The Irelands live near Saint Cloud, Minnesota. Kaelin and Paul have been married for 17 years. They have nine children from 15 to 2 years old. They are regularly asked, “are they all yours?” They say “yes, we have nine biological children together”. The Irelands share that having a large family is a lot of fun! There’s always something going on, always someone to talk to, and always someone to play with. Paul shares, “Having a large family is purposeful and meaningful work, because our kids are eternal beings. We love all these people!” The Irelands homeschool their children. Kaelin has been a stay-at-home mom since their first child was born. Paul works from home building enterprise web applications. They share that most days they are all at home and are often together.
Did you always know you wanted to have 9 children?
Kaelin: While we were dating, I asked Paul how many kids he would like to have. To my surprise, he said five! I thought that was really cute, it demonstrated his big heart.
Paul: At that time of my life saying five kids was like saying a dozen! Neither of us come from a large family. I have one brother and Kaelin has two younger half brothers. We both liked the idea of our kids having a lot of siblings.
Are you planning for more children?
Kaelin: Our oldest daughter sure is! She asks me regularly if we can please have another baby. We always say it’s fun to have a baby in the house. We shall see what the Lord has. We believe the Lord is the author of life. My life is an open book for Him. He is the best planner!
Are you able to get 1 to 1 time with each of your children?
Kaelin: We spend a lot of time together, so those one on one times happen naturally. It might look like talking with one of the teenagers in the kitchen late at night or talking while working on a meal with one of my daughters. As we do projects or run errands, a child who is old enough or interested will join us. We also pray with each of our kids each night before bed.
Do you have large gatherings?
Kaelin: We enjoy having other families over! It is good for our souls!
Paul: We’ve been blessed with a large house and large yard. We have several friends with more kids than us. Gatherings at our house can have over 30 kids! A great thing about big families is that the big kids all love the little kids and watch out for them. We even see teenage boys ask to hold the baby! We adults like to sit around the table and talk while the kids run off in every direction and play. If someone gets a scrape or there’s some conflict, the other kids will help them find their way to the parents.
What would you consider a large family?
Paul: We felt like a big family with four and five kids! Four and five is when it gets more complex; before that, Mom can do everything. With that many kids we had to work more as a team, involving the kids in chores, and figuring out how to do things at scale. Six kids is when we really felt large. That’s when we couldn’t fit reasonably in a minivan and bought a 15 passenger van.
When you are connecting with other larger families with as many children, what are the things you relate to that smaller families may not understand?
Kaelin: Having a big family is like driving a large ship. We make plans and plod steadily toward them. We have to accommodate a lot of interruptions and slowness. Other large families get that.
A large ship is slow but it is also heavy. It comes with a lot of work and responsibility. Everyone has to contribute. Other large families get that too and we give each other extra grace in our friendships.
What have you learned from your growing family, any new lessons with the 9th child?
Kaelin: In the last year especially I have been learning to reject self-condemnation. For many years I would find myself feeling bad about what I did or didn’t do as a Mom, decisions I made for our kids, and things I wish I could have a do-over on. Mom-guilt was tearing down my health. One morning Paul encouraged me with Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.” That familiar Bible verse hit me afresh. Now when I catch myself being tempted to beat myself up over my imperfections, there is no condemnation for me. I am covered by grace.
What is the most important thing you want your children to take with them into the world?
Kaelin: I want them to be firm in their identity in Christ and to know that they are always loved and accepted. I want them to walk into the world with confidence and humility.
What advice would you give to families that are having many children?
Paul: The number one thing is to focus on your marriage. On the plane they say to first put on your own oxygen mask before you assist others. Marriage is the lifeblood of the family; the love between a husband and wife carries the family. Billy Graham said that love is spelled T-I-M-E. A strong marriage requires lots of communication and togetherness. We talk about everything! We discuss pretty much all purchases and all plans. We spend 1-2 hours at the end of each night talking and enjoying being together.
A close second is to be determined. We set this forth in our marriage, we are determined to be steadfast and to stay together. We do that for our kids too, we’re determined to keep our family together even when it’s going tough.
Kaelin: For me it was to find a way that Mom can stay home and devote her time and talents to raising the children. If money is a problem, it’s not a problem. Be willing to do with less. Your child’s well-being is more important than material things. When we first started out we were using some college kid’s tossed out dishes, a vacuum where only the hose part worked, and getting many of our clothes from church clothing swaps. I feel like those were tests, because as we have trusted the Lord, He has so lavishly provided for us!
Paul: Befriend some more experienced couples with more kids and learn from them. Don’t focus on what they do, as if to exactly copy them. Each family will have its own way of doing things. Instead learn the why behind what they do. When you understand the whys you’ll figure out the hows for your own family.
What are your kids into?
Paul: As a family we focus on creating, being active, and being outside. This is in contrast to consuming and being sedentary indoors. Our kids enjoy soccer, gaga ball, ultimate frisbee,
biking, roller blading, longboarding, swimming, hiking, tag, and having adventures outside. Inside they like to read, listen to audio books, draw, make art, play board games, bake, build forts, and play all kinds of imaginative games.
Kaelin: While watching TV one day in college, God spoke to me and said “stop watching other people and live a life worth watching.” We want the same for our kids!
What are ways your family balances all of the activities?
Paul: Having nine kids has forced us to focus on what we want to do well. For example, we cannot put all our kids in separate sports, but we wanted them to learn how to play soccer, so now we lead a homeschool soccer league where all the kids can play.
Kaelin: This year, our family participated in Junior Bible Quiz (JBQ) because they could memorize the Bible as well as hang out with their friends. Most of our children were able to participate in some way.
Paul: Focus is a large part of our educational philosophy. We found that kids can learn exponentially when it is the right time and season and they are interested. The kids regularly work on the four R’s: Reading, wRiting, aRithmetic, and aRt. Beyond those we do just one thing at a time.
Kaelin: We can take a subject and use a whole day or week for that. We only focus on music and piano lessons on Fridays. We take a week or two in the spring to plant our garden or new trees. If we have a big gathering, we may take a few days to learn to bake and cook to prepare for that.
Best advice you’ve received?
Kaelin: I’ve received so much good advice. One of the funniest tips I received from a mom of five, which is actually really good for us still, is “EVERYONE takes a nap!” We have quiet time every day in the afternoon where many of us nap and other people read books or play games quietly.
A good friend and mom of eight once told me, “a wise woman always accepts food.” It’s true, whenever we have a big gathering and people offer to bring food I always say “Yes, thank you!”
What advice do you have for families considering having many children?
Paul: I often say “get while the getting is good,” meaning it is better to leave when everyone is still having fun and smiling than to wait until someone is tired and melting down.
Another tip is “if you want them to cook, get out of the kitchen.” Once we’ve taught kids to do something, the best training ground is to give them ownership of that area. Getting out of the way provides the vacuum that they need to fill.
What are some of the best practices your family has in place?
Kaelin: Reading together. Reading to our kids has blessed us as parents and our kids immensely. We have learned so much together and our children now enjoy reading and learning.
Eating together. We always have dinner together. It is required for all family members. We have many good discussions around our dinner table. Paul often reads books like “Farmer Boy” or the Bible aloud to the family. We do “Kingdom Sightings”, voicing affirmations for each child. Dinnertime is not always perfect and often some little person is yelling, someone is talking potty talk, or someone is stabbing the table with a fork, but we are determined to keep it going.
Working together. Whenever there is a big project to be done, getting everyone on board takes the stress off and makes everything go more smoothly. Something we say in our house often is “many hands make light work!”
Paul: We prefer activities we can do together. Togetherness is an intentional practice.
Favorite moment as a parent so far?
Kaelin: My every day is filled with many beautiful moments! I really enjoy our kids! I have so much fun watching the baby waddles and hearing baby talk, listening to our elementary aged kids recite long scripture verses from memory, and talking to the teenagers about hair and clothes and relationships and all that teenager stuff. A highlight moment from this last year was watching our kids take the top positions in their league in the Minnesota state JBQ competition.
Paul: A memory I treasure is when I called over one of our little boys while on the stairs. He ran over and with complete abandon jumped down the stairs toward me. I wasn’t expecting it but my dad-reflexes pulled through and I caught him! I was touched by his total trust in me!
Tell us about how you met.
Paul: Kaelin and I met serendipitously at a club called the Apartment in Chicago. She was still in college at UW Madison and visiting for the weekend to celebrate a friend’s birthday. I was there for a two week training for work. We were both pulled along by friends to the Apartment. Neither of us ever thought we’d meet someone at a bar or club. It was love at first sight! She was my whole world the rest of the evening. I had never been so comfortable around a girl, especially such a beautiful woman as her!
We painfully parted ways once the club closed. I lived in California at the time, so I didn’t know if I would even see her again. But I got her number and a few months later we started talking regularly on the phone. That is a great way for a relationship to start. We did a lot of communicating! That went on for a few months until I invited her out to California for her birthday. I was traveling a lot for work so my employer actually paid for her to come out. When I picked her up from the airport we were immediately comfortable together. We got some Thai food and saw a comedy show. I had the whole week planned out with activities and meals.
The next day I asked her to be my girlfriend. She asked, “is this leading to marriage?” I said yes. She then asked “is divorce an option?” Having experienced the pain of divorce in my family, I decisively said “No”. We married a little over a year later and it has been a fun and exciting love story ever since!
Kaelin: Really the Lord brought us together!
Funniest kid story?
Kaelin: Our kids are hilarious. They make us laugh every day. The funniest things are the things that they say. We write down as many of their funny quotes as we can and put them in a book. Here are some quotes in the last few years and the age of the child when they said it.
Zion (5) was upset that putting on his shirt messed up the hair style Mom combed
Elam (6): You don’t need to cry about it. I don’t comb my hair any time!
Eveli (4): Mom, can you buy me rocket boots?
Luke (15): The actual Prince of Nigeria must have a lot of problems sending out emails.
Elam (6): Mommy, what’s the point of earrings?
Dad: Zion, please help clean up
Zion (5): I’m like tortoise, I’m really slow.
Elam (6): Tortoise is really fast, he beat Hare!
Kaelin (8 months pregnant): I feel really full and I don’t know why.
Micha (6): Your belly looks full!
Zion (5): Salad again for lunch? We’ve got to talk about this
