West Cumbria’s largest family?

Last updated at 12:48, Friday, 28 September 2012

Elizabeth Kennedy can be forgiven for forgetting the odd birthday – after all, she has seven children, 29 grandchildren, 29 great-grandchildren and four more on the way.

Mrs Kennedy, known as Lily, lives at Steer Avenue in Maryport and she is not so much a mother and grandmother as the founder of a tribe.

She has eight children, seven surviving, and the grandchildren who range from 32 to just a couple of weeks old – and with four more great-grandchildren due in the next few weeks, the family is still growing.

She said: “I have to say I don’t keep up with all their birthdays. Some of them are moving around and it is hard to keep track of them all.”

Mrs Kennedy, originally from Northern Ireland, has lived in the UK since 1980 and in Maryport for the past six years. She said: “I came up here after I had a stroke to be nearer my daughters Margaret Dawson, Elizabeth Stewartson and Joanne Balausiak, who all live here.”