Big Families

Big families are quite rare these days.  People think you are strange or even crazy.  People don't understand or whatever.   Today at basketball we were talking with another family that has 6 kids from 15 to about 3 (all bio).  We have friends that have 14 from adult to young teens. 

Big families are different in many ways.   Your kids tend to become closer with each other.  They learn to lean on each other.   Simple things are a bit more complicated like going to the store with the kids, getting out the door to church, going to dinner, going on vacation.   One thing is for sure not many people invite you over for dinner (just cant understand why?)

Another thing about a large family is you likely own a church bus for one of your vehicles.   We happen to love our 15 passenger van. 

Going on trips is fun, you hear some interesting conversations between the kids in the van.   It takes 2 hotel rooms to put up all of our kids.  When we go visit family we end up with parts of the family at multiple homes often.

Our 9 are spread out across the years with 3 being out on their own for the past several years but 5 at home now and 1 on the way.

Big families are not for everyone but it is right for us.   We love our big family and would not trade it for anything.   We now anxiously wait to see how Hannah Joy fits in with this crowd.  How long will it take her to adapt to the big family?  Will it just seem like the environment that she has been living in?   Time will tell. 

For us we know that a big family was the right choice for us and it is part of Gods plan for our family.