The following is a guest post by Dariela and is part of the Your Bicultural Holiday Traditions series.
Photo courtesy of Dariela
This year I have a list of traditions and activities I want to make that will help bring together the two cultures we have in our family: Venezuelan and American.
Since our son is 3 years old and we have a girl on the way, it is already proving to be fun to start these traditions through the holidays:
Christmas Books in Spanish and English
We have one that we read in both languages and has a small explanation of what happened in Christmas and why we celebrate it and how different cultures celebrate it. My son’s immersion in books is amazing and he wants it read 100 times, so this helps a lot! We plan to add many more to our library through the years.
Also, having conversations about what happens in Christmas and telling stories about what we used to do when we where young is priceless for our son; he loves this and the stories created are very special.
Nativity Scene
In Venezuela this is very big. It not only includes the main characters but also lots of little towns with cute houses, people, animals, little blinking lights, moss and real mountain backgrounds, too. Sometimes families dedicate a whole room for it at their homes.
We are not making a big scene but we have a little collection of several ones that I put out as decoration and Adrian knows that on Christmas Day baby Jesus will be born and he will be placed there.
Christmas Decorating
We had a special day to decorate the house and this included decorating the tree, setting up the nativity scenes and some other ornaments around the house. He LOOVED this, of course.
Singing to Baby Jesus
Oh, music is sooo important as a holiday traditions! We sing Aguinaldos (as we call our folkloric Christmas carols) to Baby Jesus in front of the Nativity scene. I’m sure Adrian will love to learn some of these. And why not include some traditional Christmas Carols in English too? It will be fun!
Christmas Eve celebration
Celebrating Christmas Eve with a Venezuelan dinner and our best outfits will be one of our traditions. Luckily, we live in LA and there are some places where we can buy some Hallacas and the Pan de Jamón (Ham Bread) which is a big part of the traditional holiday meal and is hard to make, so with some other additions it will be great!
We will open our gifts that night-maybe not at midnight like we used to in Venezuela- but after dinner. A good fiesta and dancing to some Gaitas (Venezuelan Christmas music similar to Salsa) if we have guests would be in order as well!
Christmas Day celebration
We’ll also have a Christmas Day dinner celebration. WOW! We will get two parties! My in-laws live close by, which means we can celebrate with them too. We all pitch in for an American traditional dinner, listen to lots of Christmas carols, play some board games, watch a Christmas movie and open gifts from Santa. Which brings me to the last tradition:
Santa brings presents and Baby Jesus, too!
In Venezuela Baby Jesus brings presents to the kids on Christmas, usually he leaves them by the bed. Adrian will have some presents by his bed from Baby Jesus and some presents by the tree from Santa! I’m not sure if this will be confusing, but we’ll try and see how it goes.
New Year’s Eve celebration
The Holidays wouldn’t be complete without the proper New Year’s celebration. We would like to make it a tradition to have a big family party where all the family is invited, this means, not just an adult party but kids too, please. Kids can have fun together and adults can party as well. We’ll have plenty to eat too and maybe do all those fun traditions likr eating 12 grapes right when midnight strikes, kissing somebody, watching the ball drop on TV, going out the door with some luggage if you want to travel next year and many more that I can’t think of right now!
And this is really just the beginning of my list but it is the most important part of it. I realize that having two cultures in our family is so different than just doing one regular tradition and it’s fun! I hope our kids think the same thing!
Dariela is a designer and latin Mami living in Los Angeles. She loves to blog about her bicultural family at Nuestra Vida con Adrián. You can see her designs at Folklore Eye.
What’s on your list of important holiday traditions?
Your Bicultural Holiday Traditions continues on Monday with a story from Silvia, Mamá Latina Tips, how she manages to capture the true meaning of giving and receiving at Christmastime. Make sure you’re subscribed to our feed either by RSS or email so you don’t miss a beat.
I had never heard of Pan de Jamón or Gaitas, so I learned some new things today!
The gifts from Baby Jesus and from Santa is a bit of a dilemma for many parents because one day the child will discover that Santa isn’t real. Your child will say, “But he left me gifts!” and you will have to say, “Your father and I left the gifts. It’s just a fun tradition for children.” — As kids are quite clever, the next question will be, “And what about the gifts from Jesus? Did you leave them as well?” … thus resulting in their first struggle with faith.
There are so many complications to parenthood that no one warned me about – and probably twice as many for parents trying to straddle two cultures and languages!
Feliz Navidad, Dariela, to you and your growing family!
.-= Sra. López´s last blog ..SpanglishBaby and TikiTiki =-.
Dealing with the kids when they are bigger about Santa o el niño is going to be something else, but I don’t mind it, yes, parenthood is much much more than what we ever thought it wood be!! Feliz Navidad to you too Sra Lopez!
.-= Dariela´s last blog ..Giveaway Winner! =-.
We also have Christmas Eve and Christmas day celebration! but I also learn something new from you, about the Gaitas, I would love that! it sound like a lot of fun
Love your pic, as always.
We are also big about Nativities, my husband wants to set one big Nativity on our front lawn, I don’t think is going to happen this year, maybe next.
Feliz Navidad Dariela!!
.-= Silvia´s last blog .."The Spy Next Door", Sorteo de Pases para Pre-estreno (5 ciudades)/ "The Spy Next Door" 5 City Pre-screening Pass Giveaway =-.
Uy si, the gaitas are very bailables and the lyrics are always fun because not only do they sing about the holidays but they have up to date political event lyrics! Felicitaciones! -Como dicen en Mexico!
.-= Dariela´s last blog ..Giveaway Winner! =-.
Thank you for sharing! I loved learning about your traditions in Venezuela. I had not heard of several of them. I am curious how you deal with the two languages in your house. Do you speak Spanish to Adrian and your husbands speaks English? ¡Feliz Navidad!
.-= Adriana´s last blog ..Plate Making Kits =-.
Glad I was able to show some venezuelan traditions that some of you didn’t know!
About the languages, yes, we use the OPOL method. I speak to him in Spanish only and my husband in English, sometimes I do translate too because my husband doesn’t understand Spanish! Feliz Navidad Adriana!
.-= Dariela´s last blog ..Giveaway Winner! =-.
I am still thinking about the Pan de Jamon…typical of me ( :
I enjoyed reading up on your traditions, some sound a lot like ours. I have thought of ditching the whole Santa thing and telling the kids that the gifts come from baby Jesus. So they can really think about what Christmas is all about. I think it will take some transitioning but maybe next year we can start this.
I am not sure what to do about Santa Claus.
My husband’s Mexican side of the family here in the USA tried to do Santa Claus years ago (before I knew them), but not having all the details about how to do it, the kids were never too sure about believing. So they asked some kids in the neighborhood and then, it was all over.
In fact, my husband grew up poor enough that only the very smallest children got presents from the Reyes Magos.
My American side of the family get very, very sad faces when I tell them this. I rather feel that way myself. I hope I can find a way to do Santa Claus for my son. When done right it is a lesson that will never be forgotten. For me and my family it is not about materialism but about believing that you don’t always have to understand how or why, just trust that you will be taken care of and good things will happen, if you are good.
This past Christmas my son was 18 months old and big enough to pay attention, but we were actually with the family in Mexico so we avoided the whole question.
I guess if I am going to try to do Santa Claus I’ll need to get all the cousins in on it!
P.S. I am showing my age but we had one present from Santa and the rest were from our parents. Santa is about making sure even children whose parents don’t have much money will still have one fun thing just for them. It doesn’t have to be big, but just for them specifically. Some years, the gifts from parents might all be things like new underwear and socks; the present from Santa made you feel really special. Sometimes, there were kids we knew at school whose parents didn’t seem to pay much attention to them, but they knew at least Santa had been watching them and knew if they were good, because they got something. That is what we thought Santa was for, so that no child feels forgotten. It was not a selfish thing.
Santa is very busy so we were instructed to put a range of different things on your wish list and realize we’d only get one thing. The elves cannot make everything (they cannot make puppies, for example). Sometimes, Santa might not bring you anything you even had on your list, but that was because what he brought you was what he felt was the right thing for you, after watching you all year. Writing the letter to Santa was not just about a wish list; it was a real letter with “I hope you are keeping warm” and appreciating all the toys we already have and all the things Santa does for ALL the children.
It seems Santa has changed over the years but I want to do it the old-fashioned way. We’ll just have to see how long we can keep it going
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