Duct tape and 15-passenger vans

Since we live in a world of 1.783-children families, let's get all the questions out of the way with a column about what it's like to have five children ... make that five small children ... five, small, very active children.

The basics: two kids are more work than one child. Consequently, three kids are more work than two and four are more work than three. And five kids? This means you are in a entirely different world.

For starters, you are seriously outnumbered, 5 to 2 (the two being the parents who have taken on this monumental task).

With one child, Mom or Dad can trade-off the holding, feeding, reading, restraining duties for their child and even once in a while, maybe, just maybe, get a break.

Two kids will require the attention and physical intervention of both parents. Even if the parent is left to his or her own resources, at least he or she has an arm for each child and, for the purposes involved here, remains in control.

That changes with the birth of child number three. Not only are you outnumbered, but a new situation has been created: Now you have a middle child in kid No. 2.

There's only one way to alleviate this last scenario (and it's not by shipping off one of the other children). Number four is on the way. With this latest arrival, parents reach full capacity, in other words, one child per arm. Any couple who has taken four children to church or to a restaurant or just out in public knows the general logistics involved in any of those scenarios and the general disasters which accompany these outings. But remember, at least, you have an arm for each child if the need for a quick departure arises. All of this flies out the window with child No. 5. Five children means one of the kids will have to be -- in a sense -- on their own. Unless Mom or Dad has mastered corralling a child with their big toe, while hopping on one foot and holding a child under each arm, one of the five children is going to have to fend for himself. To avoid this perilous condition, at least one of the children must be mature enough, old enough or least able to go 3 1/2 minutes without getting into poisonous substances. My children are still trying to achieve one of those three requirements.  

Of course, all of this can be avoided if the family never leaves the house, at least not all together.

But inevitably, all seven family members will have to attend the same function and another monumental task must be faced: loading everyone into car seats.

Depending on the age of the children, available space in the vehicle decreases as the number of kids increases. This is not because of more bodies, but rather the car seats.

Car seats can take over the interior of a vehicle, relegating those who just use seatbelts to the limited space, usually crammed between car seats.

Parents of multiple young children also learn to add an extra five minutes per seat at the beginning and end of each car trip for loading and unloading. This time allotment is doubled as soon as the child turns into a "car seat Houdini," requiring the parent to use every strap and buckle available to keep said child in their seat.

This extra time spent duct-taping the child into the car seat (thus restraining him for the remainder of the trip) will prove invaluable during the parent's next requirement: the drive-thru. If I had to get out of the vehicle and unload and release every child from their car seat (including cutting the duct-tape) for every errand, I'd arrive home around midnight and probably be out of duct-tape.

I would wager that if more businesses added drive-thrus, they would see a monumental increase in business, especially from the mini-van market.

Finally, people regularly ask whether five children is the limit or if an even dozen is the magic number.

God only knows, but there is one factor which needs to be taken into consideration: With seven passengers, our vehicle is now full. The birth of another child will mean we'll have to invest in a larger auto -- perhaps a 15-passenger van or a school bus. -- Ronda Graff stays at home with her small children, with most of her day devoted to changing diapers, doing laundry and buckling and unbuckling car seats.