BOCA BETH: One Song at a Time

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

When your baby boy hits 15 it kind of hits YOU that you are not getting any younger (despite what those hair color commercials say!!!).  I feel so dated, I feel so much older, and I feel so ready to go to sleep before 9 pm nightly now that my ‘baby boy’ is of driving age and the odd number of 15.  (I have always had this aversion to odd number birthdays.  Be them for myself or for my family………….the odd birthdays always SOUND soooooooo much older than the even ones, don’t you agree?)

So, my 9th grader and now 15-year-old keeps reminding me “Speak in Spanish Mommy.”  (Man, don’t you love the kid who still slips in a “mommy” every now and then and will kiss you in the car rider line (even if it was by accident!!!).)

I tried putting up PostIt notes around the house saying “Speak Spanish” and “Habla Español” with very little success rate.  I stink at remembering to bring Spanish into our daily lives even though I AM Boca Beth, even though I DO this for a living, even though I KNOW it’s best for my three children that I speak both languages.  It’s just plain, hard work!  Now I understand and empathize with my Latina friends with an English speaking husband who embarassingly admit to me that they default to English at home.

Tell me - please amigas/amigos/friends - how do you do it?  How do you make sure to keep both English and Spanish going at your home?  I would love some tips, some tried and true success stories on making the Spanish cool enough to speak daily and the English easy enough to learn.

Happy Educating!  ¡Sea feliz educando!

Boca Beth