by Eugenia S. Hunt

Created on: May 31, 2008

AND THEN THERE WERE SIX
By Eugenia S. Hunt

The day was filled with electricity as we ascended the steps and entered the sanctuary of the beautiful, old stone church. Our lives were about to embark on an adventure that would change each of us forever.
We entered those walls as individual lives and emerged, a family held in God's hands.
This man had been my friend for half my life but I knew, as his wife, our relationship would begin anew. We were taking a tremendous chance on our faith in God, in one another, and our faith in the ability of our four children to cope with, and grow within, our mutual decision. The six of us vowed that day to work and plan for the future together.

The story actually begins in March of 1988. An old friend, who was raising his two children alone, brought them from Florida to visit me and my two children in South Carolina, during Spring Break. We decided to spend the week with his Aunt and Uncle in Atlanta, Georgia, giving the four children a special week of fun. His children had been through so much that year and we felt it would be good for all of us.
At the end of the week, we were busy washing clothes in preparation of their trip home the next day. After almost two hours of total quiet, which we did NOT investigate after a week with four children, they came to us. My friend's thirteen year old daughter was the spokesperson and this is what she said.
"We have been talking and we have decided we want to be a family. So, we want to know what you two are going to do about it." And she sat down. There were four sets of eyes pinned on us with longing etched across their faces. I told them it was something he and I had talked a little about butI didn't get any further. The children ran into the back yard, screaming and tossing each other about.
As I turned to my friend for assistance, I found him staring back with the grin of a Chesser cat, totally from ear to ear. He then said, "Well, are you going to marry me or not?"
And there you have itthe Hunt Zoo comes to life.
It has been nearly twenty years since I stepped, willingly, with a little push, into the roll of step-mother to two teenagers, a gentle young man of almost sixteen and a thirteen year old, quite audacious, young lady. Since I had two children of my own, a precocious, ten year old daughter and a mischievous son of seven, this did not seem, to me, anything to fear.
As my new husband and I began our lives together, we were quick to realize that six had wed that day in June,

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