Radio 3Fourteen - Tips on Raising a Large Family

00:00:00.000 Greetings new and regular listeners, I'm Lana joining you for the next hour.

00:00:18.980 This was a filmed interview, but this show is also available in audio format on redice.tv

00:00:25.000 and redicemembers.com in the section for 314.

00:00:28.320 This show will provide some tips on raising a large family.

00:00:32.560 My guests are Jennifer Loken and Ayla, both are mothers of six.

00:00:36.800 They'll share some advice based on what they've discovered,

00:00:39.660 things that can be helpful to new and expecting mothers.

00:00:42.820 Jennifer and Ayla up next.

00:00:44.800 Jennifer Loken, I'll start with you since you're new to the program. 0.90

00:00:47.920 Say hello.

00:00:49.040 Hello, everybody.

00:00:50.920 And as I was saying off air, Loken kind of reminds me of Loki, the Norse god.

00:00:55.220 I'm sure you guys talk about that at home a little bit, right?

00:00:57.260 We do.

00:00:59.180 Now, how many kids do you have?

00:01:01.200 I have six.

00:01:02.000 Okay, you have six.

00:01:03.080 My youngest is 15 and my youngest is six.

00:01:06.260 Nice, nice work.

00:01:07.240 And then we also have Ayla, a returning guest.

00:01:09.440 Everyone knows wife with a purpose. 1.00

00:01:11.040 Say hello, Ayla. 0.99

00:01:12.300 Hi, everybody.

00:01:13.440 And she just had her sixth baby.

00:01:16.100 Yeah.

00:01:16.680 Well, fantastic.

00:01:17.500 Well, I wanted to do the show because, you know, I did a video with Ayla.

00:01:21.720 She issued a white baby challenge and a lot of people got excited about that. 0.90

00:01:25.220 And then I met Jennifer here and she has six kids as well.

00:01:29.740 And Ayla has six kids.

00:01:30.800 So I wanted to maybe get some tips because I know there's a lot of young girls that are listening

00:01:35.000 and they actually want to have large families.

00:01:37.400 So if a young woman is listening, wants to start a big family, what is some advice you

00:01:42.560 can offer her?

00:01:43.520 Who wants to go first?

00:01:45.940 Ayla, you can go first.

00:01:48.080 Okay.

00:01:48.560 Well, first of all, start young because you never know what's going to happen.

00:01:52.080 I have lots of friends who tried to start having the first baby at like 20 or 21, found

00:01:56.780 out they had fertility issues, needed like a little bit of medical help or needed to get 1.00

00:02:01.360 on a better diet and kind of or do some cleansing or something to help that process along.

00:02:05.400 We kind of live in a pretty toxic environment these days and a lot of people have trouble

00:02:10.780 conceiving.

00:02:11.440 So don't put it off for sure.

00:02:14.180 Like start, the sooner the better, start trying to have your family.

00:02:18.640 That's my tip number one.

00:02:21.040 My second tip as far as if you're wanting to have a large family, the biggest expense I've

00:02:27.140 found surrounding a large family is the medical costs and medical insurance.

00:02:31.800 So you want to kind of be pre-planning for that.

00:02:34.100 If your husband's in college or something like this, you want to be sure that he's aiming

00:02:37.780 for a job that typically comes with fairly good health insurance to help mitigate that

00:02:44.100 cost.

00:02:44.860 So I think that those are two things that you can do as a young woman that can really kind

00:02:51.140 of give you the right projectile into having a stable, large family.

00:02:55.940 Yeah, it's good that you mentioned the toxic environment.

00:02:58.300 Exactly.

00:02:58.620 I hear from a lot of women that have fertility issues, and I'm always saying, get your hormones 1.00

00:03:02.620 checked.

00:03:03.340 What endocrine disrupting chemicals are you using?

00:03:05.820 What are you putting on your body?

00:03:07.000 What makeup?

00:03:07.740 What are you eating?

00:03:08.620 All of those things will impact your fertility.

00:03:11.500 And that's one thing when you go to a fertility clinic, they don't ask you any of those things. 0.97

00:03:15.140 They're ready just to give you drugs.

00:03:16.860 They're not asking about the things that you're putting on your body and ingesting.

00:03:20.140 And that makes a huge difference.

00:03:22.160 Certain herbs you can take, supplements you can take to help your egg health.

00:03:25.660 So that's absolutely vital.

00:03:27.740 Now, what about you, Jennifer?

00:03:28.820 What tips do you have?

00:03:30.280 Well, I was an accidental mother of a larger family.

00:03:34.880 I didn't plan on it at 19.

00:03:36.680 I wasn't even married.

00:03:37.860 And I found out I was pregnant.

00:03:40.700 And I was engaged, though.

00:03:44.020 So I did have that going for me.

00:03:46.140 And we just decided to quickly throw together a wedding.

00:03:49.760 And I actually was on various different birth controls.

00:03:53.740 None of them worked, though.

00:03:54.740 So we were destined to be a big family.

00:03:59.540 But I think the big thing is learn to be mellow.

00:04:03.300 Because your kids reflect your personality a lot of ways in a negative way.

00:04:11.280 So be mellow.

00:04:12.680 Like my husband and I, we both have a kind of a let it go kind of attitude.

00:04:17.120 And our kids very much so reflect that.

00:04:20.680 And they're easier to kind of negotiate with and to work with.

00:04:24.780 So if you're going to be high-strung, expect high-strung children.

00:04:29.280 Yeah.

00:04:29.420 And if you push too hard in one direction, they might actually rebel against that.

00:04:33.840 So it's kind of a fine line, right?

00:04:35.740 Right.

00:04:36.300 Right.

00:04:37.020 And, you know, I learned right away that, you know, you try, like, disciplining your kids

00:04:42.860 how you were disciplined.

00:04:44.980 And I learned right away that my children did not respond well to, like, the spanking that

00:04:50.440 my parents used to do to me.

00:04:52.180 And so I thought, actually, you know, it takes time and effort, but it works better to actually

00:04:57.900 explain to my kids the process and why. 0.98

00:05:01.600 And it's a pain in the butt. 0.88

00:05:03.100 And I, you know, talk them through all the processes of why they did something. 0.98

00:05:07.200 And my husband kind of looks at it like, you're kind of nagging.

00:05:09.860 But, you know, it kind of works.

00:05:12.200 But at the same time, you have to also apply discipline because kids, they are always testing

00:05:17.240 those boundaries.

00:05:18.040 So you do have to let them know where those are, right?

00:05:20.680 Yeah.

00:05:21.060 Yeah.

00:05:21.400 And so we do a lot of, you know, you're grounded from the computer.

00:05:25.520 Yeah.

00:05:25.880 That's probably the worst thing you could do to kids in this day and age.

00:05:27.920 I mean, when we were, when we were growing up, like, we didn't, we didn't have that.

00:05:32.320 Now little kids can go online and they can go look up, like, you know, pornography and

00:05:36.520 things about sex.

00:05:37.640 I'm like, we didn't have that kind of stuff when, when we were growing up, you know?

00:05:41.520 No, I kind of thank God that we didn't.

00:05:43.640 So it was so much better when we didn't have that kind of stuff.

00:05:47.260 So now one thing I always hear from people, especially white people, is it's too expensive

00:05:53.620 having lots of kids.

00:05:55.080 So I guess we'll start with you, Ayla.

00:05:56.580 How do you tackle that question?

00:05:57.840 Well, basically, learn to live with less and learn to work with what you have.

00:06:05.760 So first of all, I say, look at what your advantages are.

00:06:09.460 What, what are your advantages?

00:06:10.940 Do you have the talent that you could put into a home business?

00:06:14.400 If you have that, that's great.

00:06:15.840 You could have some extra income there while mom stays home.

00:06:19.280 Do you have maybe a family member who owns their own business and you can work for them

00:06:24.320 or work with them, or your husband can have maybe a second job?

00:06:28.300 Look at what is around you.

00:06:30.160 Or maybe you have an elderly grandmother who's, who has passed away and she's given you $10,000

00:06:35.780 from her will or $20,000.

00:06:38.020 How can you best invest that instead of just going to Disneyland?

00:06:41.360 So always be looking at your resources and what you have.

00:06:44.580 We all have some sort of advantage.

00:06:46.580 We all have some sort of privilege somewhere in our lives and that we can take advantage

00:06:51.480 of and kind of try to maximize that, invest it, save it.

00:06:55.460 And that, that's the second part would be investing your money.

00:06:58.680 So for me and my husband, we, when we get our tax return, it's not like, yay, we're going

00:07:03.760 to go, you know, take an expensive trip or go out to an expensive meal or buy lots of presents.

00:07:08.420 We don't, we're not into that.

00:07:10.020 We're like, okay, what around the house can we invest in?

00:07:12.220 Can we buy solar panels?

00:07:13.380 Cause then we're not going to have a power bill anymore, a very small power bill.

00:07:16.980 Um, you know, or can we upgrade something that adds value to our home?

00:07:21.040 So we put in recently, uh, I think it was like, I think it was last year's tax return.

00:07:25.260 We used part of that to put in a really nice wooden playground.

00:07:28.100 And that not only was something that my kids could enjoy, but it, it increased the value

00:07:32.800 of our home, uh, a couple thousand dollars.

00:07:34.920 So that was, that was an easy thing to do, a easy place to put the money where we could

00:07:39.520 use it, but we're going to have access to it later when we resell our home.

00:07:43.040 And so those things are important.

00:07:45.480 Um, also just realizing that back in the old day, um, kids didn't have much and they were

00:07:52.860 still happy and really fulfilled.

00:07:54.460 In fact, probably more so than kids are today.

00:07:56.920 So I always think of my dad, my dad was, uh, he grew up in the South and his father was

00:08:02.380 an alcoholic and kind of took off on the family when my dad was five.

00:08:05.520 My dad was raised primarily by his grandparents cause his mom had to go to the city to work

00:08:09.560 to earn money.

00:08:10.760 And it was kind of like, we don't have shoe money this year.

00:08:13.480 So my dad would go a year without shoes, you know, or we don't have haircut money.

00:08:17.800 So my dad's hair would get down to his shoulders before they'd be able to cut it.

00:08:21.000 And certainly we don't want to live, you know, that destitute anymore.

00:08:25.060 And there's no sense we have to do that, but just realizing that those kids turned out

00:08:28.620 happy and healthy and functional and our kids aren't going to die if they don't get a trip

00:08:33.520 to Disneyland every year, or they don't get to go out to eat every week.

00:08:36.900 And so cut back on those things, cut back, you know, take modest and small vacations.

00:08:41.580 So my family took a vacation just last weekend.

00:08:43.880 We took a little mini vacation.

00:08:46.000 We just went an hour away up to where there was still some snow on the mountains, stayed

00:08:50.380 in a cabin, only cost a couple hundred bucks, but the kids had a wonderful time.

00:08:55.760 And so, you know, it totally beats going to some like grand ski resort or something really

00:09:00.680 fancy.

00:09:01.820 And cut back on those frivolous things like, you know, don't go out to eat for every meal.

00:09:07.100 You know, we go out to eat for special occasions.

00:09:09.020 So birthdays mostly or an anniversary.

00:09:11.860 We do have a lot of birthdays.

00:09:13.020 So the kids do still get to go out to eat often, you know, with a family of eight.

00:09:17.700 I mean, that's, you know, we're kind of averaging a little more than once a month, if you especially,

00:09:21.480 I mean, almost once a month.

00:09:23.840 And then, so vacations, out to eat, and then just those everyday expenses that people kind

00:09:30.360 of hemorrhage their money into like, you know, Starbucks coffees.

00:09:36.200 Like you don't eat a Starbucks coffee every day.

00:09:38.020 You don't have to go get like an $8 latte.

00:09:39.920 You don't have to buy the newest issue of, you know, InStyle magazine just because you

00:09:45.560 saw it at the checkout store.

00:09:47.340 And realizing that those things aren't going to fulfill you the way that children are anyways.

00:09:51.080 So it's like, oh, you have your coffee.

00:09:52.600 It's like eight bucks.

00:09:53.580 And it's over in like a half an hour.

00:09:55.900 You get your magazine.

00:09:56.900 Oh, it's so exciting.

00:09:57.860 But yeah, you read it in an hour and then you're done.

00:09:59.840 If you invest that money in your family or into having more children, you're going to

00:10:04.260 get so much more reward out of that than you are those like little tiny emotional, like

00:10:10.320 emotional buying things that we do.

00:10:14.040 Right.

00:10:15.060 Yeah.

00:10:15.620 I think like my family, I've learned how to cut all of our hair.

00:10:19.480 So I do all of our haircuts, including my own.

00:10:22.180 I haven't gone to a hairstylist in over six years.

00:10:26.300 Yeah.

00:10:26.820 Well, it looks good.

00:10:28.320 So and then I cook most of the meals and, you know, we eat out very rarely.

00:10:33.840 And when we do, it's usually how can we do this cheaply?

00:10:37.960 So we do a lot of McDonald's, which is terrible.

00:10:40.500 Oh, no.

00:10:41.740 Yeah.

00:10:43.080 But I figure if we do it twice a year, it's not the worst thing.

00:10:47.440 And there's Bella.

00:10:48.440 Yeah, I see someone spying back there.

00:10:50.000 They're always going to be someone spying.

00:10:52.200 Yes, they're always going to be a spier.

00:10:54.640 So what are some...

00:10:55.320 And there's Bella.

00:10:56.820 Guys, we're downstairs.

00:11:00.560 It's like the BBC dad interview.

00:11:03.460 Oh, that's right.

00:11:04.720 Oh, jeez.

00:11:05.540 And you know what?

00:11:06.180 I swear they've been like taunting me for the past two days that they're like, we're

00:11:10.020 going to go and we're going to...

00:11:11.520 That's good.

00:11:13.800 You guys have some fun.

00:11:14.920 Yeah.

00:11:15.260 Yeah.

00:11:15.440 The other thing I noticed, too, is people buy their kids a lot of clothes and kids outgrow

00:11:19.600 them.

00:11:19.860 You buy a baby and like two weeks later, they can outgrow something that she bought them, 0.98

00:11:23.700 you know, and lots of toys and things that they just don't need.

00:11:27.860 We should have a better setup for this.

00:11:30.120 Yeah.

00:11:31.160 For sure.

00:11:31.980 We thrift shop everything that we can and we do hand-me-downs with everything that we

00:11:36.880 can.

00:11:37.120 And one of the benefits in being in like a church community, the way that we are, is

00:11:41.620 that people in our church kind of they know the ages of our kids.

00:11:44.860 And so when they have maybe their son leaves to go on a mission, they're like, oh, we have

00:11:50.200 now all these, you know, nice dress shirts and nice slacks that he's not going to need

00:11:54.580 for two years.

00:11:55.160 He'll probably buy new stuff when he gets home.

00:11:57.440 So they'll bring it over for me for my oldest son or somebody down the street.

00:12:01.100 Their daughters grow out of their nice dresses.

00:12:03.800 And so they'll say, oh, let me go give that to Aila and her family.

00:12:08.300 So that's something really great, too, is accepting lots of hand-me-downs and thrift

00:12:12.980 shopping everything.

00:12:13.980 Like we thrift shop everything that we can.

00:12:16.800 Pots and pans, dishes, clothing, you know, toys.

00:12:21.260 Most, you know, even for Christmas, I will go to the thrift shop because like if you're

00:12:25.080 going to get a stuffed bear, for example, it doesn't have to be a brand new stuffed bear.

00:12:28.860 You can find like a really nice one, usually with even the store tags still attached, at

00:12:33.380 the thrift shop for literally like a quarter when you might spend $25 on that at like FAO

00:12:39.540 Schwartz or something like that.

00:12:40.980 So we thrift shop everything that we can.

00:12:43.440 And my kids don't even, they can't tell the difference.

00:12:45.860 They're just excited.

00:12:46.580 It's a new toy.

00:12:48.240 Right.

00:12:49.380 Yeah, we do a lot of that, too.

00:12:50.980 And we do a lot of that like penny-pinching stuff.

00:12:54.360 It's like, no, we don't need that.

00:12:55.880 You know, we kind of spend a little bit more on birthdays now that the kids are getting

00:12:59.060 older.

00:12:59.800 How old is your oldest, Ayla?

00:13:02.020 My oldest is 13.

00:13:03.500 He'll be 14 in June.

00:13:05.680 Okay.

00:13:06.280 Yeah.

00:13:07.060 Yeah.

00:13:07.360 That was like our chaos time.

00:13:09.120 There's like a large chunk for like three years.

00:13:11.360 I have zero memory.

00:13:12.560 And it's because my husband thought it would be a good idea to own a business.

00:13:16.880 And I had eight kids.

00:13:18.120 Well, I had six kids and I had, the oldest one was eight.

00:13:21.860 And my, I was pregnant and I have like three years where I'm like, I'm not really sure what

00:13:27.940 happened.

00:13:30.300 Well, yeah.

00:13:30.920 And I want to ask you guys about that because, you know, having large families, you have a

00:13:35.120 marriage.

00:13:35.480 And on top of it, you two are unique in the fact that you do videos, you know, you're,

00:13:40.260 you're active kind of fighting against this anti-whiteness that we have socially and politically.

00:13:45.180 You show your face, you're out there.

00:13:46.920 So how are you both managing to juggle all those things?

00:13:50.300 Because it could be pretty intense.

00:13:52.020 Jennifer, I guess we'll start with you because you're making videos too.

00:13:54.360 Yeah, I do the occasional video.

00:13:57.000 And then a lot, well, number one, like I, on my Facebook, I'm really selective who I

00:14:03.920 let on that one because I post pictures of my kids there.

00:14:06.460 Twitter, I don't post any pictures of my kids just because you don't want to give anybody

00:14:12.100 any ammunition.

00:14:13.160 That's right.

00:14:13.560 And so, and then on my Instagram, I have it private too.

00:14:18.960 So, you know, I can post pictures of my kids there, but I have a lot of videos of my kids

00:14:24.240 actually on my YouTube channel and I have, uh, actually made them all unlisted and stuff

00:14:29.600 like that because it just, even though a lot of them were just cute, you know, home video

00:14:33.640 type things, but it was like, there's too many weirdos out there.

00:14:37.600 So, um, yeah, my big thing is my husband's always worried.

00:14:41.480 He's like, you're going to end up on a list and I'm like, well, I kind of already was

00:14:46.980 on a list because I contribute to a free Patriot press blog and that one ended up on an S

00:14:53.840 Southern poverty law center list.

00:14:56.520 So yeah, well, that's where all the good people are on that list.

00:14:59.620 You know, that's how I go find my guests.

00:15:01.080 Now I go to SPLC and who do they hate?

00:15:03.220 Okay.

00:15:03.380 I'll have them on the show.

00:15:06.820 What about you, Ayla?

00:15:07.900 How are you juggling at all?

00:15:09.280 Well, I just go through phases of what I can do.

00:15:12.560 So when I first started making YouTube videos, um, my youngest was about one years old.

00:15:17.760 So she was kind of in that stage where she was just toddling off on her own.

00:15:21.100 She was already walking and she just wanted to kind of hang out with her brothers and

00:15:24.600 sisters.

00:15:24.900 And so I was able to kind of just sneak into the room and, and, you know, shut the door

00:15:29.360 and make a quick video.

00:15:30.880 Um, and my oldest was, you know, he's old enough to watch the younger ones now.

00:15:34.580 So that, that helps out, you know, five years ago, I couldn't have done as many videos as

00:15:40.000 I can now.

00:15:40.780 So just kind of recognizing the timing and the seasons in my life.

00:15:43.900 And so, um, 2015, I was able to put out quite a few videos and then like 2016, I wasn't,

00:15:50.140 I was pregnant and I was also quite sick during a few periods of my pregnancy.

00:15:54.320 So I didn't put out as much then.

00:15:56.460 And, um, and I even took a break from Twitter last summer.

00:15:59.900 I wasn't on for about three months.

00:16:01.540 So I just kind of recognize those seasons and, and just go with the flow.

00:16:05.780 And recently had a baby three months ago.

00:16:08.220 So I knew I wasn't going to be, you know, up making videos the next day or anything like

00:16:12.540 that.

00:16:12.880 But he's just gotten to the age now where he hangs out really well with dad or with

00:16:18.000 an older brother or whatever.

00:16:19.180 So I can start doing things like this again.

00:16:20.960 I can make my own videos.

00:16:21.920 I can do interviews, um, and that sort of thing.

00:16:24.600 And, and so it just kind of just recognizing that cycle and taking advantage of the time

00:16:29.280 that I do have and not sweating it when I don't have the extra time realizing that my

00:16:34.120 family is more important.

00:16:35.400 That's just it.

00:16:36.180 Yeah.

00:16:36.320 And I know you both watch the Doger family and the Bates and I know YouTube, I was just,

00:16:41.260 you know, checking out some large families.

00:16:43.060 There's a lot, they're mostly Mormons, but they have large families and they're basically

00:16:46.440 filming their life and putting it out there on YouTube and they're getting tons of views,

00:16:51.100 lots of views.

00:16:51.840 I mean, some of them have millions of views and it's just big families.

00:16:56.360 People are so interested in it.

00:16:57.940 I don't know.

00:16:58.340 Is it because it's, it's become like a zoo exhibit to them or on some level, are they

00:17:02.980 drawn to it?

00:17:04.020 Why do you think that some of these shows have become so popular and people are fascinated

00:17:07.480 by large families?

00:17:08.660 I think people honestly are just desperate to see a normal functioning family in this

00:17:15.840 society.

00:17:16.580 It's just kind of thick.

00:17:17.980 I mean, but it's just kind of, you know, with the divorce rate and, you know, single

00:17:21.960 motherhood and all this other stuff.

00:17:23.740 There are just people out there who would just like to see a family that, you know, likes

00:17:28.140 each other and actually likes to hang out.

00:17:31.700 And I think that's a lot of it, you know, they even, there's been speculation even with

00:17:36.220 the snowflake culture, if a lot of it is just children who weren't properly bonded to

00:17:41.360 their parents.

00:17:42.780 And I think that that's probably a great possibility.

00:17:45.960 You know, they're immediately, you know, whisked off to daycare so that the mom can go to work 1.00

00:17:50.620 and, you know, they just don't have that proper bonding.

00:17:53.200 So everything becomes a threat to them.

00:17:56.180 So, but I think a lot of it has to do with just say really like to watch families be family.

00:18:03.020 And it's just nice.

00:18:06.820 Yeah, I completely agree.

00:18:08.240 I think there's something natural.

00:18:09.820 There's a natural instinct within us that wants to be part of a large, healthy, functioning

00:18:14.880 family, no matter what the SJWs say.

00:18:17.980 And even in the, back in, you know, two, three generations ago, even if your mother, for

00:18:23.160 some reason, couldn't have a lot of children, had a health issue or something, and you didn't

00:18:26.520 come from a big family, you often had cousins and aunts and uncles who were, you know, closer

00:18:31.180 to your age than they were your mom's because your mom came from a big family.

00:18:34.220 You had neighbors and you had this really amazing sense of community where you had all this

00:18:39.120 multi-generational interaction going on and multi-age level interaction.

00:18:43.560 And there's something instinctual inside of us that knows that to put a child in a system

00:18:48.760 where they're sitting in a room with 30 other kids plus or minus their age by six months and

00:18:54.540 one adult is not natural social interaction.

00:18:58.200 And we kind of are, you know, we recoil at that a bit internally.

00:19:03.160 And so then when we see a family just getting together on a Saturday morning making pancakes

00:19:07.220 or whatever they're doing on their blog and there's a lot, you know, there's the older

00:19:11.020 ones are helping out and they're helping with the little ones and the little ones are being

00:19:14.300 cute and toddling around and getting into the syrup and all of these wonderful things

00:19:17.520 that happen in big families.

00:19:18.760 There is just a natural instinct that is drawn to that and people love it.

00:19:22.220 And I kind of think about it like the way moths are drawn to light.

00:19:25.420 And I think that big families, Christian families, wholesome families, healthy families, heterosexual

00:19:29.860 families right now are like a light.

00:19:32.120 And these SJWs and these poor millennials that grew up in households that were completely dysfunctional,

00:19:37.160 they, they haven't ever seen it and they see it and this like warm, attractive glow and

00:19:43.460 they just can't help but be attracted to it.

00:19:45.840 And they can do it in one or two ways.

00:19:47.660 They can do it in a nice way.

00:19:49.400 Like there was, I believe it was like a Slate or BuzzFeed columnist a few years ago wrote about

00:19:54.640 how she was obsessed with Mormon mom blogs and she didn't know why, but she loved them.

00:19:59.100 Or they can do it a negative way, which is what I get a lot on my Twitter and in the press

00:20:03.940 is like, oh my gosh, we have to like, you know, it's a normal functioning, healthy family 0.94

00:20:08.720 and they don't hate themselves for being white, you know, like let's throw rotten tomatoes at them. 0.67

00:20:12.700 And so, but they have to react in some way. 0.87

00:20:15.020 They're going to react with love or they're going to react with hate, but they're drawn to it.

00:20:19.080 And so when people react with hate to me or my, my, my Twitter, my videos, whatever,

00:20:23.800 I realized that they just want to be close.

00:20:26.440 They want to be close to that light and warmth.

00:20:28.780 If even it is, even if the only way they know how to be close is to be negative about it.

00:20:35.460 Right.

00:20:35.960 They don't understand it.

00:20:38.020 Yeah.

00:20:38.260 And it's interesting how, you know, people will complain on you all for having large families,

00:20:43.120 but then there's Muslims coming in into Europe and here that have 10 kids and no one ever complains 0.92

00:20:48.360 on them or Mexicans or blacks. 0.82

00:20:50.860 It seems like it's just European women that are really judged for having large families 0.89

00:20:54.960 when this is something that we always used to have, right?

00:20:58.780 Well, I posted a picture once and it was Ivanka Trump and she was holding her son on her lap

00:21:04.840 and she was doing some work and stuff like that. 0.87

00:21:06.840 And I was like, this is what the left and feminists hate more than anything. 1.00

00:21:12.060 You know, this beautiful, attractive, feminine woman sitting there nurturing her child.

00:21:17.200 They absolutely cannot stand it.

00:21:19.780 And it's because that's the quickest and easiest way to destroy the family union.

00:21:24.340 And that's what they have to do, because that's the only way that their policies have any

00:21:28.500 credibility is when you don't have children and generations who are properly bonded.

00:21:34.700 And then they're totally indoctrinated into the school system, too.

00:21:40.500 So, yeah.

00:21:41.480 Now, are you both?

00:21:42.260 I know A-Lo's homeschooling, but Jennifer, are you homeschooling the kids or not?

00:21:45.400 Yeah, I am.

00:21:46.780 We're actually taking spring break right now.

00:21:49.340 And I actually gave my kids the option.

00:21:51.240 I'm like, okay, we could do school, because I like the routine that it provides.

00:21:55.800 Or we need to seriously do some de-junking of our house.

00:21:59.900 So, we need to do it.

00:22:02.940 So, but, yeah.

00:22:04.280 My kids would have picked school.

00:22:07.480 I wish they would have.

00:22:08.660 We did last break, we did our spring cleaning during spring break, and I tried to make it

00:22:14.980 fun, and I had treats, and I had music, a playlist all set up, and we did one room a

00:22:19.500 day.

00:22:20.420 And I thought that they got okay with it at the time, but then this spring break rolled

00:22:24.440 around, they were like, we don't have to clean again, do we?

00:22:28.140 Yeah, I see.

00:22:28.980 For me, I'm pretty fashy that way.

00:22:31.020 I'm kind of a clean freak.

00:22:32.060 I like it orderly.

00:22:33.080 I guess I'm a, I have a fascist household here, you know, but, yeah, so you put them

00:22:38.840 to work, you make them do chores.

00:22:40.860 Yeah, I told my husband once, I'm like, you're so lucky I have so many kids, because I don't

00:22:45.420 have time to be as tyrannical as I would about things around the house, if I didn't have

00:22:50.940 all the kids to keep me busy.

00:22:54.260 Yeah, I'm a neat freak, definitely.

00:22:56.920 My dad was in the military, and, before I was born, but he was in the military, and my

00:23:01.480 mother was a nurse, and so they were both, like, very ship-shaped, everything had to

00:23:05.460 be, like, completely sanitized and in its place and on time, and so I really got that

00:23:10.540 from my parents, and I go a little nutty if things aren't totally clean.

00:23:14.740 I'm pretty much a neat freak, but I've really worked a nice schedule for our family, so we

00:23:20.680 do homeschool in the first part of the day.

00:23:22.820 We're usually done around 1 or 2 o'clock if the day is going well, and then my kids do

00:23:28.100 about a half hour of what we call deep cleaning, so we just rotate rooms every day, so Monday's

00:23:34.140 the kitchen, Tuesday's the living room, Wednesday is outside chores, Thursday's the bathrooms,

00:23:38.900 et cetera, and so they have their deep cleaning chores and their assignments, and they get

00:23:42.460 those done, and then they can go off and run around the neighborhood and play with friends

00:23:45.980 or, you know, watch a show or do something like that.

00:23:48.440 That's fun in the afternoon, but we definitely have to, I have to have that routine going to

00:23:53.420 keep my house clean, because kids are very messy, that's very true.

00:23:58.100 Yeah, it falls apart fast, and yeah, the routine has saved me, you know, and also sitting down,

00:24:04.500 the beginning of the school year, I did a mission statement of what I actually wanted my goals

00:24:09.500 to be with homeschooling, and that actually did a huge thing, because it's given me a goal

00:24:14.980 and a vision to go for, and so, you know, when I buy books and the things that we go through,

00:24:20.140 it's all, you know, directed towards that goal, and that's been really, really helpful for me,

00:24:26.780 is just sitting down, writing it out, down, what do I want out of this, and, you know,

00:24:31.680 I just don't want them to, you know, just not go to public school, it's like, no, I want them to be

00:24:37.860 able to challenge every ideology out there, so, because it's important that they be able to contend

00:24:45.780 for what is right, so. Absolutely. Now, I also wanted to talk about home birthing versus hospital

00:24:53.140 births, this is a topic that comes up a lot, nowadays, it's quite scary what they do in the

00:24:57.940 hospitals, if you kind of let them just do whatever they want to your baby, they'll put antibiotics 0.88

00:25:02.300 in their eye, they give them artificial K vitamin shots, instead of the natural stuff, they cut the cord

00:25:08.360 too soon, they cut the penis, you know, they take the baby off, and they have to measure them, and then 0.98

00:25:13.220 they put them behind glass, in some cases, just very unnatural things, so tell us a little bit

00:25:18.180 about your births, were they in hospitals, or at home, what are some thoughts on how to do it correctly?

00:25:24.640 Mine were in the hospital, which I kind of sort of regret, because I actually have, like, the ideal

00:25:29.040 births for, you know, home births, because my births were so incredibly easy, in fact, they were so easy

00:25:35.000 that the doctor wanted to film one of them for their Lamaze class, and I kind of said no, because that's

00:25:41.980 just too weird, a little too personal, yeah, yeah, and then all my, all my brother's friends, and they're

00:25:48.380 all started having kids, and having Lamaze class, I'm like, oh, thank god, I didn't do that, but I had

00:25:54.980 one, my fourth, you know, I got to the hospital, I was already dilated to a seven, and my husband looked

00:26:01.500 at the nurse, and he goes, you have about an hour to get everything together, and the nurse looked at 1.00

00:26:06.420 him, like, oh, you stupid idiot, what would you know, and exactly 55 minutes later, she shot into the scene, 1.00

00:26:13.760 my doctor didn't even have time to get both gloves on, she was out, so, yeah, I wish I would have did a 1.00

00:26:21.240 home birth, though, because I, I watched, like, the business of being born, I feel like, I'm like, gosh, if only

00:26:27.700 I, like, could have my kids with the brain that I have now, yeah, I know, no one teaches you these

00:26:34.180 things, most of our moms were in that generation where they didn't know a lot of the boomers, they 1.00

00:26:39.060 just kind of surrendered to doctor authorities, and nowadays, I think women are better about it, I crack 1.00

00:26:44.680 up, because there's the skin-to-skin movement, it's like, this is ancient, taking the baby and putting it

00:26:50.020 on your chest, skin-to-skin, like, this is what women always did, but now it's, it's a movement.

00:26:55.200 Yeah, I really wish I would have did a home birth, so, but, yeah, yeah, I did, I made all the mistakes

00:27:03.560 with my first three, I did, I just did everything that I was told to do, so we did the vaccines, and we had

00:27:09.000 lots of repercussions from that, my opus had a petite seizure, and then we had, like, nine serious, a week-long 0.88

00:27:19.140 reactions with the older three with each round of their shots, and it was like, this is dumb, delayed

00:27:24.160 development, we had, we suspected autism with my second one, because he just zoned out, and he just 0.50

00:27:32.340 didn't do anything, and they didn't, like, my older three, they, they, none of them watched till they were

00:27:36.780 past the age of two, and the third one, he didn't watch till he was almost three, so, and we quit 0.78

00:27:45.060 vaccinating, yeah, and they were fine, so it was like, this is so dumb, because you just don't know

00:27:52.880 anything, yeah, they put all kinds of toxic fillers and junk in there, that's just really bad metals,

00:27:57.720 and just, yeah, especially when a baby's just born, they're so gentle, and right away, they want to poke

00:28:03.320 them, and snip them, and cut them, and, like, do all these things, I mean, it's, it's frightening, what do you

00:28:07.840 think, Ayla, tell us about some of your births? Yeah, so I had my first five at home, and I had studied,

00:28:14.680 actually studied midwifery for quite a few years before I had my first son, so I already had a

00:28:20.660 midwife that I had worked with a few times, and things like that, and so I had the first five at

00:28:27.560 home, and then my sixth one, I had a couple of medical issues, so I needed to have him, I might

00:28:34.900 could have had him at home, but it was just a little bit riskier, so we decided, and kind of, I was also

00:28:39.160 kind of curious about the hospital, and we actually have a really great hospital here where I live,

00:28:42.780 so I thought, well, let's try hospital, and so I had a midwife in a hospital for my, my most recent

00:28:49.860 one, and actually had a really great experience, they were really hip to not, you know, not doing

00:28:56.220 the things I didn't want them to do, so we didn't do vaccines, we didn't do the drops in the eyes,

00:28:59.420 we didn't do the K shot, you know, they waited to cut the umbilical cord, they, the midwife let my

00:29:03.500 husband catch our son, because my husband had caught our other babies at home, and it was kind of like a

00:29:09.680 tradition we had, that dad catches them when they come out, and so the midwife was like, yeah,

00:29:13.860 totally, you know, she was kind of, she actually barely made it there as well, Jennifer was saying

00:29:19.020 with her doctor barely making it there, but when I was in the hospital, I, I said, you know, I have

00:29:24.380 really fast labors, and they're like, sure, sure, yeah, yeah, you know, and when I was at about a

00:29:30.320 seven, I was like, you really need to call the midwife, because it was in the middle of the night,

00:29:33.840 they're like, oh, we'll wait, we'll wait, and I'm like, no, you really need to call her, and she kind of,

00:29:37.720 yeah, like barely slid in there in time, I was already pushing, they told me to stop pushing,

00:29:42.440 and I was like, that's not going to happen, I don't, and I told them, I said, told the nurses,

00:29:46.840 I've had the other five at home, I don't care if the midwife is here or not, I am pushing this baby

00:29:51.460 out, she can come or not, my husband can catch the baby, I don't care, so it was really funny, so she

00:29:56.040 got there, but then she stepped aside and said, you know, there you go, you do it, and you know, and so

00:30:01.360 that was really great, we got to keep that tradition up, and I actually had a really wonderful

00:30:04.880 hospital experience, but I know that 13, 14 years ago, when I first started having children,

00:30:10.120 hospitals were still not, you know, that kind of cultural shift hadn't happened in a lot of

00:30:15.900 hospitals, they were still very militaristic about all of the procedures, and the poking,

00:30:20.460 and the cutting, as you say, so yeah, we, home birth, we don't vaccinate, we don't circumcise,

00:30:26.180 you know, all that, all that good stuff, and we've not had any major medical issues,

00:30:33.040 thank goodness. That's great, too, I hear that after, you know, four, five, and six, it actually

00:30:36.920 is easier, a woman's body's more acclimated, and the births are easier, is that true, or 0.83

00:30:41.680 not necessarily? I have found, oh, go ahead, I had weird complications with my fourth pregnancy,

00:30:49.840 um, well, no, my fifth pregnancy, I, what, I walked up the stairs, and I, it was short stairs, too,

00:30:56.840 and I heard what sounded like a rubber band snap inside my body, and, um, I got, I guess my body

00:31:04.400 releases too much of the relaxant hormone, and so I got what's called pubic symphysis dysfunction,

00:31:10.140 which my pubic bone ripped apart, and that's what I heard, was the ligaments actually snapping apart

00:31:15.920 between my pubic bone, and so that's why I actually only have six, because I would still be having

00:31:21.380 kids if I, I didn't have this complication, and I, that happened in September, and she wasn't born

00:31:28.080 to almost December, and then the sixth one, it happened when I, six weeks along, like, I found out

00:31:34.140 I was pregnant, and then a week later, I heard it, and it was just incredibly painful, and I was an

00:31:39.980 incredibly horrible wife and mother for the nine months, because I was in so much pain, and I was

00:31:47.020 just, I remember, like, maybe with my sixth, sixth child, my kitchen floor got so dirty, and I couldn't

00:31:54.360 handle it anymore, I was like, nobody can see this, and it took me two hours to scrub it, and I couldn't

00:31:59.320 move for two days afterwards, because it hurt. So, yeah. So, no more babies for you then, right?

00:32:07.060 I would still be having them if I didn't have that complication, because the doctor pretty much

00:32:13.020 said you're risking your entire pelvic floor ripping apart with each pregnancy. Yeah, and, and as you

00:32:18.920 said, birth control pills don't work, and, you know, there's a lot of research out there, there's a lot

00:32:22.220 of nasty stuff, and that's in birth control pills that are actually cancer-causing and horrible for

00:32:26.780 you. It's better to just know your natural rhythms, know your fertile days and charts. I mean, that's

00:32:32.140 what they did in the old days. That's one thing I appreciated about a lot of the pre-Christian 1.00

00:32:35.560 traditions. It evolved around, you know, fertility cycles a lot of the time, and women were more in 0.98

00:32:41.040 touch with that, and I think they've kind of, they've kind of lost, some women don't even know 0.51

00:32:44.960 their fertile days. They're just, yeah, they don't even know when they're going to get their period,

00:32:49.320 let alone that there is a time where you're, you're going to be fertile. So, but, yeah, it was,

00:32:55.500 it was pretty nasty, so, but. Sorry to hear, well, Ayla, how about you? Are you just going to keep

00:32:59.820 having kids who can't anymore? I mean, women in my family have been very fertile. I mean, 0.90

00:33:03.040 they have kids till they're 45, no problem. So, I mean, when are you going to stop?

00:33:08.180 That was our plan, but we have to stop as well. I have kind of, I have hypertension that I deal with.

00:33:15.300 Normally, when I'm not pregnant or haven't just had a baby, my blood pressure is fine,

00:33:19.620 but with my past two pregnancies, right after I have the baby, about three days later, my blood

00:33:25.900 pressure just goes through the roof. Last time on my fifth baby, it was controlled by some simple

00:33:31.400 medications. I took medications for about six months, then I was able to switch to just herbs,

00:33:36.040 then I was able to go off of them completely, and my blood pressure was fine. But this time,

00:33:40.780 my blood pressure was fine during my pregnancy, but again, just like the last time, three days after

00:33:46.460 he was born, my blood pressure went through the roof. This time, it was even higher, and it's not,

00:33:52.040 it's still not controlled by medication. I'm on an incredibly high dose of medication,

00:33:56.260 medication, and taking tons of herbs, doing all the natural things, using essential oils,

00:34:00.740 relaxation techniques, all of this, and it's still very, very high. And so, my doctor basically

00:34:07.900 said, or my midwife, I should say, you know, said, you're risking stroke or seizure if you have

00:34:12.400 another one, because this seems to be a problem that is getting worse with each child. So, whereas I

00:34:19.200 would love to have another one, yeah, we're going to have to be done as well. But we're thinking of,

00:34:25.460 we're very seriously considering adoption, though, how, and like the logistics of that are very

00:34:32.820 complicated, but we definitely would love to do that in the future. So, we'll just have to see

00:34:40.040 what happens. But not from Africa or Asia, right? Let's just get that straight.

00:34:45.580 No, we would probably want to foster adopt within the United States, you know, and get some of the

00:34:53.420 kids here in the U.S. some good homes first. But that's a ways off, because I would want my youngest

00:34:58.640 to at least, yeah, I would want my youngest to at least be old enough to have been well-established

00:35:05.480 in our family culture and have a really good sense of himself before we introduce somebody else into

00:35:11.180 our family who's going to have, you know, come from a different background, different environment,

00:35:16.340 different genetics, and all of this sort of thing. And then, like, we could just focus,

00:35:21.120 we could focus more on that child and getting that child what they need, because, you know,

00:35:25.400 they come from, obviously, they come from bad situations and shaky backgrounds. So, we would

00:35:30.800 want to be able to help that child as much as possible. So, anyways, this is a ways off. I'd

00:35:35.980 probably want my youngest to be at least around 10 years old before we do this, maybe 7 to 10 years

00:35:40.620 old, depending on his personality. But, yeah, not Africa or Asia. We want to take care of American 0.55

00:35:46.000 kids first. That's right. And, you know, generally, I think kids that grow up in large families,

00:35:51.920 they tend to have less kids. At least that's what I've seen. And then a lot of the kids that grow up

00:35:56.880 where they're the only child, then they tend to want to have a lot of kids. What do you guys think

00:36:00.860 about that? Do you think that that dynamic's going to play in your family that, you know, some of the

00:36:04.760 kids are tired of taking care of their brothers and sisters, so they're not going to want to have kids

00:36:08.920 in the future or not as many? I think it's all about how you frame it. I think it's about your

00:36:14.620 family culture. So, in my family culture, we love babies and we kind of pass that love down to our

00:36:21.160 kids. And we really try to model that for our older children in particular. And our older children do

00:36:26.340 have a lot of responsibility. Being the oldest, we ask for their help quite often. But, like, my oldest,

00:36:32.100 for example, like, he cannot wait to get married and have his own kids. Like, he's all about babies

00:36:36.980 and all about little kids. He just loves helping. He loves taking them out and pushing them on the

00:36:41.640 swing or helping out. And so, I think, and then our oldest daughter, who's four, is always telling

00:36:47.460 us she's going to have 10 babies. She's obsessed with baby dolls, loves babies. My husband came from 0.97

00:36:53.540 a really large family, including his step-siblings. He came from a family of 11. So, he wanted to have a

00:37:01.580 large family. So, I don't think it's always the case with large families that they want to have a

00:37:06.580 smaller family. I think it's all about how it's framed. If your family acts like the new baby is

00:37:11.580 a burden and that it's difficult to take care of it. So, if mom is kind of slumping around the house 0.82

00:37:16.100 and her pajamas like, oh, you know, the baby kept me up again all night or making it a negative

00:37:20.780 experience and not looking at the positives and the blessings of it, then the kids are going to kind

00:37:24.880 of internalize that as more of a negative experience. But if they're used to looking at the blessings

00:37:30.680 of having a new baby or a toddler or a young child in the house, then they're really going

00:37:35.680 to be enthusiastic about having a large family themselves. Yeah, I had, let's see, two older

00:37:43.160 sisters and three younger brothers. And so, I came from a larger family. I'm actually a second

00:37:48.680 generation homeschooler because my parents homeschooled us when, even back in the day

00:37:55.280 when it was in North Dakota, it was completely illegal to homeschool. It was? Wow. Yeah. When

00:38:01.060 they started, in fact, they were part of the movement that got it legalized in the state of

00:38:05.860 North Dakota. So, in the, let's see, it was mid-80s, it would have been, mid-80s, early-90s.

00:38:12.580 So, they actually helped get the law changed. I remember going to lots of, you know, congressional

00:38:18.500 hearings and court things and stuff, and there was just always this, kind of this, you can't

00:38:24.280 go outside until after three, kind of a thing, because nobody could see us outside because

00:38:29.980 they were paranoid that, you know, somebody would call in and say that we were- Children's

00:38:34.200 services or something, yeah. Yeah. So, but I know, like, one family in my area, they have

00:38:40.700 13 kids, and only seven of them are married, and I think that they are almost going to have

00:38:47.320 44 grandchildren, and the oldest one's 15. That's great. That's great. So, and, yeah,

00:38:54.120 I mean, she's younger than me, and she has, she just had baby number nine, one of their

00:39:00.260 kids. So, they are just popping them out, and I just, I'm like, yeah, I know. Especially

00:39:05.780 if they're cool people. You know, if they're, they're, they're great people, they're smart,

00:39:09.740 they're good-looking, like, we want those people having lots of kids, right? Of course.

00:39:13.880 Yeah, and they all homeschool too, which is even better, because then you're getting

00:39:17.340 away from that state. Exactly. They won't be programmed. Now, Ayla, earlier you brought

00:39:21.300 up sleep. Let's talk about some tips for, you know, you just bring your baby home. Some

00:39:26.540 people say never wake the baby. Some people say let him sleep. Some people say you need

00:39:30.320 to wake him up every few hours to constantly feed them. Some people put him in the bed.

00:39:34.580 Some people put him down the hall. Now, what are some, some tips? We'll start

00:39:37.860 with Ayla. Well, I've always co-slept, so I definitely recommend moms that are having

00:39:44.520 their first baby to pick up a couple books, or just kind of look around online and learn

00:39:49.100 about co-sleeping, learn about how to do it safely, and learn about the benefits of

00:39:54.120 it, and kind of get used to that idea, because it's a lifesaver. So, I basically sleep with

00:39:59.680 my babies. They sleep in the crook of my arm. They nurse. Then we change the other side,

00:40:04.880 then take the other side a couple hours later, and it works marvelously for us. And I'm typically

00:40:11.200 not sleep-deprived. I've had wonderful sleeping babies. As far as nap schedules, I've always been

00:40:18.200 a really big fan of letting the kids kind of choose their own schedule as far as napping

00:40:22.760 goes. And as a mom, you'll kind of be able to see the patterns. So, maybe if your baby is a couple

00:40:29.080 months old and they're starting to, like, sleep from, like, 6 to 8, and then that's keeping them

00:40:34.380 up until midnight, like, definitely you probably want to try to gently rework their schedule by

00:40:41.420 waking them up, or maybe letting them only sleep, like, 15 minutes around 6 o'clock, and then trying

00:40:46.080 to wake them up, or something like that, in order to get them on a better rhythm. And I've also noticed

00:40:51.660 I did a lot of visualization when I was pregnant. So, when I was pregnant and I was getting ready to go

00:40:56.100 to sleep, I would, like, just think, like, this is sleeping time, this is calm time, and try to, like,

00:41:02.680 get my baby in that rhythm of now is time to calm down, now is time to wake up, now is time to calm

00:41:08.780 down, now is time to wake up. And I don't have any empirical evidence as far as whether or not that

00:41:13.740 actually scientifically works, but I know that my kids have been great sleepers. So, I definitely

00:41:18.060 recommend at least trying that toward the end of your pregnancy for about seven months on.

00:41:23.580 Um, and then as far as waking them to eat, I've never found that to be needful, unless you're

00:41:31.180 battling, like, maybe a breast infection, like a mastitis, and you really need them to nurse really

00:41:37.240 regularly, or something like that. But I would, in that case, I would probably just buy a breast pump. 0.98

00:41:41.960 So, I always just let my babies eat when they're hungry, and that has been, that's worked the best

00:41:47.140 for us.

00:41:47.680 Yeah, I kind of, I guess I kind of do it the same way, where I just kind of am like, yeah,

00:41:52.860 you know, go with the baby. I think part of that helps is that we're stay-at-home moms,

00:41:57.300 and so we can just kind of be flexible like that, where, you know, if you're going to be sending your

00:42:03.220 kids off to daycare, I could see you needing to get them more on a schedule and a routine,

00:42:08.220 so that it works out better that way. But, um, yeah, we just always were kind of laid back about it.

00:42:14.520 You know, I think, like, my oldest, we tried the crib thing, and it just was, like, a complete

00:42:19.660 miserable thing, trying to get her to sleep in her crib. So, we just kind of gave up on that.

00:42:26.040 We even tried, like, the bassinet next to the bed, you know, because you want to be the

00:42:29.840 responsible parent. And we just, it just never worked for us. It was just, like, it just worked

00:42:36.740 better just to bring them in our bed. My husband, he wasn't crazy about it, because he's like,

00:42:41.280 I'm going to roll over and crush them or something. And it never happened. So, but he

00:42:47.200 was convinced he would. So, but...

00:42:50.300 Yeah, they have a, like, little dock-a-tots, even Snuggle Me Organic. There's all kinds of

00:42:54.980 really neat things you can buy that it almost, like, mimics the womb. It's like this mini kind

00:42:59.520 of baby mat, almost like a pad or, I don't know, a piece of fabric. I don't know, how do I explain it?

00:43:05.800 You just have to check it out. Snuggle Me Organic. And it hugs the baby. It kind of falls into it,

00:43:09.500 and then you can lay right between you in the bed, which is cool. So, no one has to worry about

00:43:13.720 squishing the baby. But yeah, like we were talking about before, in the old days, they didn't do this.

00:43:19.220 They lived in small little houses. They didn't have a whole room just dedicated to the baby down the

00:43:24.440 halls that they can put them in. And it was, it was so cold, too. They all needed to sleep together

00:43:29.300 in the same bed, right?

00:43:31.240 Yep.

00:43:33.080 Children, they all slept in the same bed, and they all had 10 kids. It was just how it was,

00:43:38.520 and it worked. So, granted, you know, the child mortality rate wasn't the greatest, which is why

00:43:45.680 they had so many kids. But at the same time, it was like, you know, it's how it was done.

00:43:52.580 You know, families bonded together. They actually hung out together. They did things together.

00:43:58.300 So, I think that that's like the funniest thing for me is people who are fascinated that I do,

00:44:03.320 we do like home meals. That's, that's fascinating to them. It's like, I make a point that we have at

00:44:10.120 least, you know, three good family meals a week together. Friday, it falls apart because we do

00:44:16.220 pizza movie.

00:44:19.880 So, and then Wednesday, we have church pot.

00:44:22.060 Yeah, let's talk about food tips. I mean, you know, cooking for a big family, it's a lot. So,

00:44:26.820 what kind of tips do you have for people cooking? Some ideas, maybe.

00:44:31.520 Crock pots are your best friend.

00:44:35.360 Definitely.

00:44:37.180 You can get it going, you can do school, and you're, by the end of the day, when you're like

00:44:41.440 burnt out, and you're just kind of like, I don't care anymore, it's already there,

00:44:45.400 there and done. I love my crock pot.

00:44:47.960 Yeah, I have to agree with that, definitely. And then, I also think we garden a lot, so we grow a

00:44:56.320 lot of our own food, and that helps. And to have a schedule, to have a meal schedule, really saves

00:45:03.380 me, because I know that, you know, on this day, I need to get, you know, dinner in the crock pot

00:45:09.080 early, I need to get it in at, you know, 10 o'clock or whatever, to make sure it's on time. And you get

00:45:13.540 in that rhythm, and it almost feels like, you know, you don't have to remember, it almost feels

00:45:17.400 effortless when you're in a rhythm, because your body and your mind are used to, to doing these

00:45:21.500 things. And so, it's like, okay, Wednesday night is, you know, chicken soup, or

00:45:25.580 yeah, like you were saying, Friday night is pizza. Like, if you, if you're in a rhythm,

00:45:29.660 that works really well. And then, with our garden, what I love to do, because you

00:45:33.620 kind of can't plan, like, what's going to be ripe, or what's

00:45:37.620 coming out of your garden at, like, exactly the right time. So, what I like to do

00:45:41.540 is have a base food for each night of the week, like, Thursday night

00:45:45.600 is rice, or, you know, or, like, Wednesday night is pasta, or something like this.

00:45:50.020 And then, I add to it whatever vegetables and things were getting

00:45:53.720 out of the garden that day. And then, I just keep some, like,

00:45:57.540 frozen veggies, or canned veggies, in my cupboard and my

00:46:01.800 freezer, in case, for some reason, like, you know, we had some kind of

00:46:05.700 disaster happen in the garden that day, or the week before, and, you know,

00:46:09.540 now this zucchini harvest we were planning on didn't happen, or, you know, something like that.

00:46:13.240 I've got some backup that I can easily just, you know, throw in and work in with dinner. But

00:46:18.780 definitely, definitely, you've got to schedule those meals. And schedule the prep work, too.

00:46:23.760 The way I do it, you know, we have our breakfast, lunch, and dinner schedule.

00:46:27.020 And then, after the dinner section on my paper, I have prep work for the next day.

00:46:32.220 So, maybe we're having muesli for breakfast. My kids really love, like, Swiss muesli, like,

00:46:36.180 the kind you soak overnight. They're, like, authentic kind. So, you know, I have to put that,

00:46:40.680 get that prepared the night before for breakfast the next morning. But it saves me so much money,

00:46:46.700 because to make my own Swiss muesli is so much cheaper than boxed cereal. And it's so much

00:46:52.900 healthier for my kids. And if I just have that little schedule, and know to do it ahead of time,

00:46:58.120 it saves me time, and it saves me tons of money, and we're way healthier for it.

00:47:02.040 Yeah, having a garden is great. Also, if your husband's hunt, because you can catch a big animal,

00:47:07.360 and that lasts for a long time. That's one thing that always pains me when I see some of these big

00:47:11.080 families, when they go grocery shopping, they buy a lot of crap, a lot of carbs, a lot of 0.98

00:47:16.260 topper almond, a lot of cheap stuff, cheap soda. And that's poison for your kids, you know. But 0.99

00:47:22.600 it's expensive doing low carb, unless you can hunt, unless you can have a garden, right?

00:47:28.760 I have a garden. We do a garden, too. We haven't been able to do anything with it,

00:47:32.720 because the ground's pretty frozen right now, still. But yeah, my husband hunts. In fact, my

00:47:38.520 15-year-old daughter, she got a deer last year. So it was her second one.

00:47:43.620 Nice.

00:47:44.660 That was kind of cool. So yeah.

00:47:48.140 Yeah, definitely. And I think with food, too, is, again, you have to recognize your rhythms and

00:47:54.100 your seasons of life. So what, like, right after I've had a baby, we're going to be eating some junk

00:47:59.840 food. You know, I'm just, I'm not going to be up cooking a meal from scratch right after having a

00:48:04.460 baby. So I realized that that first month or two after I have a baby, we're going to be eating some

00:48:09.520 boxed things. We're going to be eating from cans, especially if it's during the winter, so our garden

00:48:13.620 isn't producing much, you know, but maybe two cabbages a week or something. And so just recognizing

00:48:18.980 that it's okay, it's temporary. Or if you have a financial setback, you know, your husband loses his

00:48:24.280 job and you say, okay, look, we have a big family, and we can't afford organic, fresh food right now.

00:48:30.060 And we're going to do some mac and cheese for a little while. And this is just a temporary measure

00:48:34.420 to get us over this hump. And then we can go back to being healthy. And I think the important thing is

00:48:39.960 to not overstress yourself about it. And when you have only one or two kids, you know, when I, when I,

00:48:45.540 my family was smaller, it was a lot easier to be more consistent with the healthy food. But once you have

00:48:50.320 a large family, you have to realize that, that there's, you know, there's eight people, there's

00:48:54.820 eight different needs, there's people who are sick and people who are well, and, you know, all of these

00:48:59.340 different things that have happened. And to just go ahead and relax a little about it, and realize

00:49:04.920 that a little bit of junk food isn't going to hurt, particularly if most of the time, you're putting

00:49:09.520 in the effort to cook good, wholesome food from scratch. Yeah. And if you can afford it, Whole Foods

00:49:13.740 actually has a lot of good things in their freezer section that that isn't toxic and bad, too. You know,

00:49:18.560 some people can afford that. Yeah, right. You know, I, for my thing, I started, I watch a lot

00:49:24.500 of Jordan Peterson, and I didn't really realize a lot of the stuff that he talks about with raising

00:49:28.760 kids that I kind of already do. Like, I kind of do this thing where I only cook one meal a day for

00:49:35.220 my kids are responsible for making sure that they eat the rest of the day, I make a nice meal at dinner,

00:49:40.820 and that's it. And if they are hungry, they need to learn to make themselves a sandwich. And so like,

00:49:45.820 my six year old, she already knows how to make a sandwich. And you know, she'll help make macaroni 1.00

00:49:51.120 and cheese. And she's learning out all these things that she can do, because you know, you want to do

00:49:56.680 as little for your kids as soon as possible, so they learn how to do it for themselves. So

00:50:01.760 that's a good point. Yeah, that's an excellent point. I really agree with that. I have my kids cook a lot of

00:50:08.480 the meals, too. Yeah, you got to teach them how to be self sufficient, even the boys, because let's face it,

00:50:13.440 when they grow up, you know, a girl doesn't want to meet a guy who like, can't even make mac and 0.88

00:50:18.140 cheese, right? I don't think moms do service when they're also serving their children and doing every 1.00

00:50:23.780 little thing for them, because it tends to make kind of mama's boys, too, doesn't it?

00:50:28.380 Oh, yeah, definitely. Yeah, I always say that my kids are going to be a steal, particularly my two

00:50:34.120 oldest boys, because they know how to change a baby. I mean, heck, they've been at so many home births,

00:50:40.020 they know how to deliver a baby. They can deliver a baby, they can change a baby, they know,

00:50:44.700 you know, different nursing positions that are best when the baby's crying. They know how to do 0.75

00:50:48.880 their laundry, they know how to cook, you know, a three course meal, four course meal, they know how

00:50:53.940 to potty train a toddler, because they're helping me with all of these things. And so whoever the girls 0.96

00:50:59.860 that get to marry my two oldest boys in particular are going to be incredibly lucky, because they're

00:51:03.460 always going to know all of these things. See, that's awesome. Right.

00:51:06.720 So but yeah, I mean, I just kind of take like a hands off approach a lot of times with a lot of

00:51:12.460 stuff with, you know, chores and stuff like that. Although it does help that my fourth child is

00:51:17.720 very OCD. And like her favorite thing to do is cleaning organized things. And that's actually her

00:51:25.960 love language is acts of service like that. So like, if I really want to make her happy, I'll make a

00:51:31.640 grocery list before we go to the store. She gets to man the list. And that's just makes her happy as 1.00

00:51:39.160 can be.

00:51:39.540 Oh, that's nice.

00:51:40.380 You make a list?

00:51:44.280 Happy birthday, sweetie.

00:51:48.240 Well, before we wrap up, is there any other last tips that you want to give people or anything

00:51:53.380 that you want to share about your way that you raise your families? Jennifer, I guess we'll start

00:51:58.320 with you. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid to have kids. Don't be afraid. Don't let society convince

00:52:03.860 you that, you know, kids are these terrible burdens. They're not. They are blessings. And

00:52:08.400 they are really, really fun. They make me laugh all the time. Don't be afraid to have kids. They

00:52:14.120 are awesome. They are way cooler than most adults. I hate to say this, but you know, they are. They're

00:52:19.200 better. So yeah, I just don't be afraid. Try it. You know, you'll never regret it, but you will regret

00:52:25.220 not doing it. Yes. And I would say, don't be afraid of getting to know your deep inner self

00:52:32.460 because my favorite, one of my favorite phrases is children don't change who they are. They reveal

00:52:37.640 who you are. And you have no idea how selfish or bad tempered you can be until you have a child

00:52:44.380 testing that. But it is amazing way to develop, to develop yourself. You will grow so much. You'll

00:52:52.400 look back on your pre-child self and say, I can't believe I ever thought that way. Or

00:52:56.160 I can't believe I ever acted that way. And it matures you so much. And so be comfortable.

00:53:02.080 Allow that process to happen. And I love what Jen said. Don't be afraid. Jump in and do it

00:53:07.320 because at the end of the day, that is what we're here for. There really is, I mean, is

00:53:12.560 to have children. I mean, do you, at the end of your life, what do you want to be surrounded

00:53:16.600 by? Do you want to be surrounded by children and grandchildren and your great grandchildren? Or do

00:53:20.660 you want to be surrounded by your old work colleagues? You know, my dad was a business

00:53:25.220 guy where he worked in an office. He had lots of women in that office who chose not to have 1.00

00:53:29.960 children. And now they're aging. They're in their sixties and seventies. They're going through

00:53:34.020 health issues. Um, and they don't have a family there to help them. They have like my dad, like

00:53:39.200 goodness, my dad is like a really standup guy who would help anybody with anything, but they have

00:53:44.120 their coworkers that that's the best that they have. And so really know that you're investing

00:53:51.360 in the future. And my last tip would be, don't be afraid of that third child. Because when you have

00:53:57.240 one child, your life can stay really similar to what you were used to before having children.

00:54:03.400 When you have two children, you are a fan, like a total, like a hundred percent mom. At that point,

00:54:09.440 you don't have times when like, just like when you have one child, they nap. And so then like your

00:54:14.620 life suddenly reverts back to normal for a minute. But when you have two kids, they're not napping at

00:54:19.720 the same time. They're not doing the same thing. So suddenly you are a hundred percent a mom and it

00:54:23.560 takes a hundred percent of your effort. And so people will have two kids and then they get scared

00:54:27.840 because going from zero to one wasn't very hard, but one to two, like feels like your world is falling

00:54:33.160 apart for a little while. Hang in there. Don't be afraid to have that third kid because the third kid

00:54:38.600 is easy peasy, no problem. And after that, you can almost always add more and it's no additional

00:54:45.660 stress. Just don't be afraid of that two kid mark. I think it's better too, because they have

00:54:51.400 siblings to play with. Some of these parents that just have the one kid, it turns kind of neurotic,

00:54:57.000 if you know what I mean. They're just like obsessed about this one kid all the time. And the kid

00:55:00.480 doesn't have anyone else to play with. Yeah, right. Very true. Yeah. And the third, the third child,

00:55:07.740 he was my third child was my biggest child that I had. And, you know, the big joke is that when I

00:55:13.780 was pushing him out, I screamed and my husband says, I'm like, I'm supposed to do this with

00:55:21.720 dignity and classier. So he has like a 14 centimeter head, you know, just huge. And he was like almost

00:55:30.360 24 inches long. And so he like literally, my water broke at home, like in that 15% chance,

00:55:36.520 it was the gush all over. And I was like, thank God, I still got kids in diapers because mommy needs

00:55:41.940 them.

00:55:42.360 So I had to wait an hour for Mike to get home because he's worth an hour away. So it was a mess

00:55:50.120 all over. And I was like, well, that laundry is not getting done now.

00:55:55.620 You brought up something I forgot to mention, though, before we wrap up diapers. There's a lot

00:56:00.000 of diapers that are like awfully toxic. So that's another area.

00:56:04.560 Love diapers. Their butts actually bleed because, you know, you just try different ones and they're 1.00

00:56:12.560 so fragrant that they were brutal. Yeah, there's these Danish ones called Bambo, 1.00

00:56:20.300 which is the best on the market. And they're not that much more money, but it's worth it to protect

00:56:24.920 your your kid because there's all these amazing toxic chemicals in there. And when the kid wets

00:56:30.580 itself, their pores open, it goes right in and then they have these diaper rashes and then they

00:56:35.120 put more chemicals on the diaper rashes and they're eating this bad formula. It's amazing

00:56:39.260 that some of our kids survive, you know, seriously.

00:56:41.800 Yeah. Yeah. I would recommend for people thinking about diapers to look into elimination communication.

00:56:47.840 I don't know if either of you have heard of that before, but I did it with my first three.

00:56:52.060 And that is basically where you, well, you read the techniques on how to do it, but you recognize

00:56:58.120 when a baby's about to pee or poo because they do give signals. They'll, and if you're tuned into

00:57:04.080 that, you can actually go and hold them over the toilet. And so like my oldest, because he was my

00:57:09.200 first and my only, and I was able to put a lot of energy into him. He didn't wear diapers.

00:57:13.500 We just did elimination communication. I think maybe we had two accidents his entire childhood

00:57:18.540 or babyhood. Um, and so that is a really great option. Um, if you have a big spacing between two

00:57:25.300 kids or you only have like the one, one or two kids or the first three kids or so, elimination

00:57:30.200 communication can be really great. It saves you money on diapers, saves you on doing laundry

00:57:35.100 if you're doing cloth and it's really neat.

00:57:38.780 Yeah. Yeah. That, that, uh, wow. I, I guess with my youngest two, they basically potty train

00:57:44.620 themselves because at that point I had learned like, this is a such a pointless struggle.

00:57:49.960 They don't go and they're not going to do this. Like I have a video of my second one. It's

00:57:55.540 on YouTube, but it's unlisted, but he's sitting on the toilet and we're making, we're doing

00:58:00.280 the potty negotiation and he's like, why not just change my diaper? It's like,

00:58:07.860 but he has the most pitiful face and he's just devastated. And he's just like, why not just

00:58:18.240 change my diaper? And it's just like, because you're too old for this. And we way too much

00:58:24.000 time just sitting in the bathroom, negotiating with them. You know, you brought up some signals.

00:58:30.300 So for people who want to try the method that you mentioned, what are some of the signals

00:58:33.380 that they give off? Yeah. Okay. Well, you have to kind of get in tune with what your baby in

00:58:37.760 particular does, but usually they just start, um, I call it fidgeting. I don't know if there's

00:58:41.920 another word, but it's when they kind of just start doing this, like you're holding them and

00:58:45.920 they're perfectly calm and still. And then all of a sudden they just start squirming like this.

00:58:49.960 And a lot of times they'll also try to make eye contact with you, even from a very young age,

00:58:53.660 they'll kind of try to, you know, they have a hard time focusing, but they'll look around and

00:58:57.580 they'll try to be looking, looking for your face and they'll be fidgeting like this.

00:59:01.280 And then, um, that's a really, really good signal. And then also, um, if you just offer

00:59:07.300 to take them to the bathroom, like every hour, hour and a half, they'll get in the rhythm of

00:59:12.980 being able to hold it. Like, and, and they'll just naturally want to hold it. Most babies now

00:59:17.980 this, I don't know if it works on all babies, but it worked really well. My, my first couple

00:59:21.280 of kids. So my oldest son, I would just take him to the potty, um, about every hour and a

00:59:27.340 half or so. And he just got used to going then. So that's when he went. And then you

00:59:31.160 make a, um, a sound when they do go to the bathroom. So at the very, the very beginning,

00:59:36.080 when you're first trying this out, you put them in cloth with no cover. So you can see

00:59:40.320 when they start peeing. And the second they start peeing or pooing, you make a noise. So

00:59:44.520 our noise was, I don't know if that's picking up on the mic, but it's like a pee sound. And

00:59:50.280 then they start associating that sound with, you know, urinating or pooing. And so then you

00:59:56.600 can hold them over the toilet and make that sound. And they have, you know, kind of like

01:00:00.940 Pavlov's dog, right? They'll, they'll pee when they hear that noise. Cause they know,

01:00:04.460 oh, that's the pee noise or that's the poo noise. And so if you just do that and you keep

01:00:08.320 their, their bladder and bowel relatively empty, um, you know, you don't even have to look for

01:00:13.100 the cue signals as much, but we're definitely when they first wake up and if they're sleeping

01:00:18.240 and they start fidgeting, if they're awake and they start fidgeting, those are the, and they're,

01:00:22.060 or they're trying to make eye contact with you. Those are some really important cue cues.

01:00:26.640 Awesome. I think you both have shared a lot of great tips. I'm glad that we can do this

01:00:30.680 for people, Jennifer, that want to see your YouTube and reach you on Twitter, give out that

01:00:35.080 information. Um, my Twitter handle is at intelligence with a J for the, uh, sound. And then, um, uh,

01:00:44.180 my YouTube is just Jennifer Loken. And, um, so, and then I have a Facebook group for my political

01:00:51.000 stuff called the Rational Redhead. I'm eventually going to get a website. My husband's working on

01:00:56.040 it. So I still have to finish the, uh, description of all of that so that he can get all that

01:01:01.500 implemented. Cause I mean, I imagine that rationalredhead.com wasn't taken. Wow. That's

01:01:08.260 amazing. I was, I was amused. I think someone was doing a handstand in the back, like walking on

01:01:14.980 their hands. That was impressive. She's my type A and she actually kind of gets like anxious if she 0.96

01:01:20.860 has to be standing on her feet for too long. And she actually kind of starts to panic. Like even

01:01:26.240 when we're shopping, she's like, I need to do something. She's showing off for sure.

01:01:31.300 She shouldn't be in gymnastics, but my husband with his job, he's not too crazy about gymnastics. He

01:01:36.900 designs medical equipment for quadriplegics and paraplegics. So he's like, gymnastics is the worst

01:01:43.520 sport ever. Now, Ayla, most people know you, but why don't you give out your information once again

01:01:50.680 for newcomers? Yeah, you can find me on Twitter at a purposeful wife. And if you check my pinned

01:01:56.940 tweet right now, um, I have all of my other contact information. I have a Facebook page and

01:02:02.040 Instagram, um, a Patreon, uh, and then my YouTube channel is also there, but my YouTube channel is,

01:02:07.620 um, youtube.com slash users slash adorable Ayla and Ayla spelled A Y L A.

01:02:13.520 That's great. I didn't know you had a Patreon. That's great. Everyone support her. She does some

01:02:16.920 good work and she has a big family. So definitely pitch into that. Well, thank you ladies so much. 1.00

01:02:21.240 We'll have to do this again sometime in the future.

01:02:23.080 Yes, for sure. Thank you.

01:02:26.060 Yep. Thank you.

01:02:27.320 If you enjoy my show, please support it. The best way is to sign up for a membership at

01:02:32.320 red ice members.com. From there, you can stream or download all my previous shows and also catch me

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01:02:45.540 prefer, you can donate at paypal.me slash red ice. Thank you for listening. And don't forget to

01:02:51.340 subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll talk again soon.

01:03:08.520 Bye.

01:03:38.520 Bye.

01:03:39.140 Bye.

01:03:59.240 Bye.

01:04:00.400 Bye.

01:04:01.400 Bye.

01:04:01.460 Bye.

01:04:01.480 Bye.

01:04:01.740 Bye.

01:04:01.800 Bye.

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Radio 3Fourteen - April 17, 2017

Tips on Raising a Large Family

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