If you lived through the ‘80s, you probably remember Kirk Cameron for his starring role as Mike Seaver on the family sitcom Growing Pains. What you may not know is that he went on to marry his on-screen sweetheart, co-star Chelsea Noble, and became the proud father of six children of his own. Now between the ages of 19 and 25, the “kids”—Olivia, James, Isabella, Luke, Ahna, and Jack Cameron—are all now older than Kirk was during the height of his fame. With two married, another recently engaged, several starting their careers, and the youngest graduating from high school just last week, there’s plenty to catch up on in the Cameron clan. Read on to see the family of eight now!
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Kirk and Chelsea have a large family of biological and adoptive children.
Having been adopted herself, Chelsea shared in a 2019 interview that she always had a “passion for adoption.” The pair adopted their first four children in quick succession—each just one year apart—saying they always wanted their adopted kids to know that they were the couple’s “first choice.” Soon after their fourth adoption, they added two additional biological children to their brood.
“They’re just my kids. Literally, I forget who’s adopted and who’s not…I’m their dad and Chelsea’s their mom,” People reported Kirk saying in 2008. “Adoption is so special. My adopted kids know that they’re in our family because we wanted them to be in our family. We chose them. That’s something special that every adopted child can know,” he added.
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The family celebrates their differences.
Any family with six children is sure to have its differences, but in the case of the Cameron family, those differences are consciously celebrated. “We have a multi-racial family, and so that makes our family a family of different colors, different backgrounds, different talents, different gifts. And it’s really a beautiful mosaic of things that God brings together for our family,” said Kirk.
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Kirk raised his kids differently from his own childhood.
Looking back on his own childhood on the set of Growing Pains, Kirk remembers himself as a “prankster who planted stink bombs under the audience seats, greased door knobs and hid crew members’ cars in bushes.” In his autobiography, Still Growing, Kirk recalled reveling in practical jokes, “ribbing” cast members, and regularly making “sarcastic comments that flew around the stage like the evil monkeys on The Wizard of Oz.” The cast and crew affectionately named him "Devil Boy," he shared in the book.
In contrast, Kirk’s children seemed to have a much milder upbringing outside of the limelight. In 2008, he shared this family snapshot with People: “My son Jack is 11, he’s into music and Legos. My daughters are into ballet and singing. My littlest one, she wants to be a farmer. She wants to be Fern from Charlotte’s Web. She’d like to have a cow and a goat and a goose and a rat and a spider. And my other little guys, they love race cars and power tools and catching lizards.”
More recently, several of Kirk's kids have shown an interest in following their famous dad's footsteps in the entertainment industry. His oldest son, Jack, is a talented guitarist and photographer, while daughter Bella is a singer and shares a YouTube channel with her husband called "Us, Moore or Less."
The family may soon make some big changes.
Kirk has continued acting ever since his teen idol days, a fact that has kept the family in their native state of California for several decades. However, he recently shared via Facebook that the family may soon relocate for personal reasons.
“While there are many beautiful aspects of California, there are also some...not so great factors,” he wrote, adding a laughing emoji. The actor shared that his family is now considering a move to a new state—Tennessee, Florida, or Texas, perhaps—“where taxes are lower, patriotism is higher, and biblical values of faith and family are celebrated.” Any one of these locations would bring them closer to the family's two oldest children, who both reside in Fort Worth, Texas, as well as their family foundation, which hosts an annual summer camp for seriously ill children and their families in rural Georgia.
