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Hola, mamis

¡Me da mucho gusto saludarlas! I am the mom of  a three-year-old toddler and am raising her to be bilingual (ingles y español, por supuesto). I'm taking the one-parent, one-language approach, because my husband does not speak Spanish, so I speak to my daughter exclusively in Español. And even though you wouldn't know it from my message here, I try to avoid "Spanglish" at all costs when I am speaking with her.  I am Latina, born and raised in the States, however Spanish was my first language thanks to my mom and abuelita.  I would love to know if there are any other Chicagoans out there!

Hasta la proxima…

Giselle

Hi Giselle,

I am 6 months pregnant with our first hope-to-be bilingual child. And, we're in Chicago!

Our situation is that I am a guerita that learned Spanish as a teen/young adult through study and immersion and now use Spanish somewhat regularly through my work with Spanish-speaking immigrants and newcomers. My partner's parents

are from Mexico and he was born and raised here in the Chi with Spanish as the home lg. and (briefly bilingual ed.) English as the school lg. We spend most of our relationship/homelife in English though we would like to make every effort to speak Spanish at home around the bebe. We live in a Spanish-speaking dominant neighborhood andhis parents are nearby…so hoping that helps!

~Megan

Like Megan, I am a guerrita who learned Spanish in Mexico in my late teens and
my husband is of Mexican descent and grew up speaking Spanish at
home and English at school and with peers. We have a 3 1/2 year old
daughter and a 6 1/2 year old son who are more bilingual then I ever
thought they would be! While my son entering kindergarten has given
us a bit of a challenge (in the ever challenging world of language
acquisition) he remains very fluent. In the beginning, we weren't sure what method to
go with since our life as a couple was basically in English unless we
were by the in-laws, but when my son turned one, we switched to all
Spanish at home (and with grandparents, certain friends, etc.) and
English otherwise and it seems to have worked out.