As Loudoun Grows, So Do Its Families

"Bagel," Ryan said, then bounded out.

Lori and her husband, Chris, have four kids, but on any given day they are fielding five, six or seven if friends are around. They are so deep into kid athletics that Chris Campbell identifies houses by sport.

"We have soccer, soccer, a single couple," he said, referring to his neighbors without kids, "soccer, swimming, lacrosse, swimming, cheerleading, taekwondo. We have 28 kids within 150 yards here."

They had two when they moved into their five-bedroom house eight years ago.

"And it was, 'Hey, this is pretty cool,' " Chris Campbell said. " 'We have one of each. Life is going along nicely.' Then it was, 'Let's go for the third!' And we got twins."

The Campbells are breezy conservatives who talk about "family values" with the caveat that "we know liberals have family values, too." They both grew up in big, churchgoing families in Fairfax County.

Lori went to college in Indiana, married Chris, worked at Lady Foot Locker, then spent several years with Pitney Bowes, selling mailing equipment. Her life would have been "equally fine," she said, if she'd continued on the career path, but she didn't really have a plan, and that's not how it went.

She noted a talk with her dad on drive to a wedding years ago. He told her he thought she should stay home with her two kids. She asked him why he sent her to college.

"He said it was more for the life experience," she recalled without any resentment.

Eventually, she started staying home, as her mother did. The family moved to Hagen Court, she started wanting to have more kids and now they have a full house, just as they both had when they were growing up.

"Now," she said, packing up uniforms, "I need to call my husband because he has to stay with some of them while I go to soccer. We have to coordinate on some days."

With her husband home, she filled the water bottles and headed off with two kids.

Chris Campbell said he wasn't sure what prompted them to have four, although he was sure his past had something to do with it, his optimism, the neighborhood.

"Being in this community, it would be unusual not to follow suit," he said, and he figures his kids will probably do the same.