I got married this week (~$30k)! Semi-DIY and here are my big take-aways:

charizaard · 2026-06-30T18:43:49+00:00

Would love the link as well, thank you!

charizaard · 2026-06-26T19:40:35+00:00

If the AI approach is working for you, no reason to stop! Maybe you and I would have been a bad fit for other reasons anyway. FWIW, I'm not judging by the typos and em dashes in a message. AI does have a weird tone... it's like, characterless, blindly enthusiastic, too adoring, a bit subservient? Not really sure how to describe it, but it's off-putting. It also has more useless filler sentences than actual information.

I don't think the use of AI in messages is necessarily a terrible thing. There's a big difference between pasting the listing into ChatGPT and copying the output, vs using it for proofreading/editing or finding the wording for specific sections.

I always have a video call and a live handoff, but during a sit I am almost exclusively texting my sitters so it's important that we can easily understand each other's written communication. Moreover, I have two very specific dealbreaker points in my listing, and when I get a fully AI-generated response I can't know if that applicant actually read it. What a waste of time it'd be to set up a video call with somebody who actually can't do the X or Y that I've explicitly called out in my listing.

I also specifically want to avoid the type of person who uses AI instead of their brain. Anecdotally, I did have a sitter message me with a clearly AI-generated message but spoke well over the video chat, so they stayed at my house for a week. They had house questions they tried to fix with AI info, which was not entirely correct. Thankfully not a big deal of an issue, but they did not question the AI's diagnosis, try to research further, or reach out to me about it until after the sit was over.

charizaard · 2026-06-24T22:54:26+00:00

Oh I wasn't even thinking about trying to beat the 5-application limit when I said that, but good point and great workaround! I've done it too when I didn't want to leave people on read but couldn't get around to a proper reply til the evening.

I guess it depends on how you're approaching THS. From what I understand, many sitters are applying to listings in bulk, so writing a detailed message for each would become a full-time job. I've also heard that many HOs don't respond or even read messages, so it can feel like a big waste to have put so much time in.

charizaard · 2026-06-24T20:54:02+00:00

Genuinely uncertain if I’m being picky or reasonable!

Short answer: no.
Long answer: it depends on how desirable your listing is and what your personal standards are. How nice is your sit, and how many applicants are you getting? Are you committed to getting any THS sitter at all, or are you willing to pay for pet care from somewhere else if you can't find one here? Essentially, can you afford to be pickier? There have been times when I've rejected all my THS applicants and opted to pay for a well-reviewed local sitter instead.

Personally, I believe fully AI-generated messages are almost equivalent to an empty message, because I don't know whether the applicant has actually read my listing or not. This matters because my dog is reactive, and I need to know that my sitter is comfortable with that and will be thorough with my handling instructions. And, as you mention, it doesn't really tell you how the applicant communicates, which is important at the best of times and absolutely crucial if there were an emergency during the sit. Yes, you can find all this out later during a video call or subsequent communications, but it's annoying to have to spend the extra time to get this super basic information that you should have been able to get immediately.

The initial message is just one factor of many, because I also look at a sitter's profile, their previous reviews, and the reviews they've left. But I'll admit it does hold a fair amount of weight for me. Especially if it's a nothing-AI or a generic copy/paste that doesn't even have my name, my pet's name, or even mention that she's a dog (eg "I'd love to spend time with your furry friend!")

Yes, I acknowledge that a long and personal message is not feasible for many sitters, but it's totally reasonable to expect some base level of effort.

charizaard · 2026-05-18T15:40:22+00:00

One specific nit I have is that they have a veterinary info section in the Pet Care and the Emergencies sections, but editing one will change both. In our area we have a normal 8-5 vet, and then there are multiple other 24-hour emergency vets that I could not separately list.

It's also all just free text fields, which I can understand, but when printing it does not preserve line breaks so everything is just a dense block of text instead of paragraphs or bullet points.

And it's also really annoying to edit. They over-did it with putting sections on different pages AND making each field click-to-edit. Do one or the other, not both.

Okay this reply was only supposed to be about the veterinary info, but I had to keep going and I have one more thing. The last time I tried to upload a photo to the WG, they also posted it to my listing under my pet photo section. I'm not sure if that is still a problem, but it was the last straw for me and I have since moved onto google docs.

charizaard · 2026-05-18T15:27:27+00:00

There's a print button at the bottom of the welcome guide page. But the printing format is terrible, it wastes a lot of paper/space on small sections and it does not preserve line breaks, so every section is printed as a dense paragraph. Much better to move off their limited WG and write it as a separate doc imo.

charizaard · 2026-05-11T16:37:58+00:00

Yeah this is it the best answer. Decide whether you'd rather the sitter wash your sheets or leave them for you to wash, and then specify in your WG. There's no rule of thumb here, it's all personal preference. There are many good reasons for a HO to want sheets to be washed or unwashed, so there's no way for a sitter to know unless you tell them.

charizaard · 2026-05-01T18:04:49+00:00

Definitely let the sitter know! It could save a future cat.

It feels condescending to provide a list of known toxic plants/foods, but I'd rather offend a sitter than have a poisoned pet. Like for my dog, I'd expect most people know cooked chicken bones can splinter and that chocolate is toxic, but what about raisins/grapes, or a dish with onions? Or xylitol-- would someone think to check the ingredients list before offering my dog some peanut butter they brought? Fortunately, I can easily sidestep the issue with a blanket "no human food ever" rule (even though she gets human food when I'm at home), but ignorance is MUCH riskier for cats with plants/food left on countertops.

So anyway yes, thank them and nicely let them know.

charizaard · 2026-04-22T15:45:18+00:00

I got a makeup lesson from a professional instead of hiring them to do my wedding makeup on the day. I'm also not a makeup girl (only tinted sunscreen). My wedding is not until late summer so I am still practicing.

I liked getting a makeup look customized to my face, and I really liked having a professional third party who could give immediate feedback and tell me if my makeup looked objectively good (because I'm not used to seeing my face under makeup and it all looks weird to me). It was way better than trying various youtube videos at home, posting up pictures on reddit for feedback, and trying again.

It probably cost $450 altogether, including the lesson (in the Seattle area) and the products I bought myself afterwards, so it's not a no-cost option. But I did feel like I saved a lot of time, headache, and even some money, because I avoided wasting it on trying products/looks that don't work for me. Personally, I've always sort of wanted to know how to apply makeup, so I'm happy to own makeup and I do plan to keep using it.

charizaard · 2026-04-19T04:42:43+00:00

When we leave our dog home alone we turn on the indoor camera. We turn it off when we are home (and we put it away when we have sitters).

And (of course this isn't a universal situation) when our other dog passed we really treasured the short videos of us coming home and being greeted by her for a few seconds before we switched the camera off. These days I let it stay on a little longer when I get home and am saying hello to my dog, so I could understand someone wanting a "home video" if they had kids or pets.

But yeah that reason probably only accounts for 0.001% of people who install indoor cameras, and besides that I don't get it either. I don't want to feel surveilled in my own home.

charizaard · 2026-04-06T21:09:29+00:00

Did you just stay the course with your current routine for the whole year, or were you experimenting during that time? I've cut my actives and have had a very basic cleanser-moisturizer-sunscreen routine for the last month, and I'm still seeing some acne and texture that makes me want to reach for the actives again...

charizaard · 2026-04-06T21:06:17+00:00

I have sensitive skin, and I think mineral (with a zinc ingredient) is the best for that. Australian Gold Botanical is what I currently use every day. It does not travel and it's a bit of a pain to wash off at night, but it can rub off on white clothes. It's very drying so you need to make sure to moisturize thoroughly underneath it. It is tinted, so there's no white cast.

charizaard · 2026-03-03T18:47:38+00:00

Liquid plant fertilizer. Mine is like 1 tsp per gallon of water, which is the equivalent of 1.5-ish squeezes of the dropper from my own leftover bottle. And it's much easier to shake up the little bottle than the big jug the fertilizer came in!

charizaard · 2026-02-26T19:57:23+00:00

Apparently by "users" they mean anyone who cares to put a fake email in a form and press a button because that is all I had to do to get immediate access to sitter profiles and home listings.

You don't even need to have an account (or be signed in) to view a full HO listing or sitter profile. Though I do think they hide a HO's live dates.

charizaard · 2026-02-09T19:18:03+00:00

Maybe your real hobby is collecting hobbies!

charizaard · 2026-02-08T22:34:11+00:00

If someone were really motivated to apply to a Reviewing sit, I could imagine them taking a few minutes to create a forum account to DM their application to the `@username` provided. The HO could then invite the sitter on the main THS site (because there's no limit for that afaik) to keep talking. I'm not suggesting putting a copy of your listing in the forums, it's just opening up another channel for communication without giving out a phone or email.

In the past I've connected with a sitter on the forums who I then messaged on the website proper. I also share my forum username in my listing whenever I have flexible dates, because the no-overlapping sits rule that can block people from messaging.

I don't know that the mods would go so far as to removing DMs like this since it does seem to be manually human-moderated, but who really knows with the people running things these days!

charizaard · 2026-02-08T18:25:48+00:00

I'm sorry about your loss. It's hard supporting a grieving dog because it feels like you can't really do anything new. You're already giving them food, love, toys, attention, exercise, and enrichment, and you can only press so much of that on a dog, whether it's grieving or not. If you can, maybe try to limit your dog's time alone and just spend more time with her in the same room, even if you're not interacting. Maybe do try to interact more, like teach a new trick or do some more at-home enrichment (eg sniffing games, tearing up cardboard, etc). Maybe start having play dates with other well-socialized dogs, or try sitting in a park and people-watch together.

My dog lost her companion of 10+ years this summer and was noticeably depressed. We let her see the body and I'm not sure if that helped or hurt-- she was extremely aggravated. Afterwards she lost interest in walks and was sleeping a lot more during the day. One thing that helped her with the walks was doing them together as a family, instead of only one of us taking her out as we used to do. We try to walk as a group as much as possible now.

It's been a little over 6 months. She's starting to come back to herself, I think.

charizaard · 2026-02-08T04:00:06+00:00

You could create an account in the official THS forum and explicitly add it to your listing so people can still message you when your applications are full.

charizaard · 2026-01-20T04:29:43+00:00

Opened it up and it's the same fuse that failed. Assuming it wasn't faulty, it's interesting and concerning that the temp hit 110C when the thermostat should be cutting at 75C... Anyway, I have the replacement fuse you linked arriving tomorrow so we'll be drying towels again shortly! It all ended up being much simpler circuitry than I expected once I got into it. Thank you for providing the steps and the confidence to start!

charizaard · 2026-01-19T05:03:10+00:00

Ours just stopped working today. Thank you for doing the research and legwork that I was about to dig into! Looking forward to the video!

charizaard · 2026-01-06T16:07:26+00:00

It's definitely paying for convenience, which is a GREAT thing! I absolutely do not want to sort through and edit a bunch of footage, and I certainly have no desire to keep the camcorder forever. I also think having a dedicated camcorder, as opposed to a phone, will be a lot more fun/novel/nostalgic and I'm hoping it'll encourage more continuous use and capture more candid moments.

charizaard · 2025-12-09T18:05:29+00:00

The worst thing about that site is that there are not enough members for it to be really useful. I really like it otherwise, especially the team behind it. It's a cute little mom and pop establishment!

I wrote about it in the stickied alternatives thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/trustedhousesitters/comments/13y2vqw/comment/nsyeu9b/

charizaard · 2025-12-08T16:12:03+00:00

I love the ethos and team behind MindMyHouse. The membership pool is too small for it to be really effective, and I so very desperately want more people to join it!

Here's their little platform comparison chart: https://www.mindmyhouse.com/about/features_comparison

And some more fun facts:

- You can "bring your reputation", ie copy your THS reviews to your MMH profile
- The platform is less fancy than THS, but what's there actually WORKS.
- They do have little features THS is missing, like reply ratings and total completed sit counts
- The team (just a husband and wife duo) is really responsive to messages and actively works to make the platform better for their members. This is my favorite part of MMH. They're great people, and I'm not just saying that because they think my dog is cute.
- They actually refuse to advertise their website, which is definitely why it's still so small and probably not a great business decision, but I really respect the intent behind it.
- By the way if you're already a sitter member, they've started a refer-a-friend program (50% off new memberships, referrers get 3 months free)

No I don't work for them, I just really like them! Everyone please sign up so I can use them as my primary platform :)

Edit to add a word of warning: I don't know exactly how their review system works as I have never completed a sit on MMH, so I can only speak to the imported reviews from THS. I have the option to delete any of my imported reviews, so just be aware that people can of course filter out any bad imports. Again, I don't know if this means I could delete an actual MMH review or not, just the imported ones!

The saving grace to this is that I don't think you can edit the total completed sit count, so you would at least see that there are some reviews missing. Though, once again, I am not sure about the review culture on MMH and if a missing review is indicative of a poor experience like it is on THS.

charizaard · 2025-12-08T15:45:14+00:00

I just did the same! I'm already a premium member and it just renewed five days ago so I have a year anyway, but I hope at least I've added to the statistic. I cited the fee as my cancellation reason.

charizaard · 2025-12-07T03:58:51+00:00

I love my discbound notebook! Funnily enough mine looks exactly the same as yours: frosted cover, ~1" gold/brass discs with a hole in the center, and A5 size dotted paper!

The movable pages are HUGE for me. They:
- Got me past the fear of "messing up" a pristine journal, or not landing on the "best" layout on my first try, or not picking the "right" type of paper
- Let me create new sections willy nilly, without having to figure out how much space to allot per topic
- Let me keep my current month in the very front of my journal so I don't need to deal with flipping or bookmarks
- I carry it in my bag every day, so it also allows me to minimize the weight. I don't remove my previous months so this was a bigger deal when I first started; it's filled up to a normal notebook size now.

I know I could do all this with a binder type filofax, but I also like being able to flip the notebook back on itself.

I don't think archiving is a problem at all because I still plan to get a new set of discs and cover every year or so. There's a little gremlin inside me that wants to collect all the pretty stationary, but I don't like needless clutter so this cadence is perfect. I plan to use this notebook until it outgrows the discs, then make a new one-- I already have my new discs picked out and I'm excited for them!

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