till near-dawn on work nights), I had overwhelmingly positive experiences with our au pairs and so did my kids," she says. "We still keep in touch with some of them, and my kids have great memories of the time they spent with our family."

Her advice to those considering the au pair route? "Be specific about what your expectations are. You have to be comfortable knowing that this is the person you are trusting with your kids. You also have to remember that these are young adults who are far from home, and understand the experience from their perspective as well."

Love Match

Lynne, a stylish single mom and co-owner of a Center City retail establishment, her almost 2-year-old daughter Olivia, and Olivia's nanny Alana have a very good thing going.

"Alana was 20 when she started nannying for us last year. I found her through word-of-mouth. She already had child-care experience, and it's worked out absolutely wonderfully for us all," says Lynne.

A big reason, asserts Lynne, is that "Alana does absolutely nothing outside of being with Olivia, and that's how I want it. When you think of it, is it better to have a nanny who does housework or one who spends her time with your baby? To me, but maybe not to some other working parents -- the answer is pretty obvious. Olivia and Alana do amazing things during the day -- play group, spend a lot of time outside in parks, hit the coffee shops and museums. Sometimes it seems like everybody in town knows Alana and Olivia."

"Alana is incredibly mature for her age, much more mature and level-headed than most people my age," says Lynne, a self-described "cool mom" of 40.

"People wonder if I ever get jealous of the bond between them," muses Lynne, "but the isn't that the best thing -- to have a nanny you respect and trust who your child loves and who loves your child in return?"

Until recently, Alana was a live-in, with use of a separate loft apartment unit in Lynne's Northern Liberties home. Since Lynne's recent move to Chestnut Hill, Alana, who did not want to be parted from her city haunts, has switched to live-out status. Lynne has cut back her work schedule, currently depending on Alana for child care about 25 hours a week.

"I know that eventually Alana will move on to other things, and that's how it should be, but for now, we have a great thing going," notes Lynne. "We get along incredibly well, but we found out that we don't vacation together well. Because we both want to have fun when we go away, it's more of a gray area. If we do it again, we're going to try really hard to lay out a schedule in advance. Scheduling, and establishing the boundaries of the relationship up front, are really important if you want to have a positive relationship with your nanny."

Who´s Watching Nanny´s Kids?

Not surprisingly, many live-out nannies have families of their own. Who is watching their kids as they spend long hours tending to the needs of someone else's children?

"That's an interesting question," says White, mother of two sons. "My husband and I worked it out with our schedules while I was nannying and the kids were younger, but every once in while I'd bring my younger son to work with me, and he would definitely be jealous of my relationship with the kids I cared for.

"The way I looked at it," she continued, "I had to work, and I liked nannying, and it was my job the same way their father or their friend's mothers had jobs. You have to look at it that way."

"I was very fortunate in that my mother was able to care for my children when they were younger and I was at work," says Susanna. She is mother to three, now

teenagers and adults, but “when they were younger,” she says, “I know they sometimes felt a little jealous of the children I cared for.”

“My own children always came first, and the families I worked for understood and respected that,” says Susanna. “If one of my own children was sick and needed my care, I would try to arrange a substitute nanny for the day. But regardless, if my children needed me, my employers understood that I needed to attend to them. If they didn’t, they were not a family I wanted to continue working for.”

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Professional respect is an issue with nannies. They often feel undervalued, and with good reason.

"Think about it," says Sachs, "upward of 70 percent of your child's waking hours are spent with your nanny. This is what parents should consider when they think about the benefits a qualified nanny provides to their family."

Mark, and the nannies interviewed for this story, agree wholeheartedly. "Nannies are professionals and deserve to be treated as such," says Mark. "I'm not interested in placing a nanny with a family who says they want a nanny but really expect a combination Mary Poppins, housekeeper, maid, cook and bottle washer."

"Before I developed a sixth, seventh and eighth sense about the kind of family I wanted to work for," says live-out nanny Susanna, "I made the mistake of taking a position with a stay-at-home mom. I found it very uncomfortable. Early on in our relationship, she left the house for the morning, and I spent the hours she was gone playing with and interacting with the baby, fed her her lunch, put her down for her nap -- at which point I finally sat down at the kitchen table to eat my lunch and read the paper. The mother came home, asked me what I was doing and wanted to know why I wasn't cleaning the silverware drawer Œor something' instead."

"I've since realized that working for a stay-at-home mom is simply a disaster waiting to happen and will not take such a position," Susanna adds.

Organizations like the International Nanny Association and newsletters like The Nanny Agency Advocate (edited and published by Bob Mark) are working to change the perception that nannies are simply glorified baby-sitters. It can be an uphill battle, says Susanna N.

"One of the negative aspects of nannying occurs when you come up against that perception -- and it's out there -- that you are simply hired help. If you entrust your children to me yet don't value my skills and what I bring to your children and your family, then I am not interested in working for you," she says.

The Biggest Lie

"The biggest lie in world," says Bob Mark, "is the line ŒMy children are my most precious possessions.' Why? Because children are not possessions -- they are people. Too often, the missing ingredient and the thing money can't buy is love."

Mark, who says he's working on a book about life in the nanny trenches, provides a telling example. "We had a couple who wanted to hire a daytime nanny, a nighttime nanny and a weekend nanny -- three nannies at one time for their Œwonderful, adorable, lovable 2-year-old daughter.' They explained that she was an accident, they'd never planned on another child this late in life. With their ŒIvy League degrees' -- and they went into detail, believe me -- and other accomplishments, the baby interfered with the way they'd planned on living their lives at this point. When I interrupted to ask why they hadn't released their child for adoption by a loving, nurturing couple who could love their child the way she -- or any child -- deserves to be loved, they became livid."

Wonderful Nannies, Wonderful Families

Though it's more fun to revel in the particulars of the unseemly antics of parents without a clue than to listen to heartfelt testimonials from nannies and the families they serve, countless strong and thriving relationships are commonplace.

"The most frequent complaint I hear from nannies is that they are underappreciated," says Sachs. "They say, ŒShow me some appreciation for what it is I do for your kids and your family.' A simple thank you, a compliment at the end of the day -- regular recognition like this is very important."

"The ideal situation for a nanny is one where both parents are working, they truly love their kids and enjoy spending time with them, and they need a nanny to facilitate the fact that they are both working," says Mark. "In such situations, the parents recognize and value the nanny as the true professional that she -- or he, though unfortunately, highly qualified male nannies continue to battle the misperception that they are not as nurturing as females -- truly is."

A qualified and experienced nanny will never lack for job prospects, say local nannies.

"When my last family decided they no longer needed a nanny as their kids were getting older, I had so many families wanting me to work for them," says White. "But I don't know. After 13 years, I was nannied out, for a while at least, and decided to take a break."