Need a baby-sitter?

Save time! Call:

The Baby-Sitters Club

and reach six experienced baby-sitters.

Karen Brewer, President Suzi Barrett, Alternate Officer

Nina Marshall, Treasurer Myriah Perkins, Secretary

Claire Pike, Vice-President

Jenny Prezzioso, Assiociate Club Member

Suzi Barrett may think her little sister and brother were pains but there's no bigger pain than one of the Baby-Sitters Club's new clients, Mandy Fisher. She whines and acts like a total spoiled brat! This is Suzi's job, but can she handle it? Maybe with a little help from Mandy's cute big brother she can!

Suzi Meets her Match

Chapter 1

"Help me! There's a wild animal chasing me!" screamed my ten year old sister, Marnie Barrett. My step-brother Ryan, who's her age, followed her also screaming, "Help us!"

"You are not being chased by a wild animal Marnie and Ryan. Cut that out Buddy!" I called to my brother Buddy. He's fifteen and I guess he could pass for a wild animal.

My name's Suzi Barrett, and I am thirteen years old and I'm entering eighth grade in the fall. Me, my mom, Buddy, Marnie, Ryan, and our three other siblings, Madeleine who's twelve, Lindsey who's sixteen, and Taylor who's fourteen (Taylor's a boy), my step-dad Franklin (who is actually Taylor, Ryan, Lindesy, and Madeleine's dad) our dog Pow, and I live in Stoneybrook, Conneticut. It was July now and boy was it a hot day. Buddy, Marnie, Ryan, and I decided to go outside even so. Buddy had been chasing Marnie around making wild animal calls. How imature for his age. I was lounging in the lawn chair on our back porch reading the July issue of Seventeen.

Hmmm. I have a very long life story to tell you and it's not going to be easy either. A long, long (and I mean) long time ago, my mom and dad got divorced. Then it was just Buddy who was seven, Marnie who was two, and me (I was four) and my mom and our dog. We lived in a pretty small house together. My mother was very unkempt and not at all organized. She used to get confused a lot and forget things. Then, the Baby-Sitters Club changed our lives for the better. A sitter from California named Dawn Shafer helped us out around the house. I was very glad we had her around. You could say I grew up with the Baby-Sitters Club.

Then a year later, a lot of things changed. I didn't actually like the changes either. My mom wanted to get married to a man named Franklin Dewitt. He already had four children of his own. I didn't like Ryan, Taylor, Lindsey, or Madeline that much. Well, my mom ended up getting married and we moved into a bigger house. Guess what though. Another sitter from the club was my mom's bridesmaid, one of my favorite sitters in fact, Stacey McGill. Well my life's pretty confusing now too. I still don't like having so many people around. I don't know how my friend Karen Brewer puts up with it.

I guess you could sort of say I was baby-sitting my little siblings even though Buddy's older than me and he was home. It seemed to me like I had to baby-sit him too. (My other siblings were out at the moment.) I love baby-sitting and so do my five other friends. We're all in that baby-sitting club that was started a long, long, time ago. I guess I should tell you the story of the Baby-Sitters Club right about now since I didn't before.

When I was only four years old, four girls named Kristy Thomas, Mary Anne Spier, Claudia Kishi, and Stacey McGill started the Baby-Sitters Club. It was actually a lot more than just a club. To them it was more of a business. The club grew over the years though, and they aquired and lost members. Among them were Dawn Shafer, Jessi Ramsey, Mallory Pike, and a girl named Abby Stevenson. Now they're all grown-ups and not long ago, my friends and I started up the club again. I'm glad we did because we're kind of passing on the tradition of baby-sitting. Also, I get lots of jobs.

Another thing about me is that sometimes (and only sometimes) I can be very forgetful. I hate being that way because it usually hurts my friends or the people we sit for. My mom is very forgetful too and often leaves our house in a mess and forgets to tell us things, but we always help her along and we help clean the house with her.

I glanced at my watch. It was time for me to get going for our Wednesday club meeting. "Hey guys, I gotta go! I'll be back at six!" I called to my siblings. They waved bye and I hopped on my bike and rode over to Claire Pike's house.