Justin and Claire 3: Always Beige

[JDuggs]

I think Austin and Joy value their alone time without kids more than Joe and Kendra for example. Austin and Joy seem to like to travel, hunt, camp, etc. I think Austin realizes how too many kids will cramp their lifestyle. After the trauma of Annabelle’s stillbirth, I speculate that Austin has convinced Joy that they don’t need double digit children to be a happy family. I believe at that time, Joy mentioned four as the number of kids they thought they would have.

[CanadianMamam]

I could see them having less children, especially the ones who are cultivating an Instagram/YouTube following because honestly 4-6 kids isn’t that unusual and still relatable to the SAHM crowd. They can probably get a lot of traction out of following of the conservative mommy crowd. 

[Idlewild]

If they do stay in Texas I wonder if they’ll feature much on the show? I realise Jinger and Jeremy do after they moved but they are ‘breakout stars’ (their words not mine) & Jinger was always popular with viewers. There’s no real hook of interest with these two- very young, he works as a labourer, not sure what she does - works for her dad’s company?  I’m sure Hilary will think up some stunts to put them in front of the camera as she seems ‘thirsty’ but I think it will be tedious even by this family’s standards. 

[Mama Mia]

50 minutes ago, Idlewild said:

If they do stay in Texas I wonder if they’ll feature much on the show? I realise Jinger and Jeremy do after they moved but they are ‘breakout stars’ (their words not mine) & Jinger was always popular with viewers. There’s no real hook of interest with these two- very young, he works as a labourer, not sure what she does - works for her dad’s company?  I’m sure Hilary will think up some stunts to put them in front of the camera as she seems ‘thirsty’ but I think it will be tedious even by this family’s standards. 

Yea, I could see them being on occasionally, but I don’t think they’d draw the interest overall. Pretty much ALL the younger ones after Joy are a big jumbled blur - with the exception of Johanna and Jackson who were featured quite a bit in TH because they were very personable and funny. And Josie of course. 
Among all the other really weird things of being a reality show family- how weird would it be that some of your siblings personalities get them a following, while others don’t. Like regular families with introverts/extroverts - but so magnified. 

[CaptainFunderpants]

On 3/13/2021 at 9:12 AM, CarrotCake said:

Johanna will be married off way before Joy gets to 8 kids.

And it seems more and more likely that it might be to a Bowers boy, which... Yikes in both directions.

[Expectopatronus]

On 3/14/2021 at 12:14 PM, Mama Mia said:

Yea, I could see them being on occasionally, but I don’t think they’d draw the interest overall. Pretty much ALL the younger ones after Joy are a big jumbled blur - with the exception of Johanna and Jackson who were featured quite a bit in TH because they were very personable and funny. And Josie of course. 
Among all the other really weird things of being a reality show family- how weird would it be that some of your siblings personalities get them a following, while others don’t. Like regular families with introverts/extroverts - but so magnified. 

I wasn’t a religious watcher of 19K but it seems to me that the four oldest girls, Josh, Josiah, Jackson, Johanna and Josie were the main faces of the show. Joy got tacked on later. Whether that was Jim Bob and Michelle’s choice, TLC’s choice or the kids’ choice is most likely something we’ll never know. I seriously doubt TLC will travel to Texas a lot to film Justin as he was kind of a nonentity. Poor kid! No child should be an « extra » in their own family. 

[just_ordinary]

On 3/14/2021 at 5:00 PM, CanadianMamam said:

I could see them having less children, especially the ones who are cultivating an Instagram/YouTube following because honestly 4-6 kids isn’t that unusual and still relatable to the SAHM crowd. They can probably get a lot of traction out of following of the conservative mommy crowd. 

It’s always interesting how different family sizes are judged. Here, a family with four children is a BIG family (no difference between urban and rural, north/south/east/west). More is mostly met with extreme suspicion. 

[Jana814]

4 hours ago, just_ordinary said:

It’s always interesting how different family sizes are judged. Here, a family with four children is a BIG family (no difference between urban and rural, north/south/east/west). More is mostly met with extreme suspicion. 

I live in a well off area in the suburbs of New Jersey. If a family has more then 3 kids. Other people think you are nuts. 

[front hugs > duggs]

17 minutes ago, Jana814 said:

I live in a well off area in the suburbs of New Jersey. If a family has more then 3 kids. Other people think you are nuts. 

I’m from the same area. I know one girl growing up with FIVE siblings and that was mind blowing to me

[Jana814]

13 minutes ago, front hugs > duggs said:

I’m from the same area. I know one girl growing up with FIVE siblings and that was mind blowing to me

I had a few classmates in school that had a bunch of siblings. One girl was the youngest of 6 her oldest brother is 15 years older then her. It was mind blowing to me also. 

[justmy2cents]

Grew up in CT. One of my best friends in HS had 8 siblings. She was 2nd to youngest so by the time we met most were out of the house. Fun fact: they all had varying shades of red hair.

[NotQuiteMotY]

SE PA here. Four is considered a big family. Three is borderline. If you have two, you'll get a lot of "you're done now, right?" if you have opposite-sex kids and "you're trying for [opposite] next, right?" if you have same-sex kids.

Oddly enough, though I seem to be seeing a number of four-kid families lately, so who knows?

[ihaveanexamintwodays]

1 hour ago, justmy2cents said:

Grew up in CT. One of my best friends in HS had 8 siblings. She was 2nd to youngest so by the time we met most were out of the house. Fun fact: they all had varying shades of red hair.

So basically your bestie was american ron weasley ?

[Jana814]

44 minutes ago, NotQuiteMotY said:

SE PA here. Four is considered a big family. Three is borderline. If you have two, you'll get a lot of "you're done now, right?" if you have opposite-sex kids and "you're trying for [opposite] next, right?" if you have same-sex kids.

I know many families where they have 3 kids all the same gender. Now as an adult I realize that a few of these families probably decided to have a third child hoping to have the opposite gender to what they already had. 

Edited March 16, 2021 by Jana814

[rebeccawriter01]

12 hours ago, Expectopatronus said:

I wasn’t a religious watcher of 19K but it seems to me that the four oldest girls, Josh, Josiah, Jackson, Johanna and Josie were the main faces of the show. Joy got tacked on later. Whether that was Jim Bob and Michelle’s choice, TLC’s choice or the kids’ choice is most likely something we’ll never know. I seriously doubt TLC will travel to Texas a lot to film Justin as he was kind of a nonentity. Poor kid! No child should be an « extra » in their own family. 

Joy was used more in the very beginning of the show with Josiah to create a vibe more like Jackson and Johanna. However, as Johanna became more verbal, producers probably realized her banter with Jackson was more palatable than Josiah and Joy who seemed a little sanctimonious and condescending. I can remember early episodes of 17 KAC and 18 KAC where it would start with Joy and Josiah answering the door and saying what activity they were doing before running off to join said activity with the cameras following. They tended to use phrases like, "in a normal size family they...but we..."

Justin was always a member of the Howler group of boys I couldn't ever tell apart. They could have seriously snuck in some random sandy haired kid and I would have assumed it was one of that group. 

[justodd]

I grew up surrounded by catholic families in Northern California, and it was very uncommon to see a family with more than three kids. I think I knew of three with four, and only one with more than that. They had six, almost all boys and practically one after the other except for a roughly four year gap between numbers four and five. (Their mom once told me she’d had a miscarriage during that time and she’d always wondered if it would have been another girl.) Every one of them was incredibly attractive, and I was simultaneously tortured by and pleased with all the teasing about how their youngest and I would get together someday. 
 

Actually, I guess technically, my family was also an outlier. There were three of us as I was growing up, but there were three others who all passed through different means before I was born, and my mom says she always wanted eight. She’s from a small village in Mexico and grew up surrounded by siblings and other large families, so that was what she’d always had as her ideal. 

[Vivi_music]

Yeah I grew up in Canada, in a pretty secular, and also upper middle class suburb.

We were 4 kids all born in the 80's or early 90's. Not religious. Though we are kind of a blended family. While we have the same Mother and all grew up together, we don't all have the same father. My Mom got divorced and remarried and she did have custody of all of us, so it always felt like one solid family unit. My mother found another partner when I was a kid, who himself had a son from a previous mariage, which made for a big mix of 5 kids sometimes living under that roof. My ''step-brother'' (I don't call him that anymore, I kind of hate the term) was still seeing his mom because they had shared custody so he wasn't always there, but it still made a lot of people at Christmas dinner.

We were really considered the oddity though when I was in school. Amongst my peers, I rarely met other kids with as big of a family as mine.

[piratewench8]

I live in a well off area in the suburbs of New Jersey. If a family has more then 3 kids. Other people think you are nuts. 

Yes I live in NJ in the suburbs and we have six kids (1 adopted and 5 biological). We get side eyed and snide comments about the size of our family quite often. My response “not your family, not your problem”. We don’t receive public assistance, we have a nice home, our children are clothed, fed and happy. Most of all they’re wanted and well loved by my husband and I. That’s what is important in life. No we’re not fundies. We’re a reformed Catholic (hubby) and a reformed Mormon (me), lol.


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[Jewels64]

5 hours ago, piratewench8 said:

Yes I live in NJ in the suburbs and we have six kids (1 adopted and 5 biological). We get side eyed and snide comments about the size of our family quite often. My response “not your family, not your problem”. We don’t receive public assistance, we have a nice home, our children are clothed, fed and happy. Most of all they’re wanted and well loved by my husband and I. That’s what is important in life. No we’re not fundies. We’re a reformed Catholic (hubby) and a reformed Mormon (me), lol.


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I live in Texas and have 5 kids. I get looks and dumb questions when I have all five with me. We are NOT fundie. We just wanted a big family. 

Edited March 17, 2021 by Jewels64

[piratewench8]

I live in Texas and have 5 kids. I get looks and dumb questions when I have all five with me. We are NOT fundie. We just wanted a big family. 

Exactly as did we. My husband is the youngest of 7 and I’m the middle child and only girl of 6. We both loved our childhoods and wanted to give our children the same wonderful experience.


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[Mama Mia]

10 hours ago, Vivi_music said:

Yeah I grew up in Canada, in a pretty secular, and also upper middle class suburb.

We were 4 kids all born in the 80's or early 90's. Not religious. Though we are kind of a blended family. While we have the same Mother and all grew up together, we don't all have the same father. My Mom got divorced and remarried and she did have custody of all of us, so it always felt like one solid family unit. My mother found another partner when I was a kid, who himself had a son from a previous mariage, which made for a big mix of 5 kids sometimes living under that roof. My ''step-brother'' (I don't call him that anymore, I kind of hate the term) was still seeing his mom because they had shared custody so he wasn't always there, but it still made a lot of people at Christmas dinner.

We were really considered the oddity though when I was in school. Amongst my peers, I rarely met other kids with as big of a family as mine.

That’s how most of the bigger families around me are, including the family I raised. A mix of brothers and sisters from moms side or dads side or both. I also hate the term step and half-sibling. Awful. And leaves out your siblings siblings. My kids have anywhere from 5 to 9 siblings, depending on the kid and how they are counting them. We frequently had 8 in our home. Not full time, all at the same time, but vacations, holidays, summer, weekends - and 4- 6 full time most of the time. We were definitely considered big. I don’t know anyone with more than 4 kids who had the same biological mom and dad for all the kids. Most families who don’t have that going on have 2 kids.

[viii]

Growing up, most families were 3-5 kids were I lived, that seemed pretty average. 

Now as an adult, I notice that where my sisters live (BC) it's common to have 2 kids (and both my sisters have 2 kids) but where I live (SK), I find a lot of my friends are still having 3-5 kids. Maybe it's a small town thing?

[Satan'sFortress]

It seems like most families in my childhood neighborhood had lots of kids.  Many of us were Catholic & the kids were born in the 50s and 60s.  It was a fun place to grow up--I loved having a big family.

@Jewels64 and @piratewench8 My mom says that she got rude comments from strangers even back then. WTF is wrong with people?

[Dutch_girl]

Funny story about family-size: I have three brothers and always wanted a big family (four kids). My husband also has three siblings and that's the reason he thinks two children is enough. Last week we talked about familysize, nothing serious, just kind of wondering what the future would look like. Two days later we were walking in the park and we see a family with two children. He says "doesn't that look good, two kids, enough attention for both kids". My (sincere) reaction: "it looks like they left half of the kids at home" ? 

Disclaimer: I know far to well that you don't always 'get' the amount of children you want. After a fertilitytreatment and a difficult pregnancy we are so gratefull we have our son. 

[Expectopatronus]

1 hour ago, viii said:

Growing up, most families were 3-5 kids were I lived, that seemed pretty average. 

Now as an adult, I notice that where my sisters live (BC) it's common to have 2 kids (and both my sisters have 2 kids) but where I live (SK), I find a lot of my friends are still having 3-5 kids. Maybe it's a small town thing?

I’m in Manitoba and there’s a mix of smaller families (2-3 kids) and 5+ kids in my school. The English school has a lot of families with 7-10 kids but they are all offshoots of Mennonite or Brethren families. I remember Anna saying that she wanted at least five kids and Josh commenting that five was a pretty small family. To me, five is a lot but not a ridiculously large family. I’m not convinced that every kid gets enough time and attention once families move into double digits.