I’ve received some really cool e-mails from people after starting my fan site for the Duggar Family and the show 18 kids and counting! I’ve REALLY enjoyed watching them from the beginning of their shows on TLC and can’t wait to see how things turn out this season! Well, I’m not exactly sure what to put up for now, but I will hopefully try to make the site a little bit more cool for everyone. I’m not exactly an internet website person, but hopefully I will learn some tricks to make this a more fun fan page for 18 kids and counting and the whole Duggar Family!
There will be more stuff up on the site, so make sure to check back! Bookmark the site and if you’d like, give some suggestions! We do have a comment section on each post, so it’d be cool to hear some feedback.
Resources to help you with your children and information regarding child care and more… coming soon on 18KidsAndCounting.com! Make sure to bookmark us!
Duggar Family History
Michelle Duggar (née Ruark) is the youngest of seven children (she has one brother and five sisters). Originally from Ohio, Michelle moved to Arkansas in her childhood. Jim Bob Duggar is one of two children. The couple met in the early 1980s, when Michelle had experienced a religious conversion and Jim Bob (along with other church members) was sent for follow-up visits. They were married on July 21, 1984.
The Duggars elected to wait before having children, and practiced birth control during that time. It would be four years before Joshua, their eldest, was born. The Duggars then returned to birth control; however, Michelle conceived again, but suffered a miscarriage. Believing the miscarriage was due to the birth control, the Duggars decided to no longer practice birth control, electing instead to allow God to determine the number of children they would have. Shortly thereafter, Michelle became pregnant again, this time with the first of her two sets of twins, Jana and John-David. Thereafter, approximately once every year-and-a-half, Michelle would again become pregnant and give birth (including another set of twins).
The Duggars are seriously conservative Baptists who endorse the Quiverfull movement. The children watch very little television and their internet usage is strictly monitored. The children are home schooled using a mix of materials, including those of Switched On Schoolhouse, IBLP (produced by controversial Christian teacher Bill Gothard), and Accelerated Christian Education (ACE). Casual dating is forbidden; instead, the older children are taught that a marriage partner should be sought through a form of courtship (which requires the young man to seek permission from the girl’s father to begin the relationship, even if both parties are adults). All meetings between the engaged couple have a chaperone to accompany them and they believe in saving their affections and intimacy, up to and including kissing, for marriage.
The Duggars raise their children using the buddy system, in which an older sibling assists the younger sibling in daily tasks. According to Michelle, “They help them with their little phonics lessons and games during the day and help them practice their music lessons. They will play with them or help them pick out the color of their outfit that they want to wear that day, and just all of those types of things.” In 2004, Michelle Duggar won the “Young Mother of the Year Award” in Arkansas, which is sponsored by American Mothers Incorporated.
Jim Bob Duggar is a former state legislator who served in the Arkansas House of Representatives from 1999 to 2002. The Duggars now say their income is derived from the commercial properties they own. The Duggars claim they live debt-free which Jim Bob has said is “the fruit of Jim Sammons’ Financial Freedom Seminar” he attended years ago. However, charity and donations of food and household appliances provides in large part for their lifestyle . Their large house was completed on January 20, 2006 with aid from Discovery Networks and corporate sponsors.