“Cheaper By The Dozen” Movie Houses

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Cheaper By The Dozen Movie Houses

There are two houses in the movie to explore in this movie starring Steven Martin, Bonnie Hunt, Hilary Duff, and Ashton Kutcher in this 2003 Cheaper By The Dozen remake directed by Shawn Levy.  

Cheaper By The Dozen is a fun, heart-warming film is about the Baker family with 12 children.  That’s a family of 14 counting mom and dad, plus a dog and one trouble-hopping frog.  I come from a family of 8, counting mom and dad, so that’s 10.  I relate to this story on many levels.  

The opening scene reveals their laid back country life in a charming country home complete with an extra-large porch for many children to scramble upon.  No keeping up with the Jones’ here, just sheer bliss family living.  Steve Martin plays, Tom Baker, the Dad of course.  Hollywood on Location places this house in Petaluma, Ca. It’s Two Rock Ranch that is an apple orchard and dairy at 1051 Walker Road. It is also a private home so please don’t disturb the owners.

Hollywood on Location places the real house where this was filmed in Petaluma, Ca. It’s Two Rock Ranch, an apple orchard and dairy at 1051 Walker Road.

Bonnie Hunt plays Mom, Kate Baker.  She is the narrator of the movie.  She is writing a book about her family life here.  Took this to show all the clutter on the table meaning this is one busy, but productive mom.  

Kate starts out by saying “12 is our number.”  “It’s the number of games my husband Tom coaches at Lincoln College every season, it’s the number of times we zero out our bank account each year to make ends meet, and it’s the number of kids we try to keep track of.”

Kate writes about how she met Tom, how they both wanted 8 kids, and how they both wanted their careers; she a writer and he a football coach, but after a few children they knew they wanted a big family more.  

Here’s Lorraine Baker, played by Hilary Duff, claiming her important bathroom time. I like Hilary Duff.  She is so bubbly and cheerful.

The family at breakfast scene.  Tom and Kate become experts at handling chaos.  

The children of Tom and Kate are 1. Nora, 2. Charlie, 3. Lorraine, 4. Henry, 5. Sarah, 6. Jake, 7. Jessica, 8. Kim, 9. Mark, 10. Mike, 11. Nigel, 12. Kyle.  The last two Nigel and Kyle are twins.  I think they are the twins from Desperate Housewives too.  

I grew up in a family of 8 and they are 1. Scott, 2. Sue, 3. Shaun, 4. Shane, 5. Sherri, 6. Sandra, 7. Stacey, 8. Skip.  All S’s as you can see.  No twins, but 4 are a year apart.  Me, I am number 2. Sue.  8 is our number.  It was the number of hospital delivery bills that were paid off, the number of birthday cakes to bake every year, and it was the number of kids to keep track of too.  You can get away with a lot in a family of 8, well that’s 10 with mom and dad.        

Part of the chaos in the family is Beans the frog.

The living room.  Yep, they got kids.  The kids are not happy Dad is accepting an offer for his dream, big career, football coach job.

Because it means they are moving and leaving everything they know behind. Good-bye laid-back country life house. 

Hello new house and new life.  For kids, adjustment isn’t easy, especially if they are a teenager.  But never mind that, look at this huge house of joy to behold.  

  Music is playing as they enter and Tom says…Welcome Home.  

The kids get to pick out their bedrooms and Mark (Beans the frog owner) is left out and discovers this room at the top of the house.  It goes from this…..

To this wonderful little boy’s bedroom complete with a secret door he discovers one day.

Swinging from chandelier with the new neighbor boy who fell off the railing while roller skating in the house of course.  The chandelier plays an important role in the movie.  It is broken I think 3 times as the story line progresses.  Beautiful railing.

Another look at the house shows the deck and the windows that leave me speechless.

I count 8 kids on the bed, plus the dog.  

Look at the beautiful engraved fireplace mantel.  Ashton Kutcher plays Hank, Nora’s boyfriend and none of the kids like him so they…

soak his underwear in meat so that… 

this happens to him.  They bombed him alright. 

I really like this baby blue chair.  

Mark looking out his bedroom window.  A great close up to see the details of the home.  

Organization charts, check.  

Mom is out of town promoting her book and “chaos” is not being managed by Dad.  

Dad needs help.

Charlie is not happy.  He misses his girlfriend,school is not going well, Mom is gone, and Dad is too busy to notice.

Night, night wonderful house.

Beans the frog dies and the prayer at the funeral goes like this:  

“Beans was a good frog, not like a lot of the bad frogs you hear about today…all hopped-up.  He was lovable, he was almost human, he was like one of the family, except of course he was green and he ate flies, but, he was a hopper.  He hipped..and he hopped…he loved..hip.. hop.  

The chandelier is finally hanging, it’s not broken anymore, and neither is the family.  They survived the move and are back to being a happy Big family again.  

The End.  

Another recent movie post you might like is Life As We Know It or click my TV & Movies category.

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