Melissa was a work at home mom with 2 preschoolers. As a musician, she couldn’t always take a phone call on the job. She was constantly leaving lengthy notes for the sitter- over and over again. And she kept misplacing all those notes over and over again. Every time there was a new sitter, there was a new batch of notes.

Karen was a mother who worked outside the home. Having a nanny taking care of her twin preschoolers was a good thing, but there were still tons of notes for the nanny, plus the daily phone calls of questions. And at the end of the day, Karen often wondered what their day was like.

Karen and Melissa met when their children began attending the same preschool. Their boys became friends and with that came playdates and many mommy conversations. During those conversations they realized there HAD to be a better way to organize all that information about their children for their caregivers. It was then By the Book: How to Take Care of MY Kids was born.

Karen and Melissa began working on the book in November of 2005. By the summer of 2006 they formed Karmel Publishing, LLC. Based in St. Louis, Missouri, Karen and Melissa are pursuing the dream of making things easier for other parents by providing quality products to organize it all.