culture

Being a bicultural Latina raising biracial kids while living 300 miles from our nearest Spanish-speaking family means that any opportunity to celebrate our Latino roots is one I cannot pass up. My 3 year old daughter is becoming increasingly aware of holidays and traditions, so I felt it was imperative to celebrate Día de los Muertos. Before adorning her beautiful face with calaca face paint, Alina and I spent some time talking about the holiday and traditions associated with DayRead More ...

Hispanic Heritage Month is all abuzz with celebrations happening all over the country to recognize the richness of the Latino cultural heritage in the United States. From Sep. 15 through October 15 we have so many opportunities to immerse our children in the beauty of one of their cultures and teach others about it as well. Disney Junior is joining the celebration with four beautiful :30 second spots featuring Latino children and parents talking about elements of their heritage thatRead More ...

Our family was fortunate to have had the opportunity to once again immerse our children in Spanish by traveling abroad. You may remember that last year we spent the summer in Peru. This summer was spent in Costa Rica. There really is nothing like travel to enhance your child’s language skills and to provide them with global and cultural understanding. Such trips require planning and effort, but the work is well worth it. Since I do not have family livingRead More ...

If you grew up like me, you remember being pushed to give an abrazo to relatives you didn’t remember or who just plain gave you the heeby jeebies. I survived all those awkward moments, but I’m not planning to put my children through them. When Ana recently posted about piercing her daughter’s ears, it was the occasion for our first disagreement (friendly, of course). In explaining my reasons for not piercing my girls’ ears, I referred to my belief in bodily autonomy.Read More ...

There are rites of passage in many cultures that are sure to raise eyebrows, and even judgmental comments, from others. Many are justified for being inhumane and even torturous, but I refuse to believe that piercing my daughter’s ears when she was an infant falls within that spectrum. If I sound defensive right off the bat, I might be just a tiny bit. This week I wrote an article over at my Babble Voices blog – Besos – titled “HowRead More ...