It was bedtime in the Flynn household but the kids were wide awake, excited by the arrival of CNN reporters to their colorful, crowded Kentucky home. The entry is crammed with bunk beds on one side and, separated by a bookshelf, a makeshift den with a desk and computer on the other.
Grandparents Sandra and Michael Flynn lovingly call their home “the Zoo” and each has said, with all the kids and commotion, “its impossible to be quiet in the zoo.”
Nanny and Poppy, as they’re called, have raised two generations of children here, their own and now their five grandkids: 16-year old Willa, 10-year old Dallas, 7-year old Sarah and 6-year old twins Megan and Morgan.
“She’s the loving one,” said Michael Flynn pointing to Megan who has curled up on the couch in purple pajamas, her arms around my waist. Her sister Morgan, in similar pajamas, is navigating the crowd carrying a faded laundry basket filled with her favorite stuffed animals.
First-grader Sarah leans over the armrest. Her thoughts flow rapid fire, quick and sharp, as she digs out a journal and starts to write. Dallas, who Poppy calls a “computer whiz,” tosses a football in the air, clutching it to his side like he is about to run. As the only boy, he is outnumbered. Willa shows me a scrapbook filled with faded baby photos taken before her father died of heart attack in 2010, before her mom started using heroin. It is clearly her most precious possession.
Read more at CNN.