Claudia.

Chapter 1.

By now some of you might be wondering a few things. You might be wondering what the Baby-sitters Club is. You might be wondering who the rest of my friends are. Oh, and I guess you might be wondering who I am.

Well, I'll start with that last part. I am Claudia Kishi. I'm thirteen years old and I'm an eighth-grader at Stoneybrook Middle School. So are my friends Stacey McGill, Mary Anne Spier, Kristy Thomas, and Dawn Schafer. Mallory Pike and Jessi (short for Jessica) Ramsey, 'are sixth-graders at SMS. (They're best friends.) And we are the main members of the BSC. Kristy Thomas founded the club. It was her idea to get together a group of her friends who like to baby-sit, and for us to hold meetings three times a week. While we're meeting (in my room — club headquarters), parents call and line up sitters for their kids. They know they're bound to find a sitter, since when they phone during a meeting they reach all seven of us. Our club has turned into a business, and it's very successful. It's fun, too. My friends and I love children, and we've had some interesting sitting adventures. Plus, we've had lots of good times together as a club. We've had sleepovers and pizza parties, studied together, gone shopping together, and taken trips together.

Now we would soon be off on another trip. ToNew York City . The home of museums, theaters, the Hard Rock Cafe, Bloomingdale's, the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, Macy's, South Street Seaport, Lord and Taylor, Madison Square Garden, Saks Fifth Avenue, and HIM. McKenzie Clarke.

Even though it was only Wednesday, and the BSC members wouldn't be leaving on their wonderful two-week'trip until Saturday, I had started packing. My suitcase was open on my bed. And already it was as cluttered and messy as my room usually is. Except that my room is cluttered with art supplies — paper, paints, pastels, canvases, an easel, and boxes of "stuff." My mother says I am a pack rat. So what? Pack rats are probably very nice animals. And I bet they're prepared for anything. I know I am.