11 kids mean 'structured chaos' and lots of love for Elgin family
The Schambach family of Elgin - mom, dad and 11 kids ages 23 to 5 years old - likes to joke that there are two kinds of people in the world: Schambachs and those who want to be Schambachs.
After you spend a couple of hours with the family in the living room of their four-bedroom, three-bathroom home on the west side of Elgin, it's easy to start seeing what they mean: The conversation is lively, with people ribbing each other and engaging in animated side chats. Their love for each other is palpable as they describe a life full of laughter and camaraderie, no matter the financial and organizational challenges.
Raising 11 kids is pretty much “structured chaos,” said parents Eric and Erika Schambach, who celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary in November.
“People say, 'Oh, you must be so organized,'” Erika said. “I don't feel organized. But at the same time, dinner is on the table, food is in the refrigerator, and the kids have clean clothes. It gets done.”
The family is used to answering questions about their life, even from strangers. “A typical one is, 'Do you guys ever fight for food?'” the oldest, Joseph, 23, said. “Like it's survival of the fittest.”
The children are all home-schooled, with the two oldest ones graduating from online colleges. Despite the effort to keep everyone's lessons on track, home schooling made routines easier - never a joint, mad rush to get out of the house in the morning, for example - and allowed for lots of togetherness and bonding, the family said.
Parenting also has become easier over time as the older kids have been able to step in and help take care of the younger ones, Eric and Erika say.
Joseph is the only one who's moved out and lives with roommates in St. Charles. He teaches and plays piano.
Kathleen, 22, teaches piano and violin. Jack, 20, works for Tor Construction in South Elgin alongside his father, a construction superintendent.
Kaelin, 19, also is a piano teacher and self-employed as a caregiver and cleaner at Highland Oaks nursing home in Elgin, where her paternal great-grandparents live. She also writes plays.
The others are: Jesse, 17, and Jimmy, 14, who play rugby with the Elgin River Rats and football with Westminster Christian School in Elgin; Kalli, 15, who plays basketball at Westminster; Klair, 12, who hopes to be a softball player; John 10, who wants to be a baseball player; Jason, 7, who won a pinewood derby car race and whom siblings agreeably point to as the troublemaker; and Kyrielle, 5, who says “I want to play ballerina” while ensconced in her mother's lap. Another child, Jabez, died at 21 weeks of gestation.
Raising a big family requires solid team work, their parents said.
The kids are required to share in tasks and chores starting around age 4. There is a “boys day” and a “girls day” for cleaning the kitchen, and teams of two are assigned to clean each room.
Erika runs the daily household while Eric is the enforcer when something goes wrong. Erika fostered their love of classical music while Eric taught them the value of work, rousing them early on Saturday mornings via a house intercom system. “It used to terrify us,” Kaelin said, laughing.
The parents also encouraged their kids to engage in critical thinking, and Friday night dinners are especially famous for their spirited family debates, they said.
“We are all freethinking,” Kathleen said.
Watching sports on TV is an especially raucous time. They all root for the Cubs except for Eric, who likes the White Sox, but the real battles are about football, what with Bears, Patriots, Broncos and even Packers fans in the family.
“It was really bad a few years ago. It was really competitive,” Joseph said. “People were screaming at each other.”
There are up to four siblings per room and no schedule for morning showers, which surprisingly is only a problem occasionally, they said. “Sometimes all of us girls will be in there at one time,” Erika said. “Somebody is putting makeup, somebody is curling their hair, somebody is brushing their teeth.”
Eric is the oldest of six siblings, Erika the oldest of three, but neither imagined they would have this many children, they said.
Erika always wanted four kids, but after the third turned out to be a handful, she thought that might be enough, she said. The fourth child came as a surprise and when her sister had a baby, she decided she wanted another one. After that, it became easy to keep going.
“I really enjoyed the dynamics of a big family,” Erika said. “I feel like they are all such a blessing. I just wanted to leave that open to God to just kind of decide.”
As for Eric, “I just got convinced to keep having kids,” he said, smiling.
Both agreed, however - the family count stops at 13.
Giving “K” names to their daughters and “J” to their sons also kind of happened, the parents said. They liked the first four names and, by the fifth, it would have been weird to break the pattern, they said. “We made it a tradition after that,” Eric said. “It did make choosing names a little easier,” Erika said.
Raising 11 kids is expensive, no doubt, the parents said. Grocery store bills alone average $2,000 per month, and Sunday breakfasts, under Eric's direction, are epic: 40 eggs, 5 pounds of potatoes and 2 pounds of bacon.
The older kids share cellphones, which makes private messaging tricky, and there's a lot of sharing and passing down of clothes, with nobody getting rid of anything before asking the others.
There have been 14 broken bones among the kids, plus a cracked skull for Kaelin and a knee injury for Jack. Jesse has type I diabetes, an extra expense that requires added management.
The family had to downsize to a smaller home after the economic downturn. When Kyrielle was 6 months old, Erika started working nights at UPS, where Joseph worked. “We needed the extra income,” said Erika, who now works as a personal trainer at HIT Strength in Elgin.
They all go to church on Sundays at New Covenant Bible Church in St. Charles, loading up in a 15-passenger van. The family also owns six cars. Their house has three refrigerators, two freezers and two water heaters.
Vacation are rare because they are so costly. There have been four trips to the Wisconsin Dells and a memorable one to the Smoky Mountains, they said.
Despite having moved out last February, Joseph still spends a lot of time at home, which his siblings tease him for. Kathleen wants to move to Colorado, a thought that is hard for mom. “She's been my right hand for so long ...” Erika says.
With so many under one roof, do the siblings get to know each other well? And do mom and dad feel like they are close to all their kids? The answer is a resounding “yes.”
“We like hanging out with each other,” Kathleen said.
Sometimes you do have to make your voice heard in the crowd and finding some time alone can require a bit of effort, they agreed. But they all truly like each other and the occasional fight is never too intense, they said.
So are there favorites in the family? Joseph quickly raises his hand as his siblings point to him, laughing.
“There is always something with your first born and your last born,” mom acknowledges.
“I try pretty hard not to have favorites,” dad says. “But some personalities click a little bit better.”
Reality shows about big families like “The Willis Family” and “19 Kids and Counting” are definitely misleading, the family members agree.
“I feel like they are a little fake with how organized they are,” Kalli said.
“We could never be that,” Kaelin agreed.