How the Hoyings are redefining family, and staring their own

Just in time for the holidays, Fa La La Family is the iconic couple’s second children’s book, which was published in September. With this book, the Hoyings hope to redefine what family is and can be all over the world. The book features illustrations by Steph Lew, and is accompanied by the release of the couple’s Christmas album, M.Y.F.A.M.I.L.Y. The album includes original songs like “Mahal Kita,” which incorporates Tagalog, and “Fa La La Family,” which turns the book’s text into lyrics.

We chatted with the soon-to-be dads on what they hope their book teaches families across the globe, how much they resonate with the untraditional families represented in the book, and the importance of publishing a culturally diverse project in a time of oppressive book bans. 

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

"Fa La La Family" was written by Scott and Mark Hoying, and illustrated by Steph Lew.

Courtesy of the Hoyings

Andre Lawes Menchavez: I know you both have mentioned that you wanted this book to be a soundtrack for your future children. What messages do you hope this book instills into your future kids and also to families around the world who will be reading this?
Scott Hoying: Our dream is for our kids to be loving, empathetic, inclusive, and wonderful people, and our dream is to spread that message in this book. This book is about families and how they can look in different ways than the conventional family you see in the media. It can be a mom, it can be a dad or two, it can be a chosen family. We want our kids to know that they always have their family, which are two dads that will love them, and that they will always have a safe place there.

Mark Hoying: We wanted people all around the world to feel represented and seen. We wanted our cultures to be represented in books. There's pages where we teach kids how to say “I love you” in Tagalog and other different languages. We really hope that this book brings people representation because growing up, we didn't see a lot of stories that showcased who we are.

ALM: This book takes on more personal source material, a shift from your beautiful children’s book How Lucky Am I? that you two wrote last year. What made you want to take this shift in direction?
SH: It was fun to make mayflies into characters, and it felt really magical telling that story. But we were just thinking about other things that are important to us, especially during the holidays. I mean, I make so much holiday music, and we are starting a family, and we both are so close to our families and to each other's families. It just felt like the perfect fit.

MH: Yeah, and especially in Filipino culture, Christmas time is the most important time of the year. It’s the “ber months!” A third of the year, people in the Philippines are celebrating Christmas. So, we wanted to incorporate our heritage. There's even some pages in the book where it's my childhood home, and you can see the big feast on the tables and the kids singing karaoke, and my parents' couches and paintings on the wall that I grew up with. It was such a special experience for us, and something that we're so grateful will get to live on forever.

"Fa La La Family" shows readers the many ways a family can look like.

Courtesy of the Hoyings

ALM: Your illustrator Steph Lew did such an incredible job designing comfy, vibrant scenes reminiscent of home in the holidays. What made you choose Lew for this book?
MH: She’s an AA+PI artist, which was actually one of our goals to celebrate all types of artists, especially ones that are underrepresented. So we wanted, for sure, to have someone that was of Asian descent, and she was just incredible from the very first day we met her. She has that Pixar quality to her art with big expressions, and it was really a perfect fit.

SH: There's something about the color combinations and palette she chooses. They're stunning. The illustrations alone were so beautiful, and then when we got the book with all the coloring in it, it was just amazing. She's really got a gift.

MH: We even sent her pictures of our families, our dogs, and ourselves, and she incorporated those photos so beautifully in the book. There's even a page of the book that has our three dogs! She knew exactly what we dreamed that the pages would look like, and did it so gorgeously. We love her so much. 

ALM: Speaking of, do you have a favorite line or specific illustration you love most from the book?
SH: One of our favorite lines is, “Maybe it’s your mom and you, maybe it’s a dad or two. Maybe it’s a furry friend. Family is love, whoever who!” A lot of our friends have two moms or two dads, and we're going to be two dads in our family, and we consider our dogs our family…I also love the Filipino food illustrations! It makes me hungry every time. [Laughs]

MH: One of my favorite lines as well is, “Whatever the language, the love never changes. I love you. Te amo. Mahal kita.” Love is celebrated in so many different, important, and special ways in so many cultures. I hope this provides a way for kids and families to begin their discovery of how families and folks all across the world celebrate love, family, and the holidays.

"Fa La La Family" includes the Hoyings and their three dogs, who they also consider family.

Courtesy of the Hoyings

ALM: I also love how the book features sheet music, meant to encourage musical celebration between the family reading it! How influential has music been for your families?
SH: I think that music is so powerful in so many ways. Every single person loves music and every culture celebrates music. Music is only 12 notes but can make a sound that represents an entire country, specific to that country. It’s a really beautiful thing. We incorporate music in everything we do as a couple. At our wedding, we had a piano in the center of this field, and everyone just went around the piano and sang and then signed the piano. That's why we put sheet music in this book because there's no better feeling than being with friends or family and singing. We wanted to put the simple chords and lyrics together so people could all sing it during the holidays and create those memories.

ALM: And Mark, how special was it for you to sample your parents speaking Tagalog in one of the tracks on the Fa La La Family album?

MH: That was so cool. One of the songs is called “Mahal Kita” (which means “I love you” in Tagalog), and there's a bunch of Tagalog phrases in that song. I really wanted to make sure that we were saying them perfectly so we called my parents and they taught Scott how to say a lot of these phrases. It was so cute! But during that phone call, we recorded it just for fun and to have the memory of it. It was just such an adorable phone call that we then sampled moments from that phone call into the song, and now my parents are our secret special features, which is especially so cool because my parents are who made me fall in love with music growing up. It was a really special way to pay homage.

With their new book, the Hoyings hope to redefine what family is and can be.

Courtesy of the Hoyings

ALM: I also have to ask you both, with such a beautifully cultural and inclusive children’s book like this, how important do you think it is to publish it in this time where there are book bans targeting diverse narratives?
SH: It’s really sad that there's book bannings happening. I feel like everyone's story deserves to be told, and everyone should feel like they belong. It’s important for the queer community to be able to find books that they feel like their story is being told in. People wanting to erase that is really wild to me, especially with no logic behind it. It's just very hateful. But honestly, historically, throughout all of time, hate has never won. We've always progressed. We've always moved forward and so, that's the losing side. All we can do is fight back, and we can put art into the world, as much art as possible, and spread as much love as possible. That’s what we're going to do, and we'll keep battling it out. If there’s anything queer people are used to, it's battling it out. We’re resilient. And there always will be queer people, and there always will be queer people that have a story to tell.

MH: That's the thing, lawmakers can try to ban books, they can try to stop these stories from being told, but that will never stop these stories from being heard. Just know, for anyone listening or seeing this, we're always here for you. Millions of people are. Your stories and your love will always be heard. And we're here, and so many people are here, to celebrate you no matter what.

ALM: You guys are going to be such great dads! With so much talk about family today, I wanted to end our interview on yours. How excited are you two to start your family? The biggest congrats!
SH: Thank you! I'm just so in my baby fever mode. Every time we walk by a baby, I'm like, “We want one!”

MH: Being dads is a dream that we've had since we first met. It's something that we've always, always, always wanted. And being a queer couple that wants to start a family, your whole life you don’t know if that’s gonna happen. It’s a journey. Knowing we’re right on the edge of this new, beautiful chapter of our lives, it's something that we have dreamed of and we're so excited about.