“I’m eating slowly, okay?” BSC#24 Kristy and the Mother’s Day Surprise (1989)

Guess which holiday this one covers? Several things are going on. For starters, the BSC puts together an outing for their clients the day before Mother’s Day so that the moms can have a day off. Stacey (who has no life, I guess?) comes to hang out in Stoneybrook just so she can help with the event. They take twenty-one kids to a carnival.

Meanwhile, two other Mom-related things are going on. Mary Anne’s all kindsa sad briefly on-and-off through the book because she has no mom. And Elizabeth keeps talking about babies and being mushy and weird. She and Watson adopt a Vietnamese toddler and name her Emily Michelle. And suddenly--because we all know that having a kid solves all your family problems--the Brewer-Thomases feel like a family and all is well.

Interesting Tidbits

Before I even start this one, this is something I was thinking about at work today. (You now have a vague idea of how boring my job is—I think about the BSC during work.) Kristy takes the bus to school because she lives out of the boundaries for SMS. I’m fairly certain that the school she’s supposed to be going to is called Kelsey. But who actually goes there? All of Kristy neighbors appear to send their kids to either Stoneybrook Academy (Karen, Hannie, Linny) or Stoneybrook Day School (Shannon, Tiffany, Maria, Max, Amanda, Bill, Melody, Bart). And of course, Abby and Anna go to SMS. This turns out to actually be relevant, because Kristy mentions everyone in her neighborhood going to private school.

The cover: I’ve looked at this cover probably 100 times before for various reasons. And not until today did I ever notice that the boy on the right in the green striped shirt is playing with the girl in the skirt’s hair. What an odd choice, Hodges Soileau.

 

Oh no, I have to stop wearing layers. I’m dressing like Dawn!

I’ve always wondered about Kristy wearing a visor at meetings. She says she likes to look like she’s in charge. But the only people who ever see her at meetings are club members and maybe Claudia’s family. And they all know she’s president, so why? (That’s totally rhetorical, because it’s just a power trip on Kristy’s part.)

Claudia spelling: Jessi finds M&M’s in a box labeled ‘pastils and charcaols.’ (Interestingly enough, M&M’s are written as M and M’s in one spot, and then M & M’s two paragraphs later.)

Kristy’s so thoughtful. Everyone’s discussing at to get for Mother’s Day, and MA says she doesn’t have to worry about it. It gets all awkward and Kristy’s like…we don’t know what to say. “Sorry we have moms and you don’t?” Could have been worse. She could have actually said that to MA, not just thought it.

This book is hella full of ham-fisted foreshadowing. Karen and Andrew and DM are acting like brats at the dinner table. Even Sam is being bratty—he tells Karen her epidermis is showing, for cryin’ out loud—and Elizabeth and Watson are sitting there talking about how beautiful their family is and how lucky they are to have all these great kids. (Humorously, when Elizabeth asks how everyone would feel about another brother and sister, the older three are all for the idea of her getting preggo. I don’t know many high school kids who would welcome a baby into their family with open arms…if only because it’s proof that their parents are having sex.)

Best ending to a family dinner ever: Boo-boo comes in with a still-living mole he’d caught. My cats can’t even catch bugs for the most part. (Dobby thinks that if he meows at them enough, they’ll fall into his mouth. Or something.)

Aww, sad foreshadowing. Kristy notes that Mimi seems slower and older these days. Ultra mega sad face.

OMG…it’s the I’m Awesome necklace! It’s one of the moments in BSC fashion that I just never forget. Because we all know that if you have to tell people how awesome you are, you’re really not awesome at all. Sorry, Dawn. (BTW, I love the fact that Kristy wonders where she got it and then says, “Probably California.” Because apparently, that’s where the narcissists all live. The cool ones, anyway.)

 

BTW, found this. Dawn would probably like it:

 

Claudia spelling: Babbysat (yay, that one’s my favorite!) waht (twice), wher, discovred , printending (pretending ???, twice), circos, thight, glas, anser, probelms. She also uses there for their, bake for back and clone for clown. The last one is pretty funny; she says that Jamie was printending (still ???) to be a clone.

What’s with AMM and little kids messing up the lyrics to songs? I remember distinctly one book where I think it is Max Delaney who keeps singing my hysle cat instead of my high silk hat. In this one, DM keeps singing about iceboards instead of icebergs. That kind of makes sense. But Jamie is singing Home on the Range and gets most of the lyrics wrong. I can understand a kid not understanding a word or two in a song because I’ve done that myself. But Jamie’s silly lyrics make absolutely no sense.

Kristy’s mom cries when she gets her ‘surprise’ invitation. Kristy says it’s like she was watching Love Story or Brian’s Song on television. Seems needlessly specific. How many ten year olds in 1989 had seen either of those movies?

Jessi’s really super excited to meet Stacey…because she sleeps in her old bedroom. To me, that would be more freaky than anything else.

Ooh, more foreshadowing: Stacey’s excited to come to Stoneybrook because her parents have been arguing.

The meeting with Stacey in it is actually all awkward. Mal and Jessi don’t know how to act around Stacey; Stacey’s all wistful for living in Stoneybrook; Mimi comes wandering in, looking for a cow. (I did not make that last part up.) Finally, as a distraction, Kristy says, “I wonder what my mom will look like when she’s pregnant.” And Dawn replies, “Like she’s going to tip over.”

And we’re back to talking about how Claudia and Stacey met by running into eachother again. I like that version of events better than the one in last week’sbook. Although, at my middle school, it would have been more like, “Bitch, don’t be trying to copy me!” and then a cat fight because they were wearing the same outfit. Kristy even suggests they were mad at each other because each was trying to be the coolest.

Funny moment (to me): When they get to the carnival, Karen of course wants to go in the haunted house. It’s decided that Andrew, Archie, Suzi and Gabbie are too young to go in. Jenny opts out also, because the house is dirty. Last time I checked, she’s the same age as Andrew and Archie and Suzi’s actually older than she is. I guess Kristy (who didn’t want to invite Jenny and keeps saying EW in regards to her) just wanted to point out how prissy she is?

Mallory refuses to let Margo ride any of the rides because of her motion sickness. She finally relents and lets her on the merry-go-round. Margo repays her by barfing all over her shoes. (When they eat lunch, Kristy tells her to eat slowly. She says the title line about half an hour after everyone else is done eating.)

Poor Shea. Karen has a crush on him. Run, Shea, run!

Interesting. Mal knows a lot of songs that she uses to keep the kids focused on something. Many of them were ones we sang at Girl Scout camp, but quite a few didn’t seem like songs little kids would know. I always knew tons of kiddie songs growing up, and songs like “The Ants Go Marching” (which Mal starts with) always work best because you don’t have to know all the words, just the general gist. We used to use that one, “Herman the Worm” and “Found a Peanut” for that purpose. But “Hey-ho, Nobody Home”…I used to sing that whole series in a round with a bunch of seventh graders at camp, but I wouldn’t expect seven year olds to know it.

Claire’s Mother’s Day card says Happy Moths Day.

Mary Anne’s thirteen and she just thought of giving her dad a Mother’s Day present? You’d think some adult might have suggested that by now.

David Michael, after finding out about Emily Michelle: “But I guess a little sister will be okay. I mean, I’ve already got one, and she hasn’t killed me yet.”

Okay, here it comes. My rant.

I have two adopted cousins. One of them was adopted in much the same way EM would have been, in the same time frame. She was two years old and adopted from Korea in 1987. And my aunt and uncle paid thousands of dollars, were on a waiting list for things to clear up—legal issues, etc—for several years before they were able to adopt. And then they had to fly to Korea to claim her and spent several weeks there before even more legal red tape was sorted out.

Watson and Elizabeth have been married for less than a year. They never left the country—someone brought Emily to them. And while there are countries where you don’t have to go to pick the child up, you’d think they’d want to if they could. And even though they claim they’ve been trying to adopt for a while, they find out about Emily one day and get her the next. My aunt and uncle found out about my cousin and went to get her several months later.

Now Dawn’s in on the act of misheard song lyrics. She sings Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ “the girl with kaleidoscope eyes” as “the girl with colitis goes by.” And while, according to a book I own, that is actually a commonly misheard lyric, how has Dawn ever heard of colitis?

Outfits:

Mallory: SMS sweatshirt, jeans with zippers on the legs (remember when those were cool?), gold hoop earrings

Jessi: jeans, leotard, gold hoop earrings that match Mal’s

Mary Anne: black and white checked skirt, matching hair bow, (no shirt I guess? Way to go Mary Anne!), necklace with her name spelled on it (and probably her number…after all, she’s shirtless!)

Dawn: dress, plaid high-top sneakers, I’m awesome necklace, four different sized hoop earrings

Claudia: dress, red tie, socks that were red, blue and purple, spider earrings; blue shirt, blue and black leopard print pants tied at the ankles, purple high-tops, mega accessories

Kristy: jeans, sneakers, turtleneck, sweater; jeans, collie hat, t-shirt with a picture of Beaver Cleaver on it (REALLY?), SHS sweatshirt

Stacey: pink jumpsuit, white t-shirt, jellies (for chasing kids around in? Bitch, please. Those things would chafe your feet raw. There’s a reason no one wears them anymore!)

New characters:

Emily Michelle Thomas Brewer (2)—27

Next week: #25 Mary Anne and the Search for Tigger, where we get to delve into the problems of a family we don’t get to see too much—Logan’s.

“We’re moving to Connecticut, Stacey, not the prairie.” BSC #0: The Summer Before (2010)

Okay, so obviously this is not book #0. But I didn’t want to mess up my system here.

As the brilliant title tells you, this is the story of the summer before the BSC started, leading straight into book #1 (I mean, they overlap.) Each girl has her own story, with Kristy, Claudia and Mary Anne’s combining in places and Stacey, who is still in NYC, is off on her own.

Kristy: Deals with her feelings about her dad being absent…and Watson being present. Hopes her dad will show up for her birthday

Mary Anne: Goes on her first baby-sitting jobs. Finds a box of her mother’s things in the attic and tries to learn as much as possible about her.

Claudia: Has a few dates with a boy named Frankie…whom Janine has a crush on. Feels distant from Kristy and MA.

Stacey: Deals with Laine. Moves to Stoneybrook.

Interesting Tidbits

They always describe Kristy as a slob, and yet, on her last day of sixth grade, she cleans her locker out—with actual cleaning supplies, not just by sweeping everything into the garbage can.

Kristy’s family has hoagies whenever Elizabeth and Watson go out. I love it. It actually sounds New England.

I kinda love Richard’s note to MA on the first day of summer vacation. I get that he wants her to check in any time she leaves the house, and it’s not too much to ask for her to do some laundry. But he also wants her to check in when she gets up in the morning (to make sure she didn’t die in her sleep, I guess?) Then he tells her to make sure to eat breakfast and lunch (because she might forget to eat?). And then he adds, “P.S. Have fun!” to the end of the note.

Mary Anne mentions American Girl dolls, bringing the stories into the present day. I don’t mind when they change money references or things like that, but this one feels off.

Janine: “School is my world, math feeds my soul.”

I can understand the Goldmans, who live next door to the Kishis, letting Janine and Claudia come over to swim every now and then. But can you imagine the liability of letting Claudia have a birthday party and invite a bunch of teens the Goldmans’ don’t know to come over?

Heh. Claudia muses over why it’s ‘Goldmans’ instead of ‘Goldmen.’

Claudia spelling: She is writing a ‘geust list’ for her birthday party. She has some boys and some ‘grils.’ (Most of the characters are familiar: Pete, Dorianne, Howie and Emily, but there is also Kurt, Darnell and Polly.

Stacey is eating meatless tofu sausage. I don’t remember her ever eating tofu before…

Mistake? Watson has an honor roll sticker on his car, and Kristy says Karen just finished kindergarten. But Karen is in kindergarten while Kristy’s in seventh grade, at least at the start. She gets skipped up a grade during that year.

Kristy says Watson has an enormous Charlie Brown head. Which I find more than a little hilarious and totally not the way I pictured Watson at all.

Kristy, Mary Anne and the Pikes play “tail trail,” which I have played many times but never called that. We usually played the geography version and made that awful old joke from Married…with Children. (“Alabamer…Daddy, R!”) It seems like a very stupid game to play with a bunch of kids too young to really spell, though.

Naked mole rat…someone’s been watching Kim Possible. (I've never even seen that, but I know what a naked mole rat is because of it.) It's the animal that wins the game of tail trail.

You can tell you’re on the east coast when they start advertising back to school sales in August. We always started school in mid-August in the Chicago suburbs and here in the Kansas City metro, the kids go back a week or two before that.

Mary Anne decides to hold a “Kristy Day” celebration in honor of Kristy. She starts listing people to invite and includes Jenny Prezzioso, although I’m fairly certain that in the original books, they don’t babysit for her until book number 4. Also, Jenny apparently adores Kristy, which is funny considering that Kristy tries to avoid sitting for her on a regular basis.

So far, two cars have been mentioned—the Kishis’ and Frankie’s parents—and they’re both station wagons. You’d think SUVs would be more realistic in 2010.

On moving day, Stacey asks if there are diners in Stoneybrook. (The title quote comes from this conversation.) Didn’t her parents take her to the town and show her around? I know I would have done that if I had a twelve year old. Show her what to expect a little bit. They apparently waited until the day they moved in to do that.

Stacey’s worried about bears in her backyard. Okay then, city girl.

I’m trying to figure out why Kristy’s the only one in her family to have a problem with her mom dating Watson. I figure, DM’s never had a dad, so he likes having a dad figure in Watson. And Sam and Charlie are older and a little more mature and have realized their dad’s never coming back. But Kristy’s old enough to remember her dad and young enough (and hopeful enough) to wish that he’d come back into her life. She keeps imagining her dad will show up for her birthday. And of course he doesn’t.

Isn’t it convenient that no one showed up to Kristy’s fifth birthday party and the same thing happened at one of Claudia’s birthdays? I wonder if that actually happened to Ann M. Martin or something.

Heh. The Kristy Day banner says “We Love You Kisty,” even though Claudia wasn’t there to help make it.

Janine really is smart sometimes. She’s mad when Claudia starts dating Frankie, but she gets over it. And when Frankie dumps Claudia, Mimi suggests Claud should make up with Janine. Janine’s like…I was really just mad because I knew I could never get him.

Kristy and Mary Anne used to play under a tree when they were in Elementary school. Mary Anne because she hated recess and Kristy because Alan thought the tree had cooties or something….

Stacey McPerky. Almost as good as Hottie McStudly, which I saw on a soap opera around 2003 and still use to this day. (Because I am *that* lame, I actually googled it. In addition to where I used it in a fanfic, a transcript of As The World Turns, May 6, 2002 popped up.)

Even though two weeks ago, Stacey and Claudia met by running into each other (wearing off-the-shoulder sweatshirts), they meet at lunch this time. Stacey sits down at the table with Emily (who was her student guide) and says, “I’m Stacey. I’m from another planet.” She can’t remember anyone’s name but Claudia’s when they leave and the two of them meet up after school and walk home together.

Outfits:

Mary Anne: floral capri pants, blouse, sandals; checked pedal pushers, lavender baby-doll top, pink-frilled swimsuit

Kristy: SHS Varsity Soccer t, cutoff jean shorts; too small swimsuit

Claudia: billowy black pants, patterned shirt tied at the midriff, black tank top; bejeweled green engineer’s cap (noooooo!), decorated bell bottoms, chunky bracelet, big earrings and apparently, no top

Janine: jeans and a t-shirt with Albert Einstein and the words “E=mc²”

Next week: #24 Kristy and the Mother’s Day Surprise, where I will wax philosophical about overseas adoption.

“What do you know about bulking up?” BSC #20: Kristy and the Walking Disaster (1989)

They should rename this book “Let’s make fun of Jackie Rodowsky again!”

The little editor’s note at the end of the book makes it clear that Ann M. Martin wrote this book because she “had fun” writing about Jackie. He’s written like a cartoon character, but he’s so nice and sweet that the BSC can’t help forgiving him for the disasters that happen around him. The title of the book is kind of mean, because Jackie’s actually a decent player. He’s just klutzy and messy. (I am going to keep track of every accident he has though.) Kristy has another one of her “brilliant ideas.” (Cue Blair Warner from The Facts of Life.) Because there is a whole bunch of BSC clients who want to play softball but are too young or scared to try out for Little League, she starts Kristy’s Krushers to fill the void. As she mentions about 5 million times through the book, the average age of the players is 5.8. Kristy meets Bart Taylor who also has a similar team (although his players are older) and the Krushers play the Bashers. They don’t win, but they prove they’ve got team spirit and guts. It’s like watching reading Rudy. And Kristy develops a krush on Bart.

Interesting Tidbits

Cover love! Other than Kristy and Jackie, I have no idea who these kids are supposed to be. They’re all kinda adorable though. (But a rather large proportion are blond…)

 

Mary Anne brings Tigger to the meeting, and he keeps distracting everyone by being adorable: playing with ribbon, sitting in a shoe. Then he completely disappears…only Mary Anne doesn’t notice for a while. He turns up on Janine’s computer.

How does Amanda Delaney know so much about Bart? Does she know his brother or something?

Kristy does math: She figures half of boys are normal and half are jerks, while in her neighborhood, half of both groups are snobs. So Bart has a twenty-five percent chance of him being a decent human being. (I’m surprised she thinks half of the boys her age are normal.)

I’m trying to figure out why exactly most of these kids can’t join t-ball or other softball teams. Not Little League necessarily, where you’re expected to have at least a little talent, but a lot of communities have less-competitive softball teams for kids. It’s not like Kristy and Bart were the first people to come across the idea that kids who aren’t particularly talented might still like to play.

Jackie “oopses”: Makes a giant mess trying to make pink lemonade; threw a baseball into the neighbor’s gutter; knocked over some stuff in the garage; tripped on a shoelace.

Kristy decides that twenty kids is enough. I can’t imagine any thirteen year old wanting to take on twenty kids by herself voluntarily, especially when one of them is a toddler. (My niece is two and a half and she’s tenuously potty trained and is a handful all by herself. Good thing Gabbie Perkins is so angelic, right?)

Also, shouldn’t she need permission slips and legal documents? Watson and Elizabeth could be sued up the yin yang if one of these kids breaks a bone or gets a concussion while playing, which is always a possibility.

In this story, Hannie is seven while Linny is still eight, and Buddy is still seven and Suzi is still four.

Kristy makes a list of questions that need to be answered such as “Where can we practice?” and “How often should we meet?” The final question is about whether Bart likes her. She presumably shows the list to Watson, as he helps her find answers to all the other questions. I’m really hoping she erased the last question.

Ugh. This is embarrassing to write, but when I was a kid, I would have been with Karen. I would have hated that the team was Kristy’s Krushers because it’s not proper spelling. You all have to know how much it’s killing me to agree with Karen on anything.

Claudia spelling! First off, I announce with much glee, that she and Mal are babbysitting. Mal is presumably sitting right next to her as she is writing, as it’s a joint entry, and yet she spells her name as Mallery. How did Mal not correct her? Especially since later, when she says that Claire is compertive, Mal corrects that to competitive. (She also uses expect for except.)

Nofe-air! Nofe-air! I’ll buy that Claire throws tantrums when she strikes out or when her team loses or something, but Mallory says she throws them when she watches ball games on television, too. What the #*$@? That makes zero sense.

Kristy should have thought about how she was going to sign for Matt before she had him join the team. There must be books out there specifically on how to sign for sports. Heck, there’s a book on how to sign every curse word imaginable. I almost bought it myself. They keep signing stuff like “monkey” and “oven” instead of baseball terms.

More Jackie “oopses”: gets his gum stuck in a catcher’s mask; knocks loose a tooth, which Claudia then has to pull out; breaks a window in the school.

I think it’s funny that Kristy is grossed out by loose teeth. I happened to love losing teeth. I was still losing molars when I was Kristy’s age—I remember one just fell out of my mouth in eighth grade grammar class—and I didn’t get my adult canines until I was nearly twenty.

Unintentionally humorous. Jessi is sitting in the stands with Marnie Barrett, who is two. She’s feeding her Cheerios like she’s a nine month old. Marnie doesn’t really talk and is essentially a baby. Kristy mentions how much stuff you need with a two year old. Yet Gabbie, who is only slightly older, is like a mini-five year old, with a vocabulary, who would never sit in a stroller eating Cheerios.

I’ve always wondered why Haley, Vanessa and Charlotte never asked Becca to come cheer with them. I know she’s supposed to be shy, but so is Charlotte, and she’s into it.

I love Haley. The Bashers show up at a Krushers’ practice to check out the competition. One of them distracts Bart so they can all be rude about the Krushers players. They call Jackie Pig-pen and Gabbie a baby. They call Jake fatso and then, when Matt makes a loud animal-type sound, they call him a dummy loud enough for everyone to hear. Haley gets in the boy’s face and says, “That ‘dummy’ is my brother and if you call him a dummy one more time, I’ll personally rearrange your face.” Not only is she Matt’s protector, she’s only too ready to punch boys in their faces. She’s the girl I wanted to be at that age.

I love that whenever Watson sounds like a sentimental sitcom dad, Kristy says he sounds jerky. What kind of jerky? Beef or venison? If he were really being jerky, instead of saying stuff like, “It doesn’t matter if you lose tomorrow as long as you try your hardest,” he’d say, “Kristy, you jackass…[insert something rude and unpleasant here.]”

The title quote comes from the scene where Charlie jokingly tells his brothers and sister to bulk up before the game, so they start carbo-loading or something.

Sam and Charlie must be so popular with their classmates. “What did you do this weekend?” “I ran the refreshment table at my sister’s little kid softball team’s game….Why are you laughing?”

More Jackie: he is ‘testing’ a bat when it flies out of his hands and knocks over the refreshment table. A cake flies off the table and ends up covered in lemonade. (Sam, Charlie, Jessi and Dawn save the rest of the baked goods. I’m surprised Dawn was willing to save something with processed sugar in it); nearly hits the pitcher with the bat while batting.

A very true sentence: “Karen just cannot be subtle.”

One last Jackie moment: he knocks over a lamp while talking to Kristy on the phone.

New characters:

Jake, Laurel and Patsy Kuhn (8, 6 and 5)—33, 31 and 30

Bart Taylor (13)--38

Outfits:

Kristy’s coaching outfit: jeans, Krushers’ tee and sneakers and collie cap (jeans do not seem very sporty and even cover Kristy agrees.)

Next week: Because the next book is another Kristy (#24), I’ll be popping back/forward in time a bit to do The Summer Before. #24 will be next after that, followed by #25 to take us out of the month of February.

“Most kids want to keep a dog or cat. All you want is a bed sheet.” BSC #13: Goodbye Stacey, Goodbye (1988)

So, Stacey’s dad’s company is closing the Stamford branch of their business and transferring him back to New York. It’s apparently too far to commute (despite the fact that Abby’s mom does it later on), so they’re moving back to NYC. Stacey’s all conflicted; on one hand, she’s happy to be going back to The City, but on the other hand, she’s leaving behind Claudia, the club, Charlotte and a lot of other positives.

The BSC helps out by throwing the McGills’ yard sale and then using the proceeds to throw a large going-away party for Stacey…and inviting all their sitting charges.

Interesting Tidbits

I’ve never understood Ann M. Martin and her editors’ obsession with hyphens in words. Why is it baby-sitter? Also, why does good-bye have a hyphen on the cover?

That said, I always get the cover of this one confused with the cover of #28, which is basically the same thing happening in reverse. Same station wagon, awesomely colored harvest gold. (My friend Tracey’s parents used to have one just like it, only it was maroon with wood paneling. Like Stacey, Tracey moved away on me. Unlike Stacey, we did not make Tracey a banner.) This IS the one with the banner, though. It’s rather sloppily made and not up to usual BSC banner standards.

 

First mention of the Kristy uniform! Also, Kristy wears the visor for what I think is the first time ever.

Stacey wonders if her grandfather is sick. I remember a mention of her various aunts, uncles and cousins, but not grandparents. Most of these girls really don’t seem to have relatives unless it serves a storyline purpose. There’s Nannie, of course, and all of Kristy’s other relatives from the wedding. And Mimi and Peaches and Russ. Jessi has lots of close-knit relatives (including Aunt Cecelia). There’s Mal’s Uncle Joe, Dawn’s Granny and Pop-Pop and Mary Anne’s Grandma. Abby’s got a few relatives, too. Actually, I guess Stacey’s just about the only one without relatives most of the time. Never mind.

Stacey’s parents are trying to get her excited about the idea of moving back to NYC, so they basically bribe her with stuff like a larger apartment and tickets to “shows.” Stacey, for her part, is hoping that her parents will let her get charge cards. That…sounds like her.

Kids in books and on television are always suggesting that they stay in one place when their family moves away, by staying with a friend’s family. Stacey and Claudia suggest it here, and Brenda and Kelly suggest it on an episode of Beverly Hills 90210. They even actually do it on Glee (Sam moves in with Kurt and Finn.) I can’t even imagine suggesting this in real life because who would want to take on the legal, financial and parenting responsibilities of someone else’s kid?

Stacey actually thinks she will miss Kristy’s gross lunch comments after she leaves. I think that’s stretching things just a little too far.

The day Stacey and Claudia met, they pretty much ran into each other. They were both wearing off-the-shoulder (there’s those hyphens again) sweat shirts. I’ve always wondered about that. Flashdance, anyone? Do you wear something underneath, or just let your bra hang out?

Dawn is trying to be cool by wearing one earring. Keep trying, sweetie.

Oooh, Sharon’s being messy! There’s a can of creamed spinach on the couch and a doormat and screwdriver on the living room floor.

Mary Anne is spelled as Mary Ann at one point.

This cracked me up. Stacey’s mom can’t close a carton of books, so Stacey flings herself on top of it like it was a suitcase that wouldn’t zip.

Claudia spelling! Secrit, spys, Jordin, Byran, reglar, Malary, becuase, nieghbers, poeple, strang. (Can you tell it’s a job at the Pikes’?) Also, to for too, its for it’s, and there for they’re.

Ooh, another mistake. The Pikes are playing SAs (I always loved playing spy as a kid, too) and Claudia is hunting in the back yard, trying to find all the kids. She finds Claire and Margo behind a bush, for example. Jordan is up in the elm tree, while Adam and Byron are in the ash tree. Later, she says that Adam and Jordan in the ash tree can see into the neighbor’s bedroom window.

Mallory’s concerned about her brothers’ “inversion of privacy” of the neighbors, since they’re trespassing and setting up a tape recorder. Nicky records from the tree and only catches one thing: the neighbors saying they’re going to have ‘courgettes’ for dinner. Nicky suggests this means children, causing a Pike family panic (until Mal looks it up and learns it’s zucchini.)

Mistake #3! During the panic, someone refers to the neighbor’s accent: “‘That sounds like a regular old French accent,’ I said, but nobody heard me.” That’s probably because Stacey wasn’t actually there. Just Claudia and Mallory.

I don’t believe that people in California don’t have yard sales. That doesn’t sound right. I’m sure that someone, somewhere, in the history of the state of California, has had a yard sale.

This line is appropriate: “Kristy liked Boo-boo much better asleep than awake.” Boo-boo always reminds me of an extremely fat cat I used to know named Satan (yup.) He would sit on top of the fridge at my friend’s cousin’s house and swipe his claws at anyone who tried to open the fridge door.

Poor Mrs. Porter. She’s so lonely and desperate that she actually invites Kristy and seven bratty kids over to have lemonade with her. You’ve got to wonder if she knows about all the Morbidda Destiny stories. She cackles and winks at Kristy, so it’s almost as if she heard that Karen thinks she’s trying to get them to drink “witch potions.”

If you were moving to New York, supposedly never to move back to town again, would you want a going away party full of babysitting charges? Yeah. I didn’t think so.

Pun time! The BSC gets a special cake just for Stacey that is something she can eat because it’s sugar free. She replies, “That’s so sweet!”

“Good lick Stasy. Have fun in New Yurk.” It’s not Claudia spelling; it’s Margo.

Anastasia Elizabeth McGill and Dawn Read Schafer. ‘Nuff said.

The title quote is what Stacey’s dad says in response to the banner the BSC hangs on the house.

One last Claudia spelling. She writes Stacey a letter for the car ride that she hopes will keep her “amuzed.” Other spelling: wirth, freind (repeatedly), couldnt .

Wow, this is a short entry. Not too much snark involved. Sorry.

Outfits:

Kristy: jeans, turtleneck, sweater; jeans and blue sweatshirt; jeans, blue turtleneck, blue and white striped sweater

MA: oversized sweatshirt, jean skirt; navy minidress, pink sash, blue tights, black ballet flats

Stacey: blue stretch pants, white sweatshirt with stars and sequins; jeans and old gray sweatshirt

Claudia: purple and white striped body suit, gray “jumper-thing” (way to be specific), purple push-down socks, black ballet slippers; purple belt with telephone buckle (I would have LOVED to wear this outfit when I was a kid.)

Dawn: short kilt, large red sweater, red socks, yellow tights, red beret (I HAD this outfit when I was a kid, minus the beret.)

Next week: We skip forward ahead a little bit to #20, Kristy and the Walking Disaster, and the introduction of Kristy’s sorta-boyfriend, Bart.

“We are babysitters, not magical, flying boys.” BSC #12: Claudia and the New Girl (1988)

Why did I hate this one so much as a kid? I don’t think I ever made it past chapter five before. It’s really not so awful. Anyhoo, Claudia meets the titular new girl, Ashley Wyeth, who thinks art isn’t just a hobby—it’s a way of life! She compliments Claudia as an artist and Claud starts skipping BSC meetings and get even farther behind on her homework than normal. The BSC members, backing up what I said last week about them being a clique, get mad at her and behave in ways that seem out of character for them but that are realistic for thirteen year olds. Claudia tells Ashley she likes to live “big” and not have a narrow focus on her art. She gets an honorable mention in an art show for a half-finished sculpture of Jackie Rodowsky and seems to think she can keep Ashley as a friend (although I don’t think she’s mentioned again until book #85.)

Interesting tidbits

The Cover. I capitalized Cover because, the tag on the photo, it says Claudia might give up on the Club—and it’s all the new girl’s fault! I realize Club is capitalized in the name of the BSC, but when it’s by itself, I don’t think it deserves capitalization. This scene almost sorta happens in the book. (That’s Archie Rodowsky with the girls.) Also, regarding Ashley’s outfit…I went through a phase where I wanted to dress like that, but couldn’t afford to.

 

Aww, the book is dedicated to the readers! I feel loved!

Heh. I kinda like this part. Claudia’s not paying attention in English class. First she wonders about a fly, and then about fly family reunions. Her teacher catches her not paying attention, and Claudia says she feels powerful because she seems to have the power to ruin her teacher’s day.

Speaking of English class, it is full of Newbery winners—my favorites! Claudia said she read Sarah, Plain and Tall (which, it should be noted, is probably at a second grade reading level). Claudia hasn’t been keeping up with the reading because they’re discussing The Westing Game and From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Honestly, she should LOVE those books! They’re mysteries, and excellent ones to boot.

Does Claudia ever spend time in the ‘resource room’ in other books? In my high school (and in most of the ones I’ve worked in) ‘resource room’ was code for ‘special education assistance.’

Mimi says the second she met her husband, she knew she would marry him. That’s really sweet.

Holy crap, there are a lot of outfits so far. I do find it sort of odd that Claudia and Ashley get dressed up to go to art class and sculpt, which tends to be a messy endeavor.

I can’t decide what’s so funny about Claudia psychoanalyzing people based upon their art portfolios, but I definitely see some humor in it. Maybe because it’s a complete counterpoint to the fact that she’s in remedial math and thinks pharaoh is spelled farrow?

Claudia makes fun of Archie’s name. Nice. Then she accidentally makes Shea cry. I want her to come babysit at my house!

More Kristy lunchtime grossness: apparently, this day’s school lunch looks like a squirrel that got run over. (Claudia refers to the lunches as revolt-o. I am going to start referring to all disgusting things by that term.)

I can almost understand Stacey getting jealous of Claudia spending all her time with Ashley. It’s very age-appropriate to worry that your best friend could get stolen by someone else, especially given that Stacey’s only lived in town for a year and kinda gave up all her other friends in favor of the BSC.

Myriah is six in this book. Later, she goes back to being five, which she remains for the rest of the books.

The Perkins girls have stuffed animals named Mrs. Xerox and Mrs. Refrigerator, which they have covered in makeup. Dawn has to drag the two of them—also covered in makeup—out to the elementary school because Jeff got in trouble. Myriah offers to give both Jeff’s teacher and Jeff himself makeovers while they are at the school.

Ashley decides to sculpt an inanimate object, which she explains to Claudia is something “not alive.” Claudia assumes this means she’ll sculpt dead things, which makes me think of animal carcass artwork…which I’ve seen before. (Really not attractive looking or smelling.) Instead she sculpts a ‘noble’ fire hydrant that wins first place.

Claudia doesn’t seem to be too astute. She can’t figure out her friends are mad at her, despite the fact that she’s stopped sitting with them at lunch and has missed 2 and ½ club meetings—until they start leaving her passive-aggressive notes all over her bedroom. And in the club notebook.

Stacey keeps making fun of Ashley’s bell-bottom jeans. As if they’re any worse than 99% of what Stacey wears. But then she cries over Claudia ditching her. Again, age-appropriate and semi-realistic, as is the passive-agressiveness.

The opening quote is something Kristy says—appropriate, given she’s the one to play Peter Pan later on. Mary Anne cries in sympathy to Stacey’s tears, then can’t stop crying. The others start suggesting happy thoughts for her to pull it together, which leads to the Peter Pan reference.

You know Dawn is mad at Claudia for missing meetings, not just because she makes up a childishly mean song about her, but because she volunteers to help eat all of Claud’s junk food.

I had to look up how to short sheet a bed. Despite the fact that it shows up all the time in books, I’ve never done it or had it done to me.

Finally! It’s a flippin’ Claudia book and we made it to chapter 13 without having any of her awesome misspellings (other than farrow.) Freinds, Aslhey (really?), explian, apologise, aplogise, (in the next sentence after the last one, too!), speling (ironic), abot, Ballons, Wrinkel, carfuly, scupture (twice), sclupture. She also spells her art teacher’s name, Baehr, as Bear, which is logical.

Best moment of the whole book: Claudia calls to talk to Kristy and Karen answers. She starts blathering on about old Ben Brewer and Boo-Boo and ghost hypnosis. (I am NOT kidding. I wish I were.) Instead of listening to her, Claudia totally cuts her off.

More real Newbery winners: The Twenty-One Balloons, which I think I’ve read but can’t remember the plot of, and A Wrinkle in Time, an Ann M. Martin favorite, which Claudia actually enjoys.

Claudia makes friends with the BSC again by writing a really lame poem that makes Mary Anne cry. (There’s a shocker, right?) Stacey (again, when did she get to be funny? They must have dropped that in the later books) says, “Lunatics!...we have a club full of fools.”

How does Kristy not know what a mentor is when Ashley says she’s Claudia’s art mentor, yet she knows what apoplexy is?

Mistake! One of the BSC’s classmates is named Mari Drabek. She’s mentioned in several other books. This might be her first appearance; I’m not sure. In any case, when they say that she got third prize, her name is spelled Mary.

Outfits! Lots! Sorta!

Ashley: hiking boots, long pink-flowered skirt, loose blouse embroidered with flowers, silver bangles, braided hair not held in place by anything, six different earrings; puffy white blouse, long blue-jean skirt, hiking boots, beaded bracelets, denim headband; petticoat and work boots; bell-bottoms; long dress with ruffles at the bottom; long knitted vest over a long shirt and a long skirt that all clash

Claudia: short pink cotton dress, white tights, ballet slippers, side ponytail, palm tree earrings

 

New Characters

 

Shea and Archie Rodowsky (9 and 4)--35 and 30

Next week: We say au revoir Anastasia in #13 Goodbye, Stacey, Goodbye

P.S.: For those following my fanfiction, The Boys of Summer should be posted in its entirety by the end of the month! I’m already in the planning stages of my next work within the same universe.

“I was turning into a wonderful Mary Anne puddle.” BSC #10: Logan Likes Mary Anne (1988)

I would like to interrupt my regularly scheduled snark to bring you a link my sister shared with me on Facebook this weekend. I have nothing to do with it, but I absolutely love it: http://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/the-definitive-ranking-of-baby-sitters-club-cover-outfit?s

Now, where were we? The title of this one makes the plot fairly obvious. Logan likes Mary Anne. He’s a new boy in town, from the South, and he’s a babysitter! Wow! Even more exclamation-pointy (not a phrase, but not going to stop me from using it) is the fact that Mary Anne likes him at least as much as he likes her!! They go on a sitting job together, but meetings are too awkward, so they invent the position of associate member for him.

Meanwhile, he actually gets Mary Anne to go to a dance, where she hots herself up in an extremely memorable fashion and accidentally tosses a shoe. Then she runs out of her own birthday party and gets a cat. This was one of my absolute favorites as a kid, despite how stupid this brief summary makes it sound.

Interesting tidbits

Let’s get this out of the way. For the longest time, I had a crush on Logan as he’s shown on the cover here. I think a lot of readers did.

 

Also, Jackie Rodowsky totally looks like a girl…and like he’s got as big of a crush on Logan as Mary Anne does.

Wisdom on boys from MA: “Obviously, with a boy, you can’t talk about bras or cute guys you see on TV.” Honestly, I’d think thirteen year old boys would like hearing about girls’ bras. And you never know…you might find a really good guy friend who likes hearing about cute guys on television. (*cough* Ducky *cough*)

First day of school, and Mary Anne is already bitching about gym class. This must be because Mallory hasn’t joined the club yet. She also complains about smelling like gym all day long because she has it in the morning. A) Better than having it right after lunch, like I did in eighth grade. One girl vomited during wind sprints one day. B) Take a shower, then!

Mary Anne suggests that Claudia and Stacey used to sit with a different group of kids during seventh grade lunch because Kristy is immature and likes to talk about how disgusting the lunches are. Mushroom and cream sauce resembles glue; macaroni and cheese smells like steamed rubber in Turtle Wax. You’d think sitting with a bunch of boys would mean more of that, not less.

That said, the joining of all the older babysitters into one lunch table officially makes this the book where the BSC becomes a clique, who must do everything together, have all the same friends and have all the same opinions.

You’d think Kristy’s mom would get in trouble for doing all the BSC’s copying for them on her work copier…something they acknowledge in an off-hand way by suggesting they should pay her.

Here’s what I always wondered when I was a kid. Did Logan actually do a lot of babysitting back in Louisville, or does he just make that up as an excuse to go sit with the BSC? I mean, he tells stories about sitting, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t just get roped into a few jobs here or there.

How exactly does MA wear hoop earrings? (She’s also wearing earrings on the cover of the book.) Maybe this is before it was decided that she didn’t have pierced ears.

The first appearance of the Ohdners! (Allegedly. Didn’t they show up in an earlier story? I’m going to have to go back and double check…)

Mrs. Rodowsky is named Mariel, and she wants Logan and Mary Anne to call her by her first name.

I’d forgotten about this part, but once I started reading it, I remembered it clear as day. Logan sees a picture on the wall—a piece of artwork Jackie did that his parents framed. It’s a pretty standard kiddy picture of a house. Logan’s like, “We have the same one in my house. I thought it was the original.”

Claudia spelling time! Hav, nise, siting (sitting), Gabie, comuty (community), droped, broght. She also uses bake for back.

I might have mentioned before that, when I read these books as a kid, I’d never seen Star Wars. I totally did not get the name Chewbacca or how appropriate it was for that dog.

I’m not usually much of one for shaggy dog stories, but there’s definitely some humor to Chewy (who got loose from Claudia and ran amok through the neighborhood) stealing traffic cone after traffic cone.

Okay, gang, let’s re-wind. (Sorry. Total Ghostwriter flashback.) Shy, quiet Charlotte Johanssen is seriously suggesting that shy, quiet Mary Anne would like a surprise party? Does she have no empathy?

I’ve always had a hard time believing that Richard, who less than a year ago was a total parenting hard ass, would agree to let Mary Anne go on a date with a boy he’d never met. I even thought that when I was ten….

Oh, heck yes! When I think of BSC fashion, I think of two things. One is the awesome outfit Claudia wore back in #2 that had clocks all over the tights. The second one is Mary Anne’s dance outfit, described in full below. Just say the words “skirt with cities on it” to any BSC fan and they know exactly what you’re talking about.

I also have a hard time believing this one: Kristy says that all the girls should all go to Mary Anne’s to help her get ready for the dance. In the later books, if that has to happen, they let the answering machine get the calls, but this is 1988. Instead (and this is the part I have a hard time with) she pays Janine a couple dollars to answer the phone. A) Kristy is okay with this from a business perspective? B) Stacey is okay with that from a financial perspective? C) Claudia is okay with that from a sisterly perspective? And biggest of all D) Why would Janine agree to that? (I keep typing okay is oaky, which spell check tells me is actually a word.)

Dawn, spending the night at Kristy’s? I’m surprised Kristy actually called Dawn. I know MA was busy, but were Claudia and Stacey busy too? (Sorry, that’s actually kind of mean. But I think this is one of few times that we actually see just these two interacting.)

Okay, anyone here think that they need to explain how the game Memory is played? Does anyone in the universe NOT know how to play Memory? Raise your hand and I’ll stop. (I remember playing TONS of Memory when I was really super young, because it was one game all three of us kids could play together.)

Aww, foreshadowing to #11 and the death of Louie. Legitimately sad.

Logan likes Meatballs. And spends nearly ten minutes explaining the plot of it to Mary Anne. Does he maybe have Asperger’s too? (All the Aspies I know—myself included—can give you way more details on their favorite topics than you’d ever want to know.)

I don’t know why I found this humorous: When Mary Anne tries to convince her dad to let her get a cat, he asks what they would do if they went on vacation. She says, “Get Mallory Pike to come over and feed it?” Now, she could have said Claudia, or been vague and said a neighbor, but she singles Mallory out. Mallory Pike, Cat Sitter.

Dawn ate birthday cake! Shocking! (Of course, she then complains that about the sugar in it.)

Outfits

Dawn: hot pink shorts, white tank top, island print shirt (MA says it is “snappy”); green and white sweater, stretchy green pants

Mary Anne: bright vest over white blouse; white skirt with city names and sketches of landmarks on it in pink and blue; pink shirt and sweater; white shoes with matching pink and blue

Claudia: tight black pants; white shirt with BEPOP on it; floppy blue bow in her hair

Stacey: white t-shirt, hot pink jumpsuit

Kristy: white turtleneck, pink sweater (Kristy in pink = wrong), jeans

New characters

The Ohdners, no names or ages, but they have two girls

Jackie Rodowsky (seven)—33

Logan Bruno (thirteen)—39

The Morgans, no names or ages, but they have four boys

Next week: is going to be like pulling teeth. I don’t think I’ve EVER managed to read the entire book for next week’s story. I may have to break it up in to three chapter segments (instead of my usual five chapter segments) but I will finish #12 Claudia and the New Girl. It will happen.

“I bet his idea of an amusing afternoon is balancing his checkbook.” BSC #9: The Ghost at Dawn’s House (1988)

As I stated in one of the comments on an earlier post, I didn’t hate this one as much as I expected to do. I think I had just overdosed on the books the last time I read it, as I had literally blogged the first eight of them in two weeks. So, while I don’t give it two thumbs up, it doesn’t get the two thumbs way down it did the last time I tried to read it.

Dawn is convinced there must be a secret passageway in her house (for unexplained reasons.) The BSC all hunt for one but have no luck, but a short time later, Dawn literally falls into a passage between her bedroom and the barn. She convinces herself there’s a ghost living in it (because, likely.)

Meanwhile, Nicky Pike’s allowed to wander freely as long as he stays within two blocks of his house. The BSC decides to hunt him down anyway and discovers he’s the reason that things keep turning up in the secret passage, rather than a ghost. (Although Dawn still believes in the ghost. Because she’s that special.)

Interesting Tidbits

The cover: the passage goes from under the barn up into the house, so why does the passage on the cover lead up? (Dawn’s actually cute here though…I used to have a shirt just like hers.)

 

You’d think that since Dawn and Jeff’s dad is on the other side of the country and they don’t get to see him often, they’d spend more than two weeks of their summer with him. Especially since they haven’t seen him since January and they aren’t old enough for jobs to get in the way.

Dawn watched European Vacation on the plane to California.

Oh, so this is the book where Claudia’s hollow book first shows up! I always wanted one of those when I was a kid.

I’d forgotten how the plots in these early books flowed from one book into another.#8 features, among the other Pike-related plots, the introduction of the idea that Nicky doesn’t feel like he fits into his family because the triplets don’t want to play with him and everyone else is a girl. This, of course, is a major plot point in this book. (They tried that again leading up to a couple of the super specials later on in the series, but it wasn’t nearly as effective.)

I’m looking forward to recording all the stupid places Sharon puts stuff in this one. Chapter two starts us off well: hedge clippers in the living room and glasses in the butter dish. (Since when does Sharon wear glasses anyway?)

Somehow, I doubt Mary Anne would actually be interested in searching for a secret passage, especially since she finds the idea scary. (Sure enough, she’s actually scared of everything later.)

Even stranger, I can’t picture Stacey being scared of searching for a secret passage. Or storms. Or whatever. Isn’t she supposed to be all New York sophisticated?

Knowing that the Perkinses are real, it always annoys me how perfect and precocious they’re portrayed. They’re multitalented, never fight, argue or have tantrums, and are adorable. It makes me want to vomit.

I’m embarrassed to admit that I use a bit that Mary Anne uses when sitting for the Perkinses. Gabbie draws a picture and MA doesn’t know what it’s supposed to be, so she says, “Tell me about it.” I use that one on my niece and nephew all the time, because my nephew’s still in that scribbling stage where his whole picture is done in one macaroni-and-cheese colored crayon and is a blob. (My niece is six. Her pictures actually look like something, but I’ve still been wrong about them before.)

Dawn and I have something in common: the fear of a kid getting kidnapped.

Real book: The Tailor of Gloucester, by Beatrix Potter.

I love how Dawn finds a secret passage and automatically assumes the house must be haunted because of it.

Ever notice how often Watson and Elizabeth go out on the town when Karen and Andrew are visiting? I guess they can only take Karen in bite-sized morsels too.

Old Ben Brewer. Yawn…Why does Kristy a) let Karen tell crazy ghost stories when the kids are already worked up and b) let Karen scare HER with same crazy ghost stories? I can buy Andrew and even DM getting worked up over them, but Kristy’s about thirteen. She should not be scared by stories told by obnoxious six year olds.

Dawn and Jeff eat in front of the TV—a rerun of All in the Family, which they to hate. (I didn’t ‘get’ the show as a child, but I love it now). Neither one of them is sure why they’re watching it.

I love the conversation between Dawn and Jeff about ice cream cones when she finally shows him the secret passage. She’s like, “Remember when Dad took us to Dairy Queen that one time?” They don’t realize there are different kinds of cones because they don’t eat ice cream, so they assume the cone they found must be really old (or at least, old fashioned.) I know ice cream cones aren’t exactly “natural” but they would biodegrade. It’s not as if that cone could be there for 100 years. And I’m pretty sure ghosts don’t eat, so how does Dawn think it got there?

I love that Jeff, who is three and a half years younger than Dawn (nearly ten), keeps trying to talk her out of the idea that the passage is haunted. Like she’s six or something.

Enter the Trip-Man. I’d forgotten that he got that nickname because Dawn joked that’s what his friends call him. (The title quote is something else she says about him.)

Dawn manages to freak Jeff out and they stack furniture in front of the door to the passage. You know it’s really sad when Sharon of the glasses in the butter dish has to be the voice of reason. (Not only that, she points out that ghosts can supposedly float through walls—and furniture.)

A+ for consistency…whenever olden-days Stoneybrook comes up, it is always spelled Stoneybrooke.

One of the characters in the Jared Mullray legend is Mathias Bradford. This is actually clever, as we all know that Claudia (and at this point, Mary Anne) live on Bradford Ct.

Claudia spelling: th for the (seriously? She can’t even claim that’s a tyop…) nigt, siting (sitting), thats, porgram. She also uses diner for dinner, but this is my favorite line: “lucy [sic] was an angle.” Yes, but is she acute or obtuse?

Even funnier: Mrs. Newton spells to Claudia. I’m surprised Claudia was able to understand.

For some reason, Jamie wears pyjamas rather than pajamas. (I double checked. This is not a British edition.)

Jamie’s full name is James Anderson Newton, as we learn when Claudia gets very upset with him.

Ooh, foreshadowing! Mary Anne thinks a guy in a magazine is cute! And yes, ladies (and gentlemen, if any are reading), it’s your favorite hunk you’ve never seen…Cam Geary!

I have no idea why, but that reminds me of a line from one of the other books. I can’t remember which one it is, but it’s either a Mary Anne or a Dawn. They’re talking about names for some reason, and Dawn says, “For the longest time, I thought Logan Bruno was strange name.” Anyone know which book that is?!

Dawn calls Mary Anne a dope. After she (Dawn) scared the crap out of her (MA) in the secret passage.

You know Vanessa’s upset because she forgot to rhyme her words.

I like this: occasionally, Dawn can’t tell the triplets apart. She says things like “said one of the triplets.” If she’s only known them for a few months, babysitting them here or there, it would make sense that they’d occasionally blend together.

You’d think smorgasbord at the Pikes=gross food time, but they disappoint. Adam and Jordan have fried baloney while Byron eats fried PBJ and Nicky eats a potato chip and banana sandwich.

Someone needs to explain to Nicky that going into the Schafers’ barn—and the secret passage—without permission is trespassing.

This must have been before the map of Stoneybrook was created, because Dawn lives two blocks away from the Pikes.

The BSC is going to watch movies, and they all suggest REAL ones! I love it! Ghostbusters (Kristy), Sixteen Candles (Mary Anne), The Parent Trap (Dawn), Star Wars (Claudia) and Mary Poppins (Stacey). Dawn and Stacey are both already established as loving their choices, although it would have been funny for Dawn (the ghost fanatic) to want to watch Ghostbusters.

Wait a minute. Since when is Stacey funny? Stacey: “They’re the ones who are going to get pimples.” Dawn: “Let’s get them.” Stacey: “Pimples?”

There just was not enough of Sharon leaving stuff in random spots for my taste in this book.

La-la-la. Happy ending!

New Characters:

Myriah and Gabbie Perkins (5 and 2)—31 and

Next week: We get to meet Mary Anne’s lovah boy (why don’t these girls talk like New Englanders?! Their parents should be pahking cahs and whatnot. And I can say that because my relatives in Rhode Island—just a few hours from Stamford—talk that way), in #10, Logan Likes Mary Anne