It’s not lost on me that some people might be overwhelmed by the needs and demands of parenting 39 children. I have, not for a minute, ever regretted this choice in my life. I have railed loudly over the damage done to my darlings before I adopted them, I have been massively frustrated by their obstinacy and defiance, and I have cried buckets of tears at times when I’ve watched them make horrible decisions,

I don’t mind the non-stop work, although yesterday afternoon I had a little foot stomping, voice raising mini-explosion over a six foot high pile of clean laundry that no one claimed. About 20 of us worked through that pile until I could see the table again with me fussing, “I even want to see T-shirts hung up, not stuffed in drawers.”

What truly frustrates me is all my little efforts at being green for decades and then I look at the Big Picture, the skyscrapers that burn lights all night long, or the cranked-up AC in empty houses while people drive gas guzzlers to jobs, watering their driveways on automatic sprinklers during our severe drought, and I wonder why I’m rationing my own toilet paper use.

Then I get over myself and comprehend that every little bit helps and if I can teach these simple steps to my 39 kids and their kids, then I will have accomplished something. I worry about pollution, global warming, and the state of the world for my grandchildren’s children.

I know that because my grandparents and my parents grew a garden, I automatically did so as well. I can only hope that my children will follow suit, that their preference for good foods, for whole foods was born here at home, and that tasteless supermarket fare will turn them off, spur them on to grow their own.

My three youngest kids, 4, 5 and 7 were stealthily cruising my big back garden yesterday evening, picking ripe produce and squishing Japanese beetles under their feet. Mouths full of blackberries, how could they ever want to go to a store and purchase a bland berry that has been bred only for production? My nine year old was gathering the large seeds from the four o’clock flowers and replanting them on our acreage while my ten year old daughter was arguing with a hen over an egg. She won, the kid that is.

My 11 year old emptied the compost bucket that we keep in the kitchen for scraps, two other sons hauled wood chips for mulch around the squash plants while I explained to another 11 year old why I don’t grow hybrid seeds, preferring heirloom varieties. Last summer someone had spit Charleston Grey seeds off the front porch into the flower garden and we now have watermelon growing there as well.

Not a kid raged yesterday, it was the Walt Disney World of Adoption that I’d long ago imagined life in a big family would be. I thoroughly enjoyed it, knowing it was just a short break for me.