Karen's Carnival

  For Linda Lannon

  with affection—

  and gratitude for holding up

  her end of the bargain.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1 Nothing to Do

  2 Here, There, and Everywhere

  3 The Great Idea

  4 Mommy’s Surprise

  5 Helping Out

  6 “Fight, Fight!”

  7 Enemies

  8 Potluck

  9 Games and Prizes

  10 Announcing … Karen’s Carnival!

  11 Dollars and Pennies

  12 Cotton Candy!

  13 Mary R. Sanderson

  14 The Town Thermometer

  15 Dinosaur Erasers

  16 The Carnival Begins

  17 The Witch at the Carnival

  18 Thirty-two Dollars and Forty Cents

  19 Hurray!

  20 Stoneybrook Playground

  About the Author

  Also Available

  Copyright

  Nothing to Do

  “What do you want to do today?” I asked my friend Hannie.

  “I don’t know. Nancy, what do you want to do?” asked Hannie.

  “I don’t know. What do you want to do, Karen?”

  “I asked first!” I replied. “I don’t know what to do.”

  Hannie and Nancy and I are best friends. We call ourselves the Three Musketeers.

  It was a Saturday afternoon. A really boring Saturday afternoon. My friends and I were sitting on the back steps at my father’s house. Usually, we can think of lots of things to do.

  But not that day.

  “Let’s play Going Camping,” said Nancy.

  “Nah,” replied Hannie. “We need too much stuff for that. Hey, let’s build a tree house.”

  “A tree house!” I exclaimed. “But we would need wood and nails and a ladder and probably Daddy.”

  Hannie and Nancy looked disappointed. “Yeah,” they agreed.

  “I know!” I cried. “Let’s go to the playground.”

  “What playground?” asked Nancy.

  “The one at Stoneybrook Elementary. Where David Michael goes to school.” (David Michael is my stepbrother. We are both seven, but we go to different schools. I go to Stoneybrook Academy. So do Hannie and Nancy. We are in Ms. Colman’s second-grade class.)

  “The playground is pretty far away,” said Nancy.

  “We’ll ride bikes, then,” I replied. “I know how to get there. Nancy, you can borrow David Michael’s bike.” (Hannie lives across the street from Daddy’s house. But Nancy does not live in the neighborhood. She lives next door to my mommy’s house. Her father had driven her here to play with us. So she did not have a bicycle.)

  “Okay!” cried Nancy. “Let’s find your daddy and ask if we can go.”

  My friends and I clattered inside. We did not find Daddy. We found Elizabeth. Elizabeth is my stepmother.

  Guess what. Elizabeth said we could not go to the playground. “It’s too far away. I cannot let you ride there by yourselves.”

  “Can’t Kristy come with us?” I asked. Kristy is my stepsister. She is thirteen years old and she is a baby-sitter.

  “Kristy’s not home, honey,” said Elizabeth. “Neither are Sam and Charlie. I’ll be happy to drive you to the playground, though. I bet Andrew and Emily Michelle would like to come, too.”

  “That’s okay.” I scuffed my feet. “Come on, you guys,” I said to Nancy and Hannie.

  This was the problem. I did not want to go to the playground with a grown-up and my little brother and sister. I wanted us to go on our own.

  Boo.

  Nancy and Hannie understood the problem. They followed me back to the porch.

  “Now what?” asked Nancy. “There’s nothing to do.”

  “We could go roller-skating,” suggested Hannie. “Oh, wait. No, we couldn’t. My skates do not fit anymore.”

  “And I don’t have any skates,” said Nancy.

  “You really should have a pair,” Hannie told her.

  “It doesn’t matter anyway,” I said. “I left my skates at Mommy’s.”

  “You are always leaving things at your mother’s house,” said Hannie crossly.

  Well, for heaven’s sake. Hannie ought to know why that happens.

  Here, There, and Everywhere

  I am forever leaving things behind, because I live at two houses.

  Who am I? I am Karen Brewer. I have freckles and blonde hair and blue eyes. I wear glasses — all the time.

  I bet you are wondering why I live at two houses — Mommy’s house and Daddy’s house. Well, this is because my mommy and daddy are divorced. They used to be married. They loved each other then. So they had Andrew and me. (Andrew is four, going on five.) After awhile, Mommy and Daddy realized they loved Andrew and me very much — but they did not love each other anymore. So they got divorced.

  My family had been living in Daddy’s big house. (He grew up there.) After the divorce, Mommy moved to another house here in Stoneybrook, Connecticut. It is littler than Daddy’s house. Andrew and I moved with her. But do you know what? After awhile, Mommy and Daddy both got married again! Mommy married a man named Seth. He is my stepfather. And Daddy married Elizabeth.

  At the little house live Mommy, Seth, Emily Junior (my rat), Rocky and Midgie (Seth’s cat and dog), and Andrew and I. But Andrew and I only live there most of the time. Every other weekend, and on some holidays and vacations, we live at the big house.

  A lot of other people live at the big house. Besides Daddy, Elizabeth, Andrew, and me there are Elizabeth’s four kids: Kristy; my big stepbrothers Sam and Charlie, who go to high school; and David Michael. Then there is Emily Michelle, who is my adopted two-and-a-half-year-old sister (she comes from a faraway country called Vietnam). And there is Nannie, Elizabeth’s mother, who watches Emily while everyone else is at work or school. There are some pets, too. There’s Boo-Boo, Daddy’s fat old cat; Shannon, David Michael’s puppy; and Crystal Light the Second and Goldfishie, who are goldfish. (Duh.) Isn’t that a lot? The big house is crowded and noisy. I just love it. Except for one thing. A witch lives next door. Her name is Morbidda Destiny. The grown-ups do not believe she is a witch. They say she is just an old lady. And that her name is Mrs. Porter. But I know better.

  Can you guess why I gave the nicknames Andrew Two-Two and Karen Two-Two to my brother and me? I call us two-twos because we have two of so many things. Andrew and I have two houses, two mommies, and two daddies. I have two bicycles, one at each house. Andrew has two tricycles. We have toys and books and clothes at each house. I have a big-house best friend (Hannie), and a little-house best friend (Nancy). I even have two stuffed cats. They look just alike. Moosie lives at the big house, Goosie lives at the little house.

  (I got the name “two-two” from the title of a book Ms. Colman read to my class this year. It was called Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang.)

  But Andrew and I do not have two of everything, which can be hard. For example, I used to have only one special blanket. Tickly. I liked to sleep with Tickly every night. But I was always forgetting and leaving Tickly at one house or the other. Finally I had to tear Tickly into two pieces. That way, I could have a piece at each house. (I hope I did not hurt Tickly.)

  I also do not have two pairs of roller skates. I love to skate. But I cannot remember everything. And sometimes Hannie gets mad when I forget to bring my skates to the big house. Hannie does not understand that being a two-two is difficult. I like having two houses and two families. But I do not like missing things. I do not like missing Emily Junior when I am at the big house. (Oh, by the way, I named my rat after Emily Michelle.) I do not like missing Mommy when I am at the big house. And when I am at the
little house, I do not like missing Crystal Light the Second and Daddy and Emily Michelle, and Kristy, my special big sister.

  But when you are a two-two, that’s life.

  The Great Idea

  “I still want to go skating,” said Hannie.

  I stretched my legs out in front of me. The sunshine felt good on them. But the porch stairs were uncomfortable. I wanted to go skating, too.

  “Well, we can’t,” said Nancy. “We don’t have skates. So that is that.”

  “Maybe we could get skates,” said Hannie.

  “How?” asked Nancy.

  “I don’t know. Borrow them.”

  “From who?”

  “I don’t know. Quit asking so many questions.”

  “Oh, cut it out, you guys,” I said. I do not like my friends to fight.

  “But I want skates!” cried Hannie. “We really should have them. I need a pair that fits. Karen needs a second pair, and Nancy needs her first pair.”

  “Maybe we could earn money to buy skates,” I suggested.

  “Yeah!” cried Hannie and Nancy.

  “But we’ll need an awful lot of money to buy three pairs of skates,” I added.

  Hannie and Nancy and I sat with our chins in our hands.

  We were thinking.

  “We could sell wildflowers,” said Nancy. “We could pick bunches of them and sell them in front of your house, Karen. We could set up a stand.”

  “We could sell lemonade,” said Hannie. “And maybe other things to eat. Like popcorn. Or — or — ”

  “Or cotton candy!” I cried.

  Hannie gave me a Look. “How are we going to sell cotton candy?” she asked. “You can’t make it. You need a machine.”

  “I know that,” I replied. “I was thinking we could have a carnival. It would be a great way to earn money. We could have games and we could sell stuff. Maybe we could have a rummage sale at the carnival.”

  “A carnival would be so much fun!” exclaimed Nancy.

  “Lots of fun,” said Hannie.

  “Gigundo fun,” I said.

  “What else could we do at a carnival?” Hannie wondered.

  “Tell fortunes,” said Nancy.

  “I know!” I cried. “We could give pony rides. We could hire a magician — ”

  “Karen,” said Nancy.

  “We could borrow a cotton-candy machine,” I went on. “We could borrow some animals, too. We could have a petting zoo.”

  “Karen,” said Hannie.

  “We could get a clown.”

  Nancy could not stand it any longer. She jumped up. “Hey, we want to make money!” she said. “We can’t afford to hire a magician and a clown. That’s expensive. We’ll be broke even after we give the carnival.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I said.

  “Maybe we should just stick to games,” said Hannie.

  “A ringtoss and a bottle-cap throw,” said Nancy.

  “And we could sell things. Refreshments and — ”

  “Crafts!” suggested Nancy. “We’ll make stuff and sell it. I know how to make friendship bracelets.” She paused. Then she said, “Boy, is this going to be fun.”

  “Boy, will it be a lot of work,” I added.

  “Oh, boy!” cried Hannie. “We’ll all get roller skates!”

  Mommy’s Surprise

  Late Sunday afternoon, our big-house weekend was over. Mommy and Seth picked up Andrew and me. They drove us to the little house.

  On the way, Mommy asked, “What did you do this weekend?”

  “Played,” said Andrew.

  “Got bored,” I answered.

  “You got bored?” Seth repeated.

  “Well, not for very long. See, Hannie and Nancy and I wanted to go to the playground at David Michael’s school. But Elizabeth would not let us go alone. She said it was too far away. Unless we went with a big person.”

  “So did Kristy go with you?” asked Mommy.

  “No. She was busy. We decided we wanted to roller-skate instead.”

  “Roller-skate? You didn’t go skating,” said Andrew.

  “I know. Nancy does not have skates, and Hannie’s are too small, and I had left mine at the little house. Since we did not have skates, we decided to buy them.”

  Seth turned around to look at me, even though he was driving. “You bought three pairs of skates? How?” he asked.

  “Well, we didn’t exactly get them yet. But we are going to earn money to buy them. We are going to put on a carnival.”

  “A carvinal?” said Andrew.

  “Car-ni-val,” I corrected him. “You know. You went to one once. It’s a fair where you play games and win prizes and eat food and buy stuff. We are thinking of having a magician and pony rides and a cotton-candy machine.”

  Andrew’s eyes grew very wide.

  I thought Mommy and Seth might laugh, but they did not. Instead, Mommy said, “Karen, I have a surprise for you.”

  She did? “You do?” I cried. (It was not anywhere near my birthday.)

  “Yes,” said Mommy. “Seth and I went to a meeting yesterday.”

  Oh. A meeting. Meetings are GIGUNDO boring. But Mommy was smiling, so I said, “What kind of meeting?”

  “A town meeting. Lots of people who live in Stoneybrook went to it. The mayor was there, too.”

  “And guess what everyone decided,” said Seth.

  “What?” asked Andrew and I.

  “We decided,” said Mommy, “to build a community playground. A playground for the people of Stoneybrook. We will raise money to buy the supplies to build it, and then we will build it ourselves.”

  “And your mother,” Seth went on, “was given a very important job. She is going to be in charge of fund-raising. That means she will think of ways to earn money so we can build the playground.”

  “Yea for Mommy!” cried Andrew.

  “Guess what else,” said Mommy. “The playground is going to be built very close to the big house. You will be able to walk there with your friends.”

  “All right!” I shouted. I started to make up a song. “At last we will have a playground. A place to play around.” Before I finished my song, though, Seth parked the car at the little house.

  I ran inside. I telephoned Hannie. “Hi! It’s me!” I said. “Yesterday Mommy and Seth went to a meeting and they decided to build a playground!”

  Then I telephoned Nancy. “Hi! It’s me! I’m back!” I cried. “We’re going to build a playground. I mean, everyone in Stoneybrook is. It will be right near the big house. Oh, I cannot wait!”

  Helping Out

  I just love school. I really do. I like the weekends, and I also like Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays. Ms. Colman is a very, very nice teacher. She does not yell. (Often.) She always helps kids. She is fair. And she is fun.

  Ms. Colman makes lots of Surprising Announcements. One day she said, “Okay, boys and girls. Today I am going to read a special story to you. It’s a newspaper story. Then we will talk about it. The story is called ‘Helping Out.’ ”

  “Oh, disgust,” said Bobby Gianelli with a groan. Bobby is sort of a bully. And he does not like school.

  “Bobby?” said Ms. Colman. “Don’t you want to hear a computer story?”

  “Oh. Sure!” Bobby likes computers a lot.

  “All right, then. Settle down.”

  Ms. Colman began reading. The story was about a classroom of kids who worked together to raise money. And they raised enough money to buy a computer for their school.

  When Ms. Colman finished reading, she put the newspaper on her desk. “What do you think of that story?” she asked.

  “Is it true?” Natalie Springer wanted to know.

  Well, for heaven’s sake.

  I like Natalie a lot but sometimes she is a drip. Newspaper articles are not fairy tales. They are stories about true things. She should know that.

  Ms. Colman just said, “Yes, it’s a true story.” She did not get cross.

  “Those kid
s earned a lot of money,” said Ricky Torres. He did not remember to raise his hand. (By the way, Ricky and I are pretend married. He is my pretend husband. Ricky and Natalie and I sit in the front row of desks. This is because we wear glasses. Nancy and Hannie get to sit in the back row.)

  “They did earn a lot of money,” Ms. Colman agreed.

  “But they’re just kids,” said Pamela Harding. (Pamela is my enemy.)

  “Kids can do a lot,” I said. (I remembered to raise my hand.)

  “That’s right, Karen,” said Ms. Colman. “Kids can volunteer. There are many ways they can help people or their schools or their town.”

  Leslie Morris (who is a mean friend of Pamela’s) raised her hand. “Are we volunteering when we go to Stoneybrook Manor to visit our adopted grandparents?”

  “You certainly are,” replied Ms. Colman. “The elderly people who live there look forward to your visits. You cheer them up. What are some other ways kids could volunteer and help out?”

  “By starting a pet-sitting business?” suggested Hank Reubens.

  “Well, pet-sitting is an important job,” replied Ms. Colman. “And it is very helpful. But if you are paid to do something, then you are not volunteering. Volunteering means helping out for free.”

  “Like when my mom and dad fight fires?” asked Bobby. “That’s not their job. They are not firefighters all the time. But sometimes when there’s a fire, they rush to it and help put it out for free.”

  “That’s volunteering,” said Ms. Colman.

  “I know how kids could volunteer,” I said. “They could pick up litter. They could write letters to people who are in hospitals. Oh … and they could raise money like the kids in the article did. Raising money for something is volunteering. And I know what we could raise money for.”

  Ms. Colman had not asked us to talk about real projects. Even so, I told my class about the playground for Stoneybrook. “My mother is in charge of raising money,” I said proudly. “We could help out.”

  “Yeah!” exclaimed Hannie. “We could have a toy sale with our old toys.”

  “We could have a bake sale or a car wash,” said Pamela.

  “We could mow lawns,” said Natalie. (I sighed. None of us is allowed to mow lawns. I think Natalie’s brain is on another planet.)