
DATE: Friday, March 21, 1997                TAG: 9703200144

SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER      PAGE: 06   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: COVER STORY 

SOURCE: BY LIZ SZABO, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:  152 lines

NO EMPTY NEST THIS FLOCK OF ROBINS IS ONE BIG HAPPY FAMILY

WHEN KAREN ROBINS was 19 and engaged to be married, her doctor braced her for some unwelcome news: she would probably never have children. Crushed, she sought a second opinion from another doctor, only to hear the same diagnosis. There would be no babies in her future.

Twenty-five years later, the Robins family has proved those doctors wrong.

Ten times wrong.

Karen and Bill Robins and their children, ages 7 months to 23 years, share a modest, six-bedroom brick house in Deep Creek. Only 10 of the family's 12 members actually live at home, as the two oldest sons are grown and live on their own.

A day in the life of the Robins family is a complicated juggling act involving diapers, lunch money and mismatched socks.

Managing the chaos involves patience.

Lots of patience.

Area highways may be gridlocked at 7 a.m., but morning traffic moves smoothly through the Robins household.

Bill Robins rushes off to work shortly after sunrise, leaving his wife to supervise the youngsters. Karen Robins once taught math in Chesapeake public schools but now stays home with the smaller children.

``Mornings, I just get out of the way,'' Bill Robins said. ``Even though it means we have to work a little harder, it's so important to me that she's able to stay home with the kids. She's something else. I think she's just as pretty as she was when I married her. I kind of stand back in awe. And I'm real, real proud of her and the kids.''

A petite woman who still wears a size six - the same dress size she wore when she got married - Karen Robins, 44, possesses an energy level that would make a teen-ager jealous.

One recent morning, she sat perched on a brown plaid couch, breast-feeding the baby with one hand while administering medicine drops into another child's ear, all the while careful not to sit on the toddler asleep under the afghan blanket behind her. Her dark brown hair was pulled into a youthful ponytail, her turquoise chenille bathrobe unzipped at the top to make nursing easier.

There are no prudes in the Robins house.

Karen Robins has nursed most

of her children, and openly breast-feeds whenever the baby is hungry. Bill Robins has been in the delivery room for all 10 children. And their second oldest son, Chad, even helped deliver Kelsi.

This morning, the children took turns passing around the 7-month-old infant, Kelsi, from one pair of arms to the next as their mother tries to find the coffee pot. Three-year-old Marni - sacked out on the couch, where she fell asleep the night before after watching a movie - somehow manages to sleep through it all, even while partially buried under shoes, socks and backpacks. Skippy, 11, pauses in the doorway to gently brush Marni's head without waking her.

The baby Kelsi's eyes brighten when her brother Joey, 15, enters the room. Joey is her favorite, and she prefers to be held by him more than any other sibling. Kelsi's right eye was crusted shut when she woke up that morning, a symptom of a contagious eye infection making its way through the household.

Parenting such a large family is hardest when the kids are sick, Karen Robins said. When one starts to cough, it's only a matter of time before the entire house is felled with the same bug.

``Viruses spread like wild fires around here,'' Karen Robins said. As long as the children are healthy, however, getting them out of the house and off to school on time is easier than it looks, Karen Robins said.

Children wander in and out of the kitchen to ask for their lunch money and pick up their backpacks, used to the rhythm and flow of a household large enough to have its own softball team. The television is on, broadcasting the morning news, but no one seems to be watching it.

``We have it down to a science,'' Karen Robins said. ``They either eat Pop Tarts or eat breakfast at school.''

The entire family is rarely home at the same time. The rest of the kids - who are involved in everything from Boy Scouts to the school play to team sports - seldom sit down to dinner together.

``It's not as hectic as people think it is,'' said Kacey Robins, 13. ``We're so busy we're usually not all home at once.''

Children rotate their shower schedules to avoid jamming into three bathrooms at once, Karen Robins said. But even if a mother's patience appears limitless, hot water is not. The last one to wake up in the morning usually takes a cold shower.

And nobody but dad gets to use their father's shower, Kacey Robins said. Harried parents need to set some limits.

Karen Robins' biggest headache is not cooking, she said, but laundry. With so many pairs of feet, there are always extra unmatched socks.

Even cooking dinner is a breeze. Robins said she has an easier time fixing dinner for her children than professional cooks do, recalling the stunned looks of the cashiers at fast food restaurants when she orders 18 hamburgers at once.

``They usually tell us to go out and do our grocery shopping, then come back and pick up our order,'' Karen Robins said.

The clerks in the neighborhood supermarket all know her first name, Karen Robins said.

``If I don't show up at the store for a couple days, they all ask where I've been,'' Karen Robins said. ``If I buy food in bulk, the kids just eat it. I buy the economy size and shop every day. . . . When you see Pampers stock lose its value, you'll know it's because we've stopped potty-training the last kid.''

The kids admit they wage their share of fights. But Karen Robins counts herself lucky to have raised children who are so well-behaved - at least most of the time. Affectionately referring to her offspring as ``the little monsters,'' Karen Robins said they ``fight like cats and dogs but also defend each other to the death.''

Karen Robins does not claim her progeny are child prodigies, but she does brag about them like any other mother. One is an Eagle Scout; another is president of the Deep Creek High School drama club; others are Girl Scouts and Brownies; two more are youth leaders with the United Methodist Church; last year five starred in the same school play. The oldest, Brad, is engaged to be married in June.

``Last year we didn't have one C in the whole house,'' she said.

Chesapeake school teachers know the family well. The Robins have lived in the same house for 17 years, and all of their children have gone to Chesapeake schools. The same school secretary who registered their first child recently registered their second youngest.

The Robins will celebrate their silver anniversary this summer by renewing their wedding vows. Karen Robins said she hopes to wear her original wedding dress.

The Robins spent their honeymoon on a cruise to the Bahamas, courtesy of a wedding gift from the grooms' father. But the newlyweds also wound up in a super-economy suite next to the ship's boiler rooms, sleeping on bunk beds, courtesy of the father's odd sense of humor.

``I think those beds were about 12 inches wide,'' Karen Robins said.

But true love prevailed.

Their first baby was born nine months and one week after their wedding, Karen Robins said. Others followed at regular intervals: Brad is 23; Chad is 20; Nikki is 18; Joey is 15; Karen, nicknamed Kacey is 13; Willard, nicknamed Skippy, is 11; Kori is 10; Whitney is 8; Marni is 3; and Kelsi is just 7 months old.

At times, Karen Robins said she has still been breast-feeding one baby while pregnant with the next. Contrary to the old wives' tale, ``breast-feeding does not prevent pregnancy,'' she joked.

And the Robins are not ruling out additional children.

``I get kind of tired of answering that question, but you never know around our house,'' Karen Robins said. ``The big rumor around the house is that Mom is pregnant again. The last time I was pregnant, Brad said he knew. He took me aside and asked me privately if I was having another baby. I asked him how he knew, and he said, `Mom, the only time you ever get a gut is when you're pregnant.' '' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photos including color cover by MORT FRYMAN

In the midst of a hectic morning breakfast routine, 10-year-old Kori

Robins takes time out to cuddle with her 7-month-old sister, Kelsi.

With 7-month-old Kelsi at her breast, Karen Robins administers ear

drops for Kacey, while being careful not to sit on a toddler asleep

under the afghan.

The entire Robins family - children aged 7 months to 23 years - is

rarely home at the same time. But mornings feature the most action.

Here, Whitney and Skippy have breakfast at the table, Kori prepares

hers at the counter, Karen Robins holds baby Kelsi at the stove, and

Kacey cleans up at the sink.