{"id":1214,"date":"2015-09-05T18:58:06","date_gmt":"2015-09-05T23:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/?p=1214"},"modified":"2015-09-05T18:58:06","modified_gmt":"2015-09-05T23:58:06","slug":"it-takes-a-zoo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/2015\/09\/05\/it-takes-a-zoo\/","title":{"rendered":"It Takes A Zoo."},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the boys\u2019 favorite books is \u201cWild About You,\u201d a sweet story about a tree kangaroo and a panda bear couple who each adopt a baby animal from a different species to raise them as their own.<\/p>\n

The last lines of the book read,<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery kid needs a family, we know that it\u2019s true.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

And to bring up a baby\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

IT TAKES A WHOLE ZOO!\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Living here in Oklahoma during our Ling(uistics) time among 14 adults and 13 children often feels like a zoo. Especially once you add all the creatures that have been found, captured, and caged in: scorpions, tarantulas, lots and lots of crawdads, lizards (Judah had his own pet lizard for a while and named him Kerry John), frogs, stickbugs, a turtle, and various beetles. Imagine the noise of dinner time with everyone eating together, and you even have the sound effects of a zoo.<\/p>\n

Although it can get loud and crazy, it is truly precious to see our Ling family<\/strong> here working together to \u201cbring up our babies.\u201d These other adults (and older children) may not be our boys\u2019 parents, but that doesn\u2019t mean that they can\u2019t have an impact on Judah and Elias. It\u2019s in the small things.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s another dad throwing the ball back and forth with Elias.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s the 9-year old boy teaching Judah how to hold a crawdad so it doesn\u2019t pinch you.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s the 4-year old girl feeding Elias little pieces of her food during dinner while giving him kisses on the head.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s the other mom who watches our boys so John can go to language session with us.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s the older kids allowing our younger ones to be part of their adventures.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s the guy who\u2019s carrying around Elias because John and I are busy cooking.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s the gal who greets our boys with a loud and genuine \u201cJudah!!! Elias!!!\u201d like they\u2019re the most important people in the world.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Although life here in Ling-land can be challenging (and just plain loud and crazy), I hope we can always take time to cherish those moments of raising our children together.<\/p>\n

It does take a zoo.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"1-IMG_6407\"<\/a>
Movie night with all the kiddos<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6409\"<\/a>
When they find MUD, it’s even more like a zoo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6424\"<\/a>
Yoga in the mud<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6428\"<\/a>
Snake face! Judah loves getting his face painted by Miss Sara.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6450\"<\/a>
The boys are in love with our littlest neighbor, Baby Daea!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6455\"<\/a>
Miss Kaylee loves kids and the kids love her!!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6456\"<\/a>
Playing with the crawdads<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6459\"<\/a>
Judah felt brave and held one all by himself \ud83d\ude42<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6462\"<\/a>
Elias just squealed whenever his hand came too close to one<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6473\"<\/a>
Story time!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6477\"<\/a>
John watches 4 other kids along with our boys twice a week and has done little lessons with them.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6478\"<\/a>
It takes a zoo AND lots of coffee :). Pumpkin spice lattes, in this case!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"1-IMG_6482\"<\/a>
Coloring party!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Waiting<\/a>
Waiting for the turtle to peek out. Elias kept yelling “Come out!” Smart turtle didn’t obey.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the boys\u2019 favorite books is \u201cWild About You,\u201d a sweet story about a tree kangaroo and a panda bear couple who each adopt a baby animal from a different species to raise them as their own. The last lines of the book read, \u201cEvery kid needs a family, we know that it\u2019s true. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1077,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[448,637],"class_list":{"0":"post-1214","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"tag-ethnos360","8":"tag-new-tribes-mission","9":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1077"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1214\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/john-anyan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}