Sweet Fellowship: Duggars and Friends (aka the Bates Family and Other Featured Families Thread)

[Minivanessa]

Add me to the chorus of "WTAF?" when looking at those photos of the bedroom for two MANLY males. And as @Trillium pointed out, one of them is an adult. Per @ginger90 below, he's 20. 

I saw a comment on another forum recently that stuck with me. It pointed out that Jill has two goals she pursues with her social media content:

• Presenting herself and her family as devoted servants of the correct Jesus, who sacrifice much in worldly terms to be missionaries saving souls, and therefore needing, and deserving, the financial support of the righteous: the Grift.
• Hard-selling Plexus as a cure-all, not only to move product but to enroll people in her downline, shilling it as a lucrative business by showcasing her success: the Plexus Push.

Those two goals are contradictory. In that post above about the boys' room, she couldn't resist saying she ran out and bought stuff (although claiming she got great deals), and posting images of all. that. stuff. 

Maybe she's given up the hope that someone will give them a new RV? Will stop showcasing her youngest daughters in ragbag garments?

Is this the new Style Maven Jill - comfortably off financially thanks to Plexus and Jesus, who is flexing her super skilz as a bargain shopper and home stylist? Have we seen the last of sad desperate grifter Jill, sacrificing the goods of this world for Jesus and deserving of endless love offerings?

Edited September 3, 2023 by Jeeves
Added the important part about them being so MANLY, and their ages.

[satrunrose]

You know, if this was the upstairs attic, I would say it makes a decent guest room (too many artificial flowers and not at all my taste, but it's not unusual decor). For teenage boys, especially teenage boys who Jill must insist are hyper-masculine it's... odd...

[ginger90]

48 minutes ago, zenme said:

How old are the boys? I’m getting Golden Girls—ish.  How does it look outdated if she just ran out to get things to freshen up the room? 
I don’t think Elle Decor will be calling Jill anytime soon.

 

Gabe is 17, Samuel is 18. (Edited because I mixed up the ages)

 

The new things were one of the dressers, and the picture with the boat.

Edited September 3, 2023 by ginger90

[BradandJanet]

Phillip had better plan a long stay at Marietta BC because it looks as if he's been officially evicted from the barndo. 

[oliviabenson]

It’s obvious the boys didn’t pick anything out for the room. Jill stuffed it full of junk and moved the boys in. 
 

I hope Jill doesn’t pick up bedbugs along with the free/cheap furniture/decor.

Also no boy is going to put a decorative pillow on a chair.

Look at the CD player, kids do not own them. Lol

[BradandJanet]

17 minutes ago, BetyBee said:

That doesn't look anything like a room for teen-age boys!

Jill is unable to view the world outside of her own tastes, wants, and needs. Like everything else she touches, the "boys'" room is all about Jill. She reveals this truth again and again. 

[libgirl2]

Why can't they can't they decorate their own room? They are old enough. 

[oliviabenson]

10 minutes ago, BradandJanet said:

Phillip had better plan a long stay at Marietta BC because it looks as if he's been officially evicted from the barndo. 

Yassss! Poor Philip is now no longer allowed back into mahmos barn. Maybe Mahmo will allow him to live in a tent in the backyard.

[BetyBee]

2 minutes ago, oliviabenson said:

Yassss! Poor Philip is now no longer allowed back into mahmos barn. Maybe Mahmo will allow him to live in a tent in the backyard.

"Leave and cleave"?

[oliviabenson]

30 minutes ago, libgirl2 said:

Why can't they can't they decorate their own room? They are old enough. 

Jill decorated the Hill home. If the married couple didn’t object, her kids won’t. No one stands up to hurricane Jill. I think she is very pushy/mean. People give in to her not to enrage PRECIOUS Mahmo. 
 

I think her kids are terrified of Jill. 
 

 

[farmgal4]

1 hour ago, ginger90 said:

That’s the bedroom that every red-blooded male dreams of having! 🙄

[beckie]

1 hour ago, ginger90 said:

Where is that supposed "Bible" reading chair in the corner? And that top bunk looks like a crib for a baby. 

[ginger90]

1 minute ago, beckie said:

Where is that supposed "Bible" reading chair in the corner?

It’s in the third picture.

[BradandJanet]

52 minutes ago, oliviabenson said:

Yassss! Poor Philip is now no longer allowed back into mahmos barn. Maybe Mahmo will allow him to live in a tent in the backyard.

He'll pay rent on the tent, of course.  

His other option is to find a girl for a courtship and buy a tiny, crumbling house for her and the 20 kids they'll have. These seem to be the two choices for Rod males after "graduation." Sam is a bit of an outlier now since apparently he didn't graduate, so Jill has to decide what to do with him. 

Does Samuel still fit in that bunk bed? Who has the top bunk? 

[oliviabenson]

56 minutes ago, BetyBee said:

"Leave and cleave"?

Philly has no choice but to cleave. He been kicked out.

[beckie]

8 minutes ago, ginger90 said:

It’s in the third picture.

There was so much stuff going on in that picture that I completely missed it!

[BradandJanet]

Baby-blue walls, a big basket of fake flowers, a white heart-shaped basket, a scented candle or two, delft medallion-patterned curtains and table scarves, old-fashioned hat boxes, and a kids' bunk bed. 

This is the dream bedroom of every fake gun-totting, flag shirt-wearing, arm-wrestling twenty-year-old in America. 

I'm glad Sam still has space in the barndo, but this is an unnecessary embarrassment to both Sam and Gabriel.  

However, Jill loves it because God is So Good to her, and she gets what she wants because nobody has the nerve to object. 

[dargosmydaddy]

1 hour ago, oliviabenson said:

Look at the CD player, kids do not own them. Lol

Never mind the CD player, are those VHS tapes on the top shelf?! 

Can anyone tell what movies they are? Is the downstairs map hooked up to a VCR? Are VCR's the godliest form of home entertainment? I'm so confused...

[oliviabenson]

What do they listen to on the CD player? Tim R singing? Mahmo singing?

[Teriacky]

OMG Jill!  Stop with the “decorating” already!! Instead of adding more and more to every space in your home try upgrading your furniture starting with the children’s bed in your boys room!! 

[satrunrose]

24 minutes ago, dargosmydaddy said:

Never mind the CD player, are those VHS tapes on the top shelf?! 

Can anyone tell what movies they are? Is the downstairs map hooked up to a VCR? Are VCR's the godliest form of home entertainment? I'm so confused...

My guess is it goes back to fetishising ye olden days when women wore t-shirt blouses and baseball bonnets and manly, arm-wrestling boys knew the value of a good silk flower arrangement and trinket box. 

[dargosmydaddy]

Enlarging the picture, it looks like a mix of VHS and DVD.

One of the outward facing ones literally says "Bible Challenges on DVD."

The other outward facing one also looks like a DVD case with someone on horseback. One word title that appears to end in "ffey."

The VHS spines seem to include Left Behind (a Kirk Cameron movie about the rapture), Wings of the Morning (described by IMDB as "first Technicolor movie shot in the British Isles, features Gypsies, horse racing, singing and romance," from 1937), possibly Thomas the Tank Engine, and something that looks like... "Jeffy Likes Dad"? "Jesy Looks Dead"? Plus several more VHS and DVDs that are too blurry and small to read.

Don't most people tend to keep their DVDs/ tapes* close to where they're actually watching them? Is there secretly a TV/VCR/DVD player hidden behind the boat picture? 

(*Of course I know no one has tapes anymore... or maybe even DVDs... but back in the day...Surely these could be stored in one of Jill's eleventy-billion downstairs cabinets, closer to the TV-map.)

[mythoughtis]

That’s decorated as a guest room.  No teenage male( especially those she so ardently described as masculine) is going to choose lace table runners, cutesy fake flowers, moose statuettes, and so forth.  

[smallfry]

How in holy hell is that a room for teen age boys?? Those beds look like they were made for toddlers and the stupid blue material on top of the dressers look girly as all heck!! And of course Jill filled every inch with her crap! Maybe she could have taken the boys shopping with her and let them pick out what THEY WANTED for their own room. The control runs deep with Jill. Those boys are sissies through and through. I am embarrassed for them.

Edited September 3, 2023 by smallfry
spelling

[xwordfanatik]

1 hour ago, oliviabenson said:

What do they listen to on the CD player? Tim R singing? Mahmo singing?

DBD's sermon of the week, which he rotates like a TV rerun.  🤮

[Notabug]

3 hours ago, libgirl2 said:

Why can't they can't they decorate their own room? They are old enough. 

I can't have been the only kid whose mother let us pick out the colors and decor of our bedrooms from about the age of 10.  And, even being a girl, by the age of 10, I was NOT sleeping with a teddy bear.  Maybe on the dresser or a shelf, but not on the bed.  

Those poor kids, not even able to express themselves in the simplest ways; instead being smothered with stuffed animals and silk flowers.  

As far as 'deep cleaning', the boys are also plenty old enough to do that for themselves with minimal supervision from Jilly.  Of course, being manly, virile, masculine men; they probably sat on their a**es while their little sisters did the work.

[libgirl2]

31 minutes ago, Notabug said:

I can't have been the only kid whose mother let us pick out the colors and decor of our bedrooms from about the age of 10.  And, even being a girl, by the age of 10, I was NOT sleeping with a teddy bear.  Maybe on the dresser or a shelf, but not on the bed.  

Those poor kids, not even able to express themselves in the simplest ways; instead being smothered with stuffed animals and silk flowers.  

As far as 'deep cleaning', the boys are also plenty old enough to do that for themselves with minimal supervision from Jilly.  Of course, being manly, virile, masculine men; they probably sat on their a**es while their little sisters did the work.

When we moved to our newly built home, I had red carpeting and my parents painted my room pink. I don't much like pink, but I didn't mind much. I hung up things I wanted to, posters and pictures. I had a desk with a hutch that I decorated with things I liked, a doll or two, things like that. I had no pictures of my family up. 

When my parents decided to redecorate they asked me what I wanted.... blue! Carpet and paint! I used to draw a lot and my favorite framed drawing was of Elizabeth the first at her coronation. It hung above my bed. I had Doctor Who on one side and The Who on the other! 

Edited September 3, 2023 by libgirl2

[BradandJanet]

49 minutes ago, dargosmydaddy said:

Don't most people tend to keep their DVDs/ tapes* close to where they're actually watching them? Is there secretly a TV/VCR/DVD player hidden behind the boat picture? 

(*Of course I know no one has tapes anymore... or maybe even DVDs... but back in the day...Surely these could be stored in one of Jill's eleventy-billion downstairs cabinets, closer to the TV-map.)

The tapes and DVDs are there for decoration and storage. They used to be in Jill's closet with the player and a TV. Sometimes the kids were allowed to watch one of the movies while nestled among Jill's many items of clothing and her stuffed teddy bear collection. Now that they have the big map on the wall in the Upstairs Attic Addition, the TV is in Jill and David's nest and the space in Jill's closet is freed up for cowgirl outfits and other useful stuff.  

The boys' room has badly made built-in shelves for some reason, but Sam and Gabe don't seem to own any books other than their Bibles. Jill had to find something to fill a shelf, so win-win for her. 

[CalicoKitty]

That room must be so dusty with all the klomp (family word for "mess") in there.  Surely someone must be able to "donate" a couple of twin beds for these guys.  Or a "grown up" or lofted bed. That bunk is for a child, not a "manly" teen young man.  And what is Jill's obsession with fake flowers?  I just feel so, so sorry for these guys.  My only hope is that maybe they don't care because they know nothing different.  This is their world and their reality, and anything else is beyond their imagination or aspiration.

[Notabug]

38 minutes ago, libgirl2 said:

When we moved to our newly built home, I had red carpeting and my parents painted my room pink. I don't much like pink, but I didn't mind much. I hung up things I wanted to, posters and pictures. I had a desk with a hutch that I decorated with things I liked, a doll or two, things like that. I had no pictures of my family up. 

When my parents decided to redecorate they asked me what I wanted.... blue! Carpet and paint! I used to draw a lot and my favorite framed drawing was of Elizabeth the first at her coronation. It hung above my bed. I had Doctor Who on one side and The Who on the other! 

I certainly never had a picture of my parents in my room as a child.  I've got a small one of the two of them dressed up for a New Year's party in the late 60's on my dresser now, but I never displayed it until after they were gone. It wouldn't have even occurred to me as a kid.  Good lord!  I lived with them every day!

My sisters and I painted our bedroom bright yellow, with the ubiquitous beige carpet of the '70's and the walls were nearly invisible due to the posters hanging on them.  We had Dark Side of the Moon, Todd Rundgren, James Taylor and a bunch of others I can't even remember.  

No fake flowers anywhere except for some roses my sister painted on the window-shade.  On the dresser, we each had a small jewelry box and nothing else.  No silk flowers, tchotchkes, stuffed animals, dresser scarves or other detritus.

Now, the heaps of discarded clothing and shoes all over the floor.....

Edited September 3, 2023 by Notabug

[AstridM]

4 hours ago, libgirl2 said:

Why can't they can't they decorate their own room? They are old enough. 

Right? My mom knew better than to try and touch my room after age 12, lol. Possibly earlier!

[CalicoKitty]

I was allowed full say when my parents wanted to redecorate my room.  Color, furniture, window  covering---my room, my choice.  Luckily, I wanted a pretty tame room with nothing too dramatic.  When I moved out for college, they repainted the color they preferred, and all was good.  It became a "guest room" (that no one ever used), with plenty of storage for my mom.  But my mother did not decorate my room for me.  It is one way I learned what I liked and could show some independence.  It was part of growing up.  Jill does not want her kids to grow up and have their own thoughts.  She wants to remain in charge forever.  I wonder if she was ever given personal "choices" when she was growing up.  Maybe her mother was in charge until she married and left home.  Jill apparently is calling the shots in the homes of her married, adult "children".  I wonder if Nurie or NotNurie change anything that mama has "decorated".

[sagittarius sue]

My mother chose my bedroom set when I was about 11, and I don't think I would've chosen white French Provincial myself.  I think it was a popular choice in the early 60s.  I did appreciate having a double bed and nice dresser with a big mirror.  It stood the test of time as my younger sister used it herself and for her daughters at least until at least 2000.

[Lisa418722]

1 hour ago, sagittarius sue said:

My mother chose my bedroom set when I was about 11, and I don't think I would've chosen white French Provincial myself.  I think it was a popular choice in the early 60s.  I did appreciate having a double bed and nice dresser with a big mirror.  It stood the test of time as my younger sister used it herself and for her daughters at least until at least 2000.

When I saw the dresser Jill picked out, it reminded me of the Sears French Provincial bedroom sets.  When I was a kid, I always wanted one of those with the canopy bed, but since my bedroom was also the guest room when we had visitors, I had to have a more neutral bedroom set with a double bed.  When I moved into my condo, my parents let me have the dresser and chest and I appreciate it now because the drawers are real wood and in comparison to today's furniture, the drawers are huge. 

 

3 hours ago, mythoughtis said:

That’s decorated as a guest room.  No teenage male( especially those she so ardently described as masculine) is going to choose lace table runners, cutesy fake flowers, moose statuettes, and so forth.  

 Seeing this bedroom, their bedroom is more feminine with more "stuff" than my bedroom is.  My bedroom is more neutral.  Jill really has no idea what teenage boys might want and I'm sure the boys wouldn't know what they want either because they've never been allowed to have any sort of opinion and figure what they like.

 

Edited September 3, 2023 by Lisa418722

[BradandJanet]

If Jill can't figure out a way to prevent it, Ma and Pa Turtleneck may come back to stay at the barndo for a few months as they make their way around the daughters' homes. They would get the boys' bedroom again, and Gabe and Sam would go back to the upstairs attic.  Some of the furniture would have to go upstairs with them, but the the frilly decor would be perfect just the way it is.  

Could Jill be thinking ahead? It would be a first, but maybe not impossible. 

[satrunrose]

I would love to think that the long range plan was making a nice space for Ma and Pa (I think it would work sans bunkbed). Unfortunately, all of Jill's "lovingly" decorated spaces for her children have the 90s grandma chic style, so I don't think we can be sure. 

I would honestly love to be a fly on the wall on there shopping trips. Does Jill do it all and then pull out the camera to film the kid faking enthusiasm for the god awful decor? Do they play an elaborate game of warmer/colder at the thrift store (Sam reaches for a poster of a sports ball player, sees Jill frown, reaches for the silk flower basket)? Worst of all, did Jill actually manage, through general awfulness, to brainwash her kids into believing that they like this stuff?

[Westiepeach]

28 minutes ago, BradandJanet said:

Could Jill be thinking ahead? It would be a first, but maybe not impossible. 

Nah. Jill only thinks of what Jill wants. Right now.

[Salacious Kitty]

1 minute ago, Westiepeach said:

Nah. Jill only thinks of what Jill wants. Right now.

The only thing she seems to plan ahead for is the Ladies Retreat. She always shows the family addressing the Save the Date notices that DBD prints up. 

[oliviabenson]

I bet all the furniture for the boys was FREE. And all the decorations were either free or in storage in the upstairs attic.

 

I doubt Jill spent $20 on the room.

 

Edited September 3, 2023 by oliviabenson

[Salacious Kitty]

3 minutes ago, oliviabenson said:

I bet all the furniture for the boys was FREE. And all the decorations were either free or in storage in the upstairs attic.

 

I doubt Jill spent $20 on the room.

 

She filled up a book shelf with old DVDs and VCR tapes. I guess that's what you do when your kids don't have actual books. 

[AstridM]

2 minutes ago, Salacious Kitty said:

She filled up a book shelf with old DVDs and VCR tapes. I guess that's what you do when your kids don't have actual books. 

Including “Thomas the Tank.” 😐

[oliviabenson]

Ma and Pa will see living at Jill’s as the rest resort. I doubt they want to live with Jill full time.

 

Now which rodlet will be stuck taking care of Jill and Dave in their old age?

[Teriacky]

Jill has done everything in her power to make her children socially awkward. 
We need to find a new word for what Jill has done to her house (and her children’s houses/dorms) because it sure isn’t decorating!!

[kaleidoscope]

What does Phillip do when he has to move out of his dorm room over the summer?  Did Jill move all of his belongings there?  What about Christmas/semester break?

[GeeGolly]

What the fuck did I just look at?!?

It looks like what a kid would come up with when they beg for their own room and make one in the basement with all the oddball furniture stored down there.

I mean shit, this makes Jed and Jer's old bachelor pad bedroom look manly and mature.

[Fosca]

On 9/2/2023 at 6:50 AM, LilJen said:

Because every 20-year-old American male wants a teddy bear.

sure to hear later, “Philip loves and honors his mother so much that he graciously and generously gifted me the teddy bear that he so desperately wanted for his own room to remind him that his Mama loooooooves him…my children have such a HEART for giving their treasures away [I sure don’t because I thrive on clutter] because they know their TRUE treasure is in heaven. Hallelujah! Jesus Is KING!!”

I doubt very much that Mahmo let Philip keep the bear; it's hers, after all (since all of the Build-a-Bears are given to her by the kids because she's so wonderful!).  I suspect she just put it there for the picture and then snatched it back to put back in her collection.

[crazy8s]

2 hours ago, satrunrose said:

I would love to think that the long range plan was making a nice space for Ma and Pa (I think it would work sans bunkbed).

When ma and pa stayed with them last winter those are the bunks they took apart and placed next to each other to make a big bed. The head and footboards weren't the same heights when next to each other and the huge dresser with the hutch they had for ma and pa is what phillip has crammed into his dorm space.

I note the "purity" figures from purity night talk at the bowling alley are displayed on the crappy shelves.

What made me really laugh is there is what appears to be a manly chin up bar mounted on the wall about a foot above the top bunk😂

[Salacious Kitty]

It's been deleted now, but Phillip wrote and performed a really bad song at the church. The lyrics were painful. It's worse than Jill's sin song. 

Someone on FJ got screenshots of the lyrics before they were taken down, sorry too many to c/p here.

 

[skatelady]

1 hour ago, Teriacky said:

We need to find a new word for what Jill has done to her house (and her children’s houses/dorms) because it sure isn’t decorating!!

Dreck-orating?

[ginger90]

3 hours ago, satrunrose said:

 

I would love to think that the long range plan was making a nice space for Ma and Pa

 

I believe last time she mentioned her parents was in July. That’s a long time in Jill land.