Her mother says half the change is due to the fact that Charlotte wasn't being challenged enough at school and needed to skip a grade (which she did) — and the other half is due to me! According to Dr. Johanssen, I helpedCharlotte learn a lot about herself and about getting along with kids. That makes me feel terrific. Also, it's kind of nice to be somebody's favorite person. (But it's scary, too.)

When I leftCharlotte 's, it was almost5:30 , so I ran straight to Claudia's house. The meetings of the Baby-sitters Club are held in Clau-

dia's bedroom since she has her own phone and her own phone number. Also for this reason, Claudia is the vice-president of the club.

The president is Kristy Thomas. Kristy was the one who had the original idea to start a baby-sitting club. (Kristy is full of ideas.) The sign of a good businessperson, my dad always says, is the ability to recognize a problem and find a way to solve it (a money-making way to solve it, that is). And that's exactly what Kristy did a year ago. She saw what a hard time her mother was having trying to find a sitter for her little brother, David Michael. Her mom had to make one call after another, looking for someone who was free. What Kristy thought was, Wouldn't it be great if her mom could find a sitter with just one phone call? And now our club provides that service. When somebody calls Claudia's number on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday afternoon between5:30 and6:00 , they reach Claudia (of course), Kristy, Mary Anne Spier, Dawn Schafer, and me, Stacey McGill.

We are the members of the Baby-sitters Club.

As I've said, Kristy is the president and Claudia is the vice-president. The secretary is Mary Anne. Her job is to schedule baby-sitting appointments and to keep track of the stuff in

our club record book. The record book is where we write down the names and addresses of our clients, important club information, and our sitting jobs.