by W. Diane Van Zwol

Created on: April 16, 2009

Baby Boomers: On Growing Up In A Large Family

Growing up in a really large, baby boomer family like ours, was fun, but it often entailed a lot of work too, particularly for the older children. There was no end to the number of meals to be cooked, dishes to be washed and beds to be made. There were always hungry babies wanting to be fed, changed or bathed. It was busy!

Lots of love and laughter!

In our family, there was always a child that needed to be cuddled, hugged or nursed, in some way. The little ones found a reason to stay close by the older children and were often underfoot, no matter what was going on.

Keeping up with the trail of little muddy boot prints, was a never ending task! Countless little faces had to be washed!

For baby boomers, this was the era before the introduction of permanent press clothing. Of course, automatic washers and dryers were just coming into vogue, so there was endless ironing to be done. Indoors, the housework was never ending too, but when it was done together, it was fun and time just flew by.

After school, packing twelve lunches at a time, proved to be quite a chore, especially when the bread was homemade and all the cakes and cookies had to be baked. Ever try to stretch a can of salmon for twelve lunches? It is possible!

Can you imagine how much fun it was, just to make certain that all the shoes and socks for fourteen children matched? Mending everyone's clothing often proved to be an all day job.

Then there were always outside chores as well, like the garden to tend, chickens to be fed and the cow to be milked.

Family excursions like fishing trips, picnics at the lake or picking blueberries in the mountains, often proved to be days well spent. Picking eighteen pails of blueberries in one day, was quite possible, with all of the extra hands. Of course, cleaning them proved to be a chore!

There was always lots of fun!

Living in the country, meant ongoing involvement in community activities. Swimming, skating and skiing were regular outdoor sports that everyone loved. Music and art played a big role in our world, as well.

Television was just barely coming into existence, so entertaining ourselves was much more appropriate. Most of the baby boomers learned to play musical instruments and in turn, taught the others to do the same.

In our family of fourteen children, because there were so many of us, we gradually began to see each other as belonging to specific groups, namely the big kids, the middle kids, the little kids or the babies.

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