Thirteen years ago, Denis and Marina Kuleshova uprooted their lives in Kazakhstan, carrying little more than dreams and their firstborn, Daria, to the quiet embrace of Russia’s Belgorod region. What began as a modest family of three has since erupted into a symphony of eight children—each note louder, messier, and more vibrant than the last.
Their home hums like a beehive after a rainstorm: sticky, alive, and perpetually on the verge of tipping into delightful disarray. Lunch and dinner are not meals but rituals—sacred gatherings where conversations spill over like untamed vines. "We cultivate dialogue like others cultivate gardens," Marina muses, stirring a pot while a toddler clings to her leg like an ambitious climber.
Denis, once a ghost in his own home due to grueling work hours, now chops vegetables with the precision of a man who’s learned time is the one ingredient you can’t reclaim. His hands, once calloused from steering a career, now knead dough and untangle sibling squabbles with equal fervor.
Marina, a psychologist by trade, measures progress not in milestones but in the frequency of Daria’s surprise visits from college. "She still brings the scent of the outside world into our chaos," she says, eyes glinting like a woman who’s gambled on love and won.
The Kuleshova blueprint is simple: a house loud with laughter, a business yet to bloom, and a future as unpredictable as a game of tag in a thunderstorm. "Five years from now?" Marina laughs, dodging a flying spoon. "Ask me after the next nap time."
