BUMPER BROOD
I’ve got 16 kids aged between 6 and 31 – I didn’t want any when I got married, my husband convinced me & we want more
A MUM-OF-16 has revealed that she never wanted kids when she got married, and it was her husband who persuaded her to have a big brood.
Jeni Bonell, from Queensland, did a Q&A on YouTube today on how she ended up with nine boys and seven girls, between the ages of 31 and six, with electrician husband Ray.
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Jeni and Ray are parents to Jesse, Brooke, Claire, Natalie, Karl, Samuel, Cameron, Sabrina, Tim, Brandon, Eve, Nate, Rachel, Eric, Damian and Katelyn.
Speaking on the , she answered a fan question about how many times she had been pregnant, revealing the answer to be 23.
Jeni, 51, said: “For somebody who started out not wanting children. I can remember saying to Ray, I am not interested in having kids, really just don’t want any.”
Jeni shared how Ray came from a family of four, and wanted four or six kids, but she said categorically that it was “not going to happen”.
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Jeni said: “I agreed to have one, maybe two babies, which was just so wonderful.
“It opened up my heart to what I was called to do in life, from there it was me who asked the hubby if we could have a third baby.”
Ray wanted another boy, so they tried for a fourth to “complete” the family with two boys and two girls.
However, the fourth was a little girl, so they said they would extend their family again.
Sadly she suffered a miscarriage, and they decided to try again, and wondered if they could increase their brood to eight.
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Jeni said: “There was discussion then of extending our family to a much larger size.
“We shut our eyes and jumped into family. We were enjoying this process of growing our family.
“We got to baby 15 and were still open to having baby 16, but we had four misarriages in a row. It was a very difficult time.”
Little Caitlin did eventually arrive, and Jeni revealed that she had not been able to have a 17th baby yet.
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The family regularly share insights into their hectic life on and YouTube, with Jeni saying she’s ‘blessed’ to have so many kids.
She said: “We haven’t managed to fall pregnant since then. Will we only ever have 16 kids? Maybe so.
“Are we happy with that? Absolutely. We are so joyful with what we have been given. We just love our kids so much. I feel so honoured to be a mum, I couldn’t think of a better path for my life.
“Here I was planning that I wasn’t going to have any children. I would have missed out on so much if I had followed that path.”
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Jeni said that her and Ray haven’t had IVF or fostered or adopted any of their 16 kids.
She said: “I think people are surprised that we are a married couple and we’ve had all these kids together.
“I love seeing people’s faces and reactions when you tell them you have, it is really priceless at times.”
Jeni previously shared how she often does a whopping supermarket shop at the start of the week, which usually costs AU$450 (£251).
Sometimes these supplies only last the super-size family half the week, and Jeni is forced to return to the shops to stock up on essentials like bread and milk.
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Her latest “quick shop” was six bottles of 3L milk, three loaves of sliced bread and an array of fresh fruits and vegetables.
She also revealed how she makes spaghetti for her family’s dinner.
To cater for the large brood, she needs 1.5 kilos of homebrand spaghetti, 1.5 kilos of lean beef mince with 700 grams of homebrand pasta sauce and 500 grams of mushrooms.
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