Bilingual In The Boonies » Parenting.com

Los Happenings

Carrie — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 14:12:00 +0000

Happy good morning…

I am having cafecito in a quiet house and expecting all that to change in a few hours — my parents and the three newly arrived Cubanos will be here this afternoon.

My parents have taken our relatives on the “See America!” tour…or at least the “See Where All The Cubans in America Live!”…Union City, West New York, New York, Bergenline, Boulevard East…and now Nashville! And maybe Atlanta!

My husband — el gringo — will be making some arroz con pollo and I am in charge of flan. Maria will be designing a “Bienvenidos a Tennessee!” sign. I am sure the guinea hens, including two newborn ones, will be delighted by the loqueria.

OK, quicky updates.

My sweet, year-long gig with Parenting.com ended earlier this month, so I just want to say a big thank you to all of you who clicked over there in the last 12 months. And a special, big gracias to my editors, Jess and Sasha, who are wonderful and generous and supportive. Archives can be found here.

The time I gave to Parenting.com now goes to Tiki Tiki, the Latina group blog where I am focusing on writing essays, putting my mug on video and finding folks like you to contribute essays in the form of words, photos or video.

My post yesterday was about Maria losing her first tooth. Oh, yes she did.

At the Tiki Tiki, we’re also giving away a book, America Libre, by Raul Ramos y Sanchez. Click over aqui to register to win it. It has gotten some wonderful reviews and Raul, a cubano from Ohio, is a muy cool guy.

Check in with the Tiki Tiki Monday when Marta offers up some Latinicious menu ideas and asks for yours.

So, that’s about it aqui. Have a wonderful weekend.

Coje tu sobrero y pontelo…Summer is here.

Carrie — Sat, 30 May 2009 14:04:00 +0000

click to enlarge. it’s worth it.

So ya, se acabo the school year. What a delight. Maria got to sleep in until 8:30 a.m., and I myself didn’t roll out of bed until nearly 8 a.m. It is Saturday, but I hope the trend continues. We both have been dragging. And, while I am all warm and fuzzy about the wonderful free time we’re going to have together, ask me how I am feeling at about Day 5 of “I have no one to play with!”

Of course, my main source of patatu is keeping up with Maria’s Spanish. Her class has been a Spanish-immersion one, and she spends six hours a day with a Catalana who kicks my ass every time she hears me say anything to Maria in English. I love that woman. Next year, Maria’s class will be bilingual, so Mami really needs to step up the Spanish action.

A thank you card from Maria’s classmate

Over at Parenting.com this week, I wrote about the volunteering I did in Maria’s classroom this year. I listened to the 5- and 6-year-olds as they read Spanish to me. The card at the top is from Maria and the one just above here is from a classmate of hers. It is very faint, as it is drawn in pencil, but can you see the image she drew of the two of us reading? Truly priceless. More over at Parenting.com.

I also am all whacked out about trying to keep up with the Spanish over the break. I’ve enrolled Maria — de cabeza va! — in a week-long Spanish camp and we will spend two weeks in Miami, where she will have to certainly habla because our Cuban relatives , who speak ni una papa de ingles, should be here by then. (And oh goodness, do I have stories to share about that immigration saga, but can’t because they’re not here yet and I don’t want to mess anything up for them.)

So, in the next few days, I will be forming the Summer of 2009 Spanish Battle Plan.

Wisheame mucho luck-o.

Parenting.com: Que pasa for the summer

Carrie — Fri, 22 May 2009 17:12:00 +0000

When Maria was 2-years-old, she and her father were outside digging in the dirt. She found a worm and was poking at it with a small trowel.
“One gusano,” she said.
My husband says that just as he was going to tell her to be careful not to hurt the worm with the trowel, she said: “Two gusanos!”
Oops.

Today over at Parenting.com , I post about the plan to spend the long summer lazing around and maybe doing nothing much more than digging in the dirt on most days. The worms need to be warned.

“And of course, all these fantasies of lazy summer are tempered by the fact I have an occasional panic thought about how many times I will hear “I don’t have anyone to play with” and how many times I will say: “Give me just a minute while I finish this work.”

What are you doing this verano?

May La Nena never outgrow tiaras

Carrie — Fri, 15 May 2009 18:08:00 +0000

My nena was once nicknamed “Cowgirl” by her father. She was a tough little fireplug who wore pants and t-shirts most of her first three years and then she discovered sparkle and skirts that spin. “Cowgirl” is no more. She’s still a tough chick, but a chick who toughs it out in dangly jewelry, tiaras and tutus — even at Target.

Today, La Maria reminds me that it would be nice never to outgrow a tiara, or a Frida-inspired rose-covered headband. Full post over at Parenting.com.

Un beso to you all this weekend.

Oh, and come back early next week for some giveways and fun noticias…

Feliz Dia de las Madres

Carrie — Sun, 10 May 2009 16:42:00 +0000

my Mother’s Day Card, 2009

It is Sunday morning, on Mother’s Day, and I am resting after a dad- and daughter-created breakfast of pancakes and scrambled eggs. I think I want to go back to sleep. But, the girl wearing silk roses in her hair and a yellow tutu sitting next to me, likely will not allow it.

“You and daddy will not work today, right?” she said.

And so, I am sneaking in this quick post.

Happy Mother’s Day.

Full post over at Parenting.com:

“When I flew by myself last month, I scored a seat in the emergency exit row, with all of its leg room and responsibility.

The flight attendant came by to make sure I could lift the 50-pound door.

“I’m a mother,” I said. “I could lift a 3,000-pound car if I needed to.”

I believe that.”

Parenting.com: The freedom of bad mothering

Carrie — Fri, 01 May 2009 21:42:00 +0000

It was the 1970s and I was between the ages of four and 12 when my family lived in the Miami version of the Boonies — Perrine. It was a haul to get there, down U.S. 1, past the Miami Serpentarium, endless pine trees and not much else. En casa del rayo.

The family next door had three kids at home and I spent a lot of time with them. They took me crabbing at “los pinitos,” to a relatives farm where they plucked chickens and promptly fried and ate them, and to their eldest son’s house just for hanging out. On these adventures, four of us would pile up in the dad’s junker of the moment. The car I remember most had a huge rusty hole in the floor board. Watching the road from the bench seat — and without seat belts — was mesmerizing.

Do you imagine allowing our kids today to sit in the back of a junker with a hole in the floor, and without seat belts? What sinful heaven we deprive them of!

There’s an episode of Mad Men that captures the huge difference between the parents of the 1950s and the parents of today. The little girl put a dry cleaning bag on her head and proclaimed herself an alien. The mother, smoking with her pregnant friend, warns her that the clean clothes from the bag better not be on the closet floor. She doesn’t blink about the kid potentially suffocating. I love that scene.

Not that I would let Maria walk around with a plastic bag on her head, but I wish we had some of the “eh, whatever” attitude of then. I think we mothers would sleep better if so.

I guess I want to be more of a “Bad Mother.”

In that vein, I write about Ayelet Waldman on Parenting.com today. She’s been called a bad mother, but I bet she’s not.

Mami comes back from a business trip

Carrie — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 16:18:00 +0000

My girl welcomed me home last night with a very big and happy hug.
My husband made arroz con pollo for me, so that when the door to our house opened it smelled divine.

I was in Denver this week working and visiting good, good friends — a double bonus trip.

And triple bonus, I got to meet the wonderful Roxana from Spanglish Baby and Andrea the Fashion Marketing Coach . We had dinner with four other women — journalists, public relations consultants and social media queens — at Cuba Cuba. Appropriate, delicioso and inspirational. All that on only one mojito. See us bellezas here.

More on the trip at Parenting.com today.

It’s good to be home.

Mas habla habla coming.

Year 16

Carrie — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 17:11:00 +0000

This “Fruit of the Spirit Stick” is my anniversary gift to my husband. It will go outside, near the entrance to our home. It is by a Tennessee folk artist we’ve long admired Bebo.

I border on the over-sharing today over at Parenting.com, talking about my marriage, which began 16 years ago today in Miami during a beautiful service and a rocking reception.

Here’s to many more rocking years…

Parenting.com: Tu me hiciste brujeria, or a kid and some altars

Carrie — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 15:57:00 +0000

Maria is leaving little altars everywhere.

I write about them today at Parenting.com.

from the post:

“You see, when you grow up Cuban in Miami and your neighbors sacrifice goats to please the gods, a few relatives and friends channel dead people, and your aunt leaves offerings of rum, sweets and tobacco on an altar before a 4-foot-tall statue of a saint, you tend not to take any chances. You step around those discarded bags. You learn to respect it all, because who knows, it may not be crazy after all.”

Cutlines and details for the pictures are on the Flickr page...

In honor of brujeria, here’s a classic salsa song about being bewitched, “Tu me hiciste brujeria!”

Dear computer, I love you, but maybe we need a break

Carrie — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 18:11:00 +0000

OK, so over at Parenting.com today, you get a more rounded picture of just how it goes here. Busy, loca, cansada. I know: whine, whine, whine. Annoying for the blessed to be so damned whiney.

But, Maria busted me a few days ago. She told me I work too much. It hurt my heart to think she would feel slighted…or maybe she just knows how to stick it to me. Whatever the case, she got to me.

While I don’t plan a blog break or anything like that, I am focusing on working smarter, getting better organized, and eliminating some stuff from my life so that I can spend more quality time with my daughter…or just simply with my culo on the couch with a book instead of a laptop.

Kinda fabulous that it took a 5-year-old to open my eyes.