It’s 10 o’clock in the morning, and Karen Baldacci is right at home in her kindergarten class at Fruit Street School in Bangor. It’s snack time, and 19 children are sucking on juice and talking with their neighbors at tables that aren’t even as tall as an adult’s knees.

Mrs. Baldacci, as she’s called, is carrying around a Ziploc bag, her hand reaching in to pull out treats for the tykes.

“Baldacci’s Restaurant is now open, and we’re serving animal crackers today,” she exclaims to the munching crowd, a whimsical reference to the Italian eatery, Momma Baldacci’s, her in-laws started ages ago.

The children occasionally direct their eyes to a newspaper reporter and photographer who are standing in their room. A quizzical look adorns their faces as they try to comprehend why their teacher is the center of such attention. Karen redirects their focus on the clock, and she tells them that when the big hand reaches the five, snack time is over.

“They get a conception from their parents that I’m married to a famous man who won some election,” she later told her visitors.

In January, Karen will become the state’s newest first lady, and the kindergartners don’t understand what that means, explained the 41-year-old teacher, who also is trying to grapple with the new role given to her by virtue of marriage.

It’s been nearly two weeks since her husband, John, was elected governor, two weeks of compiling mental to-do lists dealing with everything from selecting an inaugural ball gown to defining her social advocacy.

Topping the lists are Karen’s desire to

ease herself, her 11-year-old son, Jack, and even her kindergartners into her new public role as the next woman to preside over the governor’s mansion, the Blaine House. Though the family will be moving to Augusta, she will not give up her job in Bangor and is adamant about protecting the children from the trials she’ll be facing in the next four years.

Karen used a phrase made popular by public figures to describe her new life as first lady – “it’s life in a fishbowl,” a place where she and her family are put on display for the public to either idolize or scrutinize. It seems odd to hear her mention that phrase now, after being married for almost 20 years to a career politician whose resume includes eight years in the U.S. House of Representatives. But through that time, she’s been able to maintain a private life that only occasionally was infiltrated by “people who think they know more about our lives than we do.”

Being the first lady is going to be “different,” she said, “totally different.” Maine is a relatively small community of 1.3 million people, and the first family is their family.

“The perception and the audience is different,” she said, comparing the life of a congressman’s wife to that of being a governor’s spouse. “I’m excited about being first lady.”

During her morning class earlier, Karen had read to the children as they sat on the floor in front of her. The story was “One Stuck Duck,” about a duck who gets stuck in the muck. The dragonflies alone can’t get him out, nor can the snakes or the frogs or the opossums. But together, the animals form a team and get the duck through his crisis and out of the mud.

Karen, Jack and the 19 kindergartners are a little like that duck. All are concerned about what the future holds. The youngsters may be worried their teacher will be leaving them.

Karen acknowledges during one of three interviews conducted over the last week that she is worried, too. It’s natural for children to form attachments to people who offer them continuous care and safety as they try to find their way in the world, she said, and a teacher is one such person.

That bond shouldn’t be broken, she said, adding that she, Jack and the kindergarten children will work together as a team to keep life simple, just as it was before Election Day.

Daniel Lee, principal of Fruit Street School, said Karen remains true to her pupils.

“It’s not any different than before she was first lady,” Lee said. “Last week we were checking for head lice together.”

Beginning in January, Karen will begin commuting from Augusta, where she, John and Jack will take up residence in the governor’s mansion. Jack will be traveling with her to Bangor each morning so he can continue sixth grade at William S. Cohen School.

Share and share alike

Now, after more than eight years of traveling between Bangor and Washington, D.C., John will be the one in the family with a short distance to travel to get to work, she said. He’ll just have to walk across the street to his office at the State House.

Karen said that’s only fair. “John did it for eight years; I guess we can do our part,” she said.

With John’s decision more than a year ago not to seek a fifth term in Congress came the end to a weekend-only marriage that survived in spite of the separation. And since the campaign season ended, John, Karen and Jack are again becoming familiar with one other’s habits. For instance, Karen said, she became accustomed to having the bathroom to herself around the same time every morning while John was in Washington or on the road campaigning.

And now, “there he is standing at the sink,” she said, a smile breaking across her face.

She also revealed how the governor-elect had asked her recently to pick up razor blades at the store. When living the commuter life, John would buy his own, she said.

“I’m just not used to doing his stuff,” Karen said, her smile broadening as she quips about the relationship. “Usually he does his stuff and I do my stuff. I have to remind myself that it’s not his and mine, it’s ours now. And it has been ours. Now we’re both going in the same direction and the same way.”

On Inauguration Day, John and Karen will be celebrating their 20th wedding anniversary with a few hundred of their closest friends. Two decades ago, they danced to “Moon River” even though they didn’t have a specific song they called their own. And if she had to pick “their song” now, Karen said it probably would be “You are the Sunshine of My Life.”

The pair met 22 years ago at a restaurant while both were students at the University of Maine. Karen’s sister, Kathyryn, warned her not to get involved with John, thinking he was a married professor with two children. Kathyryn, however, was wrong. John was not married, but there was a married professor who looked just like him.

At the restaurant, “an immediate connection was made,” John said, “and we began to meet each other and talk. You never know, there’s a little bit of chemistry, a little bit of spark. I just felt that she was the one.”

And this current period of awkwardness, of getting used to each other again, isn’t so bad, he insisted.

“It’s like a second honeymoon,” John said. “It’s going to be very nice for us, very natural for us.”

Karen and John are protective of each other, their son and their marriage. Being in politics, it’s something that must be done without question.

“It’s not an easy life, a political life,” said Karen, noting numerous breakups among political families. “Look at Maine’s history. We’re going to change that, though. There’s no divorces, no separations here.”

The Baldaccis said they base the strength of their relationship not on love but on an “underlying communication” of trust and honesty.

“You’re not going to be in love 100 percent of the time,” Karen said. “But we look at marriage as a lifelong institution. I’m secure in who we are.”

While John is undertaking the transition from congressman to governor, he said, he also is standing alongside the woman he calls “the most honest person, the most trustworthy adviser to me” as she moves into her “life in the fishbowl.”

“She’s got a lot to get comfortable with, and then eventually take the training wheels off,” John said. “Once people get to know Karen, they’re going to be very impressed.”

Introduction to the fishbowl

This weekend, Karen and John are in Austin, Texas, attending what’s billed as an introductory course on how to be a governor and a first spouse.

Christine LaPaille, public affairs director for the National Governors Association, the course sponsor, said the event isn’t highly structured, but it’s a way for veterans to give novices tips on how to make a smooth transition into public life. She calls it “the things I wished someone had told me” conference, and the issues range from how to set up the mansions to managing their children’s needs.

“It’s about how do you protect your children from this, and how do you protect yourself,” LaPaille said.

Sometime over the weekend, John and Karen will be assigned a mentor, she said, a veteran governor and spouse who could serve as confidants during the next four years. Usually that “veteran” is another governor from the region, but since five of the six New England states elected new governors Nov. 5, and John is the only Democrat among them, it is likely John’s and Karen’s mentors will be from another part of the country.

“I’m not going to tell you anything about that,” said LaPaille, volunteering an answer to a question that wasn’t asked.

Karen said some of the best advice she has already received about being a first lady came from Mary Herman, who has been Maine’s first lady for the last eight years. Two days after the election, both women met for a private lunch, and Herman talked to her about how the Blaine House is operated and the rigors that come with a role that was never defined by state laws or constitutional mandates.

But, Karen said, she also gave her advice on how to insulate herself and her family from an unsympathetic public when politics become unfavorable and personal. She would not share that advice, but said it was well received and respected.

What Karen did share is that she admired Herman’s literacy campaign, which focused on putting books into the hands of parents so they could read to their children. Boxes of books were sent to pediatricians’ offices and schools and distributed at well-baby doctors visits or parent-teacher conferences.

Now it’s Karen’s turn to promote literacy, and also encourage changes in the education system to improve a child’s ability to learn. She wants to see the establishment of more prekindergarten programs so youngsters not familiar with numbers or letters or the basics of reading can learn about them before entering a more structured classroom. She wishes the gifted and talented student programs weren’t cut at some educational levels when the state budget was.

She believes the cutoff birth date for entering kindergarten should be changed. Currently any child who turns age 5 by Oct. 15 can begin kindergarten the August before his birthday. That puts 4-year-old children alongside kids who are almost 6 years old, and the younger ones are “always timid, always trying to catch up.” Moving up the cutoff date by six months would put the children closer in age and ability levels, she said.

And she feels children should be given time to be children at lunchtime. For 18 years, before earning a master’s degree in education, Karen was a dietitian with the state Women, Infants and Children’s program. She remains a strong proponent of promoting good eating habits among children.

At Fruit Street School, Karen practices a lunchtime routine that is different from other teachers. She allows her kindergartners to have a brief recess before heading to the lunchroom, so they can play with other children and shake off the discipline of the classroom. Because kids have only 20 minutes to get their lunch and eat it, they are more focused on eating if they can play for a little while first, she said.

Though she has only two years of classroom experience and refers to herself as a “newbie” in teaching, Karen said her educational itinerary is something she believes can work, and now it’s a matter of convincing her husband, the governor, of that.

While not an elected official, she does expect to make an impact in her new role, she said.

“I have my opinions,” Karen said. “In my view, first ladies … can effect and make change. They have the ability, I hate to say, to influence policy.”

In this state, with a tradition of strong women involved in the political process, Karen said she shouldn’t have a problem being an active player. Her life as first lady won’t be strictly about tea parties.

“It is a different generation, and we don’t live our lives through our husbands,” Karen said. “I will be there. I will live there. I will have my issues and causes. But I also have my career and my network of friends.”

First and foremost, a mom

She has her 11-year-old son, Jack, too, and he’s been No. 1 in her life.

Karen said one thing she is going to miss now that John is back home full time is the special, private times she shared with her son while her husband was away in Washington, D.C. They became partners, pals who hung around together until John could rejoin them.

Jack is being raised with a lot of love, said Karen, who breast-fed him until he was 2 years old. He is showered with hugs and kisses, the signs of affection between a parent and child that help boost his self-esteem and confidence.

“I try to find the balance, for each of us, as to what works for us,” Karen said.

Karen said she gets her parenting strength from her mother, Barbara Allen Weston, who raised four children while Karen’s father, Donald, built a career in the Air Force. She also admires her grandmother, Cynthia Allen, who bore and raised five girls on a homestead in a small town in Kentucky. Their home didn’t have electricity, and Allen canned fruits and vegetables and cured meat to get her family through the winter months.

“I’ve always had strong women around me all of my life,” Karen said.

She’s had her rough spots, though. There were times, typical ones, when Karen and Jack were having trouble getting along, and dad was on the other end of the telephone to be a sounding board for his only child.

“I’d do as much as I could to be the one he could talk to,” John said. “I learned from my mother [Rosemary], and he learns from his. We’re a team.”

But John said it was hard for him to be away from his son during the last eight years. He’d call during Jack’s baseball games to check up on his progress and the scores, and every morning they’d talk about his son’s homework before Jack headed off to school.

“Even though he was not physically in our house, he was a presence,” Karen said of her husband.

One day, Karen said, Jack realized that his father kept a very busy schedule, and he would watch his father keep track of his events by making notes with a pencil. That amazed him, Karen said.

“When he was younger, Jack would ask to be put on John’s schedule – ‘Pencil me in, Dad, pencil me in for 4 o’clock,'” she said.

Now that they’re together again, John and Karen have set the family’s schedule for the next four years. Saturday nights and Sundays will be family times, John said.

“We’re going to make it a family home,” he said. “We’ll be doing more things together. Karen and I are very determined about that.”

Later this month, Gov. Angus King’s two preteen children will be giving Jack a tour of the Blaine House. They’ll show him all the secret hiding places, plus the fun things they found for kids to do in the mansion, which is more like a museum of previous governors than a home.

Karen said she is looking forward to Jack’s receiving that tour. She wants him to feel comfortable there, especially since he will be entering his teenage years while his father is in office.

“It’s the public’s house,” she said. “It’s just a matter of making it our house, our home, too.”