Ben: 0:05

All right, welcome to our one blessed mess.

Liz: 0:15

Also known as our 1BM. That's the acronym. What do you say? How do you say it?

Ben: 0:21

No O1BM.

Liz: 0:23

O1BM Is the acronym.

Ben: 0:24

But our 1BM is kind of a little bit of a potty humor joke.

Liz: 0:29

Because potty humor runs in our family. It's like if there's going to be a joke somehow.

Ben: 0:34

Well, it's my fault. I never grew out of the potty humor phase. It was definitely just a character deficiency and Liz married me anyways, so she kind of inherited that. But now the kids think it's hilarious, and so bathroom humor, unfortunately.

Liz: 0:51

Yeah Well, I didn't know that it was on the dotted line. When I said I do, I had no idea that that was going to be a part of it it was part of the fine print. Actually it was there, it was just fine print okay, we didn't mean to start this podcast off with talking about our bms, but since we're talking, about kind of on brand it's kind of on brand, true, but since we're talking about it's kind of on brand.

Liz: 1:10

It's kind of on brand, true, but since we're talking about our one blessed mess. This is Ben and Liz, and we are so excited to be here with you. This is a brand new podcast and we're going to be talking about our story of raising six kids in eight years, managing an entrepreneurial home with two businesses, homeschooling and currently navigating life with how many teenagers?

Ben: 1:32

Four teenagers at the moment and there's about to be another one, so five very short five, you guys, five teenagers.

Liz: 1:38

We will receive all the prayers. We need all the prayers. It's definitely interesting.

Ben: 1:43

It's like highs and lows oh, but we forgot the eight chickens and two dogs too. Yes, so plus eight chickens and two dogs for punishment, I think well truthfully, eight chickens and two dogs, we're just kind of gluttons, for punishment.

Liz: 1:51

I think, Well, truthfully, to be honest, we are just trying to keep life interesting, and so that takes us into today's conversation. What are we going to talk about today?

Ben: 1:59

So today we're actually going to talk about my favorite subject. No, I'm just kidding, we're going to talk about us. So here we go, we're going to dive in who we are and what we're doing and hopefully relating it back to kind of what this podcast is going to be about. And, yeah, we're just going to tie in the whole One Blessed Mess theme. So let's start with you, liz. Who are you?

Liz: 2:23

Okay, so I'm Liz and, as you guys know, we have a lot of kids and I came from a single parent home. My dad was actually an alcoholic drug addict and we grew up very, very poor. My mom did the best she could with what she had, and when you come from a broken home and a broken background, when you come into a healthy marriage or want to have a healthy marriage, it just is a way that you have to navigate that you've never been before, and so you know, with growing up poor, we really didn't ever have money for anything. In fact, we used to take the toilet paper from the church. Yes, and anybody who's watching this that grew up with me will be like what the heck?

Liz: 3:08

But they had, like all this extra toilet paper at the church. And so we, my sisters and I this is terrible, I should buy the toilet paper for the church, I should go replenish, but anyway we did, because we just didn't have the money and we were the family that would go through the checkout line at the grocery store and have to put things back because we didn't have the finances. And so that's a little bit about me and how I grew up, and you know just part of who. I am not ashamed of it, but we'll kind of tap into some of that through our One Bless Mess. How about you, ben?

Ben: 3:44

Well, I grew up very differently, so I grew up with parents who never touched alcohol. Actually, um, so that was kind of crazy, but good, uh, because it um, definitely enforced some of the right things, right decisions. But, uh, we weren't perfect, obviously I mean, every family has their own issues and stuff but I am thankful that my parents didn't have any substance abuse and if they did, they hit it it really well.

Ben: 4:09

So this might be a time, mom and dad, for you to tell me if they did it, they didn't, then keep going, keep going, okay so anyways, um, but uh, we also grew up, uh, middle class and maybe, I think, probably middle of the road middle class, not upper middle class, not lower middle class, probably just right in the middle, um, and so it was very different upbringing than liz. We, my brother and I, we never really had any issues with getting anything that we needed, and then also on top of that, like we mostly got what we wanted to. If it was something that we really need or, sorry, we really wanted, you know, we would beg for it for Christmas or for a birthday and we typically got it. So it was a very different upbringing than Liz. So that's been unique to kind of see how that plays out with our kids too.

Liz: 5:00

Parenting, yeah, yes, parenting, because we have two different experiences coming together. Isn't that the beauty of the Lord? He takes two different lives, he takes different and puts them together, and it really causes you to um sacrifice.

Ben: 5:16

I always say marriage is the place that you go to die and then, and then kids on top of that are the place where you get extra death. I think, yeah, there's extra dying. I don't know what's more than dying, but whatever that is, that's what happens when you get kids.

Liz: 5:31

We are dying, and so we're so excited about our One Blessed Mess because, as we've been journeying and married, we've been married for how long now, ben?

Ben: 5:40

20 years.

Liz: 5:41

Two decades.

Ben: 5:42

Yeah, we did it. We are here 20 years.

Liz: 5:44

And we now have six kids. Like now have six kids. Like we said, we have eight chickens, two dogs.

Ben: 5:53

Um, we have two businesses and we also have what you want and a half boats one and a half boats, one and a half, but and there's a lot of stories behind that half um, because one of them is currently not functional, but we'll talk about that on another podcast. It's really funny, uh, we almost dredged it up from the bottom of a lake and on top of that I almost ran over friend. So there's lots of good action on that story, but that'll have to be another episode, I think.

Liz: 6:17

Actually, we were in the boat while I was sinking you guys, so you'll have to check back in on another podcast.

Ben: 6:23

And don't let the boats fool you. These are I don't even know if you would really call them boats that you and I would think of as boats Most people think of as boats, because these are like budget boats. We'll just say that, yeah, very budget.

Liz: 6:39

Very budget because we live on a budget, because we have such a large family. But we made it. We're here and we have plans to stay above water, so to speak.

Ben: 6:51

That's right. We want to stay above water, that's right.

Liz: 6:53

Yeah, no more sinking. Yeah, no more sinking. So just jumping into our entrepreneurial journey. My entrepreneurial journey began when I had my first daughter and she was born without any hair, so she was a bald little girl, and everyone kept saying, oh, what a sweet little boy, what a sweet little boy. And I'm thinking she's dressed in pink, all these things. I would put those headbands on her and then take them off and there's like those lines in her head and I just felt so bad for her and she'd pull them off, and so I got the idea to start putting little bows that I was making on her head and I began with K-Row syrup and that kind of became a problem. And the reason why that became a problem is because the bees would come around buzzing around her head. Not kidding, they were attracted to the scent.

Ben: 7:39

What's Cairo syrup? Cairo syrup is For everybody who doesn't know.

Liz: 7:42

It's like, I don't know, it's like syrup, but it's clear.

Ben: 7:46

I don't really it's like sweet right, it's super sweet, yeah, and very sticky, sticky, and that was a problem too, because why?

Liz: 7:54

Oh, massive problem. Because when I would go this is terrible when I would go and take the bow off of her head, it would pull the few hairs that she had off her head. And then it's even worse than that. You couldn't get it off because it was like glued, like candy glued to her head. This sounds terrible. So then I would become like a mother cat and start licking her head. This sounds terrible. So then I would become like a mother cat and start licking her head.

Ben: 8:20

We don't do that now.

Liz: 8:21

We don't do that now. She's 16. She would have my head yeah.

Liz: 8:25

Yeah, it's not, she's one of those teenagers, but anyway, I would do that to get the little bow off. Well, one day we were out shopping and I had all the kids and this NICU nurse came up to me. She's like, oh, a little girl. I'm like, oh, finally somebody notices and she says, oh, are you using KY, jelly? And I said, excuse me. She says KY, and I said what do you mean? And she goes to keep stop laughing, stop laughing. She says to keep the bow on her head. And I was like what she goes? Seriously, we do this in the NICU when little babies are born. We take just a little bit of KY, about a pea size, you put the bow on there and it will stay all day. And so I got the courage up to do it and, you guys, it worked. It really, really worked. And it made for some awkward conversations when Ben would go and drop her off at the.

Ben: 9:18

Sunday school check-in yeah, so what are you using to keep that bow on? I'd rather not say it's so funny.

Liz: 9:28

It's so funny. So it was so awkward because you know, like as she got older she was still bald and so you like bring her like sippy cup, you know, and as he's digging for the sippy cup, he's like hold on, and there's the KY deli that I kept in her diaper bag to keep the bows on her head on the way to church, anyway. So that kind of started getting a little popular with my friends. So I'm making all these bows and I'm thinking, all right, this is going to be a great business opportunity. And what ended up happening was we were pregnant again. Imagine that.

Liz: 9:55

We're always either nursing or pregnant. At least I was in those years. Well, you weren't nursing or pregnant, I mean.

Ben: 10:02

I tried, it just didn't work. Yeah, that's another podcast.

Liz: 10:05

We won't talk about that here. That's a terrible story, okay, but anyway. And so I started getting popular. But it was me, I was pregnant, had sharp scissors, all these little kids running around and it was just me making those bows. And then an opportunity came to me to start a business with direct sales. And I did, I did it and carried that on, laid the bow business aside and carried on A thriving bow business.

Ben: 10:35

A thriving, Maybe not Well.

Liz: 10:37

I mean it was gaining popularity, literally.

Ben: 10:40

So we looked at the insurance that we needed.

Liz: 10:42

Oh yeah, that part was a little crazy. Like I was like, yeah, we're not going to do that, so we just didn't have the finances to do it. But anyway, and so laid that down and picked up the other business direct sales and became very successful actually a six-figure business.

Ben: 10:58

Tell them how many cars you ended up earning.

Liz: 11:01

Well, quite a few. But the bigger part of it is that I felt the Lord tell me about a year and a half ago to lay it all down. And so I've walked away from that and have been in this season of a four-letter word. That's very hard for achievers he's laughing because he knows he's been with me on this journey and it's R-E-S-T. Rest, and just like what do you want me to do, lord? What do you want me to do? And so, through the waiting, another four-letter word, wait, w-a-i-t. A lot has come up and we realized, like okay.

Liz: 11:42

The timing was impeccable Was impeccable. And we'll be unpacking that in another podcast, but there's a lot to talk about in that and it's just been a beautiful journey, really beautiful journey. So Entrepreneurial Home and Ben has an entrepreneur story. Yeah, so my just been a beautiful journey, really beautiful journey. So Entrepreneurial Home and Ben has an entrepreneur story.

Ben: 11:58

Yeah, so my journey is a little different. I didn't get into Bose, believe it or not, but I did start out with a degree in art and then ended up becoming a programmer. But along the way I had this kind of crazy journey. I was in Kansas City and I was working as an art director for a marketing firm and there were a few other stops before then. I was doing some work at a ministry and doing kind of what we called a webmaster position. We don't really use that word anymore. It's not PC anymore.

Liz: 12:34

No, it's not.

Ben: 12:35

But anyways. So I'm here at this marketing firm and it's going, I would say, fairly well. I was working really long hours but I enjoyed the work. Problem was is just the kids and Liz didn't really see me very often. So we were kind of struggling with the fact that like I was putting in the hours but not putting in the hours but not putting in the hours at home like I needed to be.

Liz: 12:58

Yeah, I was becoming a single parent and we had a good conversation and that was right about when our son got his diagnosis of autism and I came to you and I said, hey, I did not sign up to be a single parent. I grew up in a single parent home. I know what that's like. So we got to figure this out and we began to pray. Yep, we did. And guess what God did?

Ben: 13:18

Yeah, we prayed about it and it was really kind of strange because things were actually kind of falling apart at work. Like I got brought in and put on probation because the leadership at the time said my heart wasn't in the work and it was crazy because I was spending more hours. It felt like I was spending more hours at work than I was at home.

Liz: 13:42

No, you actually were. That's actually true. I'm going to pause for just a second. You were going extra early in the morning and you were staying way past 7.30, 8 o'clock at night.

Liz: 13:47

And there were seasons that the kids didn't even see him because he was working so much, but yet your heart wasn't in it, and that is a telltale sign of transition. You were in transition, but you're loyal, you're faithful, you don't want to give up. You're going to be there till the end, which is one of the things I absolutely love about you. But you were in transition and we just didn't know where the direction was.

Ben: 14:08

No, it was pretty crazy because right before this I had met someone working with one of our clients at the marketing firm and she was a contractor. This person that I met, she was an older lady, I would say probably in her late 50s at this time, and we kind of met in a little bit of a situation. So I I actually was like telling her, hey, like we can do this thing. And she came back and said, no, we can't. And so there was like a little bit of a tiff and we ended ended up figuring out that there was a little bit of truth on both sides of things. So we stayed in touch and while she was staying in touch with me, she was actually trying to give me some extra work. So I basically found myself in the situation where she was wanting to give me this job. That was about half my salary.

Liz: 14:53

Okay, guys, stop for just a second Half salary.

Ben: 14:58

Huge yeah, but it required me to put in a solid about three to four weeks of work, and that's probably what I was going to be doing exclusively. So I was like, well crap, if I'm going to do this, I'm gonna take this opportunity. Then I'm kind of going to leave the marketing firm I was working for high and dry. So I told her no. And then guess what happened? She said yes.

Liz: 15:22

And I was like wait a minute.

Ben: 15:23

I thought you asked me the question if I wanted to do this work. And she was like you're just going to do it. Don't worry, you'll fill it in, you'll find time to do it. And oh, by the way, if we can get it done in two weeks, that would be better.

Liz: 15:36

And you did.

Ben: 15:37

Somehow it worked out. She wouldn't take no for an answer, which was crazy, and and then I ended up doing the job and getting paid and it was just like life changing. We were like, man, what is going on About? That same time, one of my friends came up to me and said hey, man, you know, I just really feel like this is from the Lord, but I feel like you're going to leave your job at the three year mark. And lo and behold, he didn't even know how long I was there, but it was. It was in the three years I was there but it was in the three years.

Ben: 16:08

I was in the three years. I was about three years three months and this lady, she comes out of the woodwork and it was just crazy. It was a crazy circumstance. Her name, her last name, was Miracle.

Liz: 16:18

Yeah, I'll give her first name.

Ben: 16:20

I don't want to call anybody out, but her last name was Miracle, and so that was another. Like wow, what in the world is going on here? I know.

Liz: 16:26

So it's our miracle story, and that threw you into entrepreneurship.

Ben: 16:36

It did, yeah, threw me into entrepreneurship. I realized that this was happening and all I needed to do was basically sign off on it. The Lord had called me into this journey and it was happening, even though I wasn't 100 hundred percent aware. So I just I basically quit. And day one I was busy, and it hasn't really stopped.

Liz: 16:53

No, it hasn't stopped. And you got your main clients and you work on very important websites which we can't share the names of them, but you, you do really amazing work and you guys he has sought out and it's so neat. I think the biggest thing is that, yes, we're a dual and entrepreneurial home, but we kind of have different stories, but it's just having that faith and stepping out and we're going to unpack that in some other podcasts. We can't do that today because this is about us, we're just sharing about us, but we are so thankful that our God is a redeemer, don't you agree, ben?

Ben: 17:29

Yeah, he is and, like you know, there was a bit of a mess at work and I just I wasn't putting in the right priorities. And, you know, god used that whole situation and gave me a way out and he wrote our story for us, like all I had to do was just follow him, you know, just a few little steps, and so I'm super grateful that you know God is a God who redeems and he takes broken things, he takes messes, and I mean I've witnessed it countless times in my life, you know, even recently. You know God is like so good at picking us back up and putting us back together, and so that's what we want to kind of share throughout this podcast is our mess, and we want to just kind of like not air our dirty laundry, but pretty close to that, because we have a lot of laundry and there's a lot of mess.

Liz: 18:12

Oh my gosh, can we talk about the laundry for just a second? Like we have a lot of laundry. Now our kids do their laundry Like I'm a big proponent of that and that has totally changed our family dynamic in this house Also, too. What's happened is it's made the kids get more responsible, but I also had to let go of control. You know, like the shirts are not going to be perfectly placed in their drawers, et cetera, et cetera. We don't want to get into all that. We'll have to do another podcast on how we run our house with a huge family. But you know, didn't you have a scripture, ben? Oh yeah, yeah, there's a few.

Ben: 18:48

So just to kind of correlate some of the you know, god uses the broken and the messy and the poor and the contrite of heart, and so one of the verses that kind of stuck out to me recently is from Psalms, and it's Psalms 119, 71. It was good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.

Ben: 19:14

And that's been something recently just, we're experiencing that. And, man, when you reach out to the Lord in the mess and reach up to him and say, put me back together, like that is so powerful, extremely powerful. And one other verse that kind of is a nice little segue too is in Isaiah 57, 15. And I'll just read that one quickly, for this is what the high and exalted one says he who lives forever, whose name is holy. I live in a high and holy place. And this is crazy. It's like God is telling Isaiah like hey, I'm God, I'm high and exalted, I live forever, I'm holy, I live in a high and holy place, but, oh yeah, I also live with the one who is contrite and lowly in spirit. And why? To put them back together, to revive them, to redeem them? This is part of God's character and it's a central part of God's character. It's not something you can understate. And we need that, like we need that in our own household. I need that personally. I know Liz needs that.

Liz: 20:29

I need that, kids need that. I definitely need it.

Ben: 20:31

Part of our blessed mess is like finding the redeemer in the mess and our story which we want to share, and we want to talk about a few things too as they come up, but we just want to always get back to that point of finding God in the mess and finding our salvation, our redemption in him and just being open to see him put us back together again.

Liz: 20:52

Yes, and so, with closing, we just want to say thank you for being a part of our One Blessed Mess today, and don't forget to subscribe and share this with your friends that you think would be excited to hear about a large family who talks about bowel movements. Apparently, lots Just kidding.

Ben: 21:11

And like sinking boats.

Liz: 21:13

Yeah, and sinking boats? Maybe don't like sinking boats. This is not something we should. We should, yeah, let's not do that one, but I don't know how you're listening to this or watching it, but, like Share Heart, give the thumbs up. However, it is because everything you do subscribe helps us with getting this message out, and until next time, we just want to encourage you to embrace your beautiful mess, because why, ben?

Ben: 21:37

Because God likes to put us back together.

Liz: 21:40

And if he can bless our mess, oh my gosh so can he bless yours.

Ben: 21:44

Have a great day.

Liz: 21:45

See ya.