Starting My Own Bicultural Holiday Traditions
By Ana Lilian Flores
This is the first time my 2-year-old will actually grasp the meaning of Christmas. Well, maybe not the true meaning of it, but in the last two weeks she´s grown savvy enough to recognize the man she calls ¨Ho, Ho, Ho¨ in any of his commercial reincarnations, as well as anything that looks or smells like the holiday season.
This makes me nervous. Es más — me aterra.
Why, you ask?
Well, because in the 30++ years of my life I have always relied on someone else to create the holiday joy for me. My mom, or a tía, or my suegra would be roasting the turkey, making the stuffing, buying and decorating the humongous Christmas tree, spending money on ornaments and decorations, and the countless other traditions that make me nostalgic for a Christmas “back home.”
Now, the voice inside my head has been saying: “Ana, this time it´s you and only you. Step up to the candy-cane colored plate.”
Thanks to the insane costs of flying over to Mexico or El Salvador to join the family posadas and eat my suegra´s romerito dish, 2009 is the year my family of three will begin its own holiday traditions. At home. In Los Angeles. In my kitchen. With our tiny, but beautiful tree.
I’ve decided that, as much as we´ll miss the family and be completely jealous when we call them on the phone on Noche Buena and hear their rum-induced wishes, I won´t cry or pout. No. I´m going to see this as our golden opportunity to create our very own traditions — con un poquito de aquí y un poquito de allá — which will leave a permanent imprint on my girl’s mind and soul. I was gifted mine, now it’s time for me to gift her her’s.
So, we’re starting with Mr. Ho Ho Ho and moving on to los Reyes Magos, all with an aroma of gingerbread cookies and ponche in the air.
We’ll also:
• go to posadas and smack a piñata or two-maybe next year we´ll even throw our own
• participate in our Heritage Language school´s pastorela as a little pastor
• take a family photo
• try our best at getting Christmas crafty with some garlands for OUR tree
• teach her to sing villancicos
• watch Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer en español
• check out books at the library about the Nativity
• I´m almost scared to write this one: Roast our own turkey a la salvadoreña!
• volunteer our time
I have an ambitious to-do list, I know. But I’m a mamá and everything we do is ambitious. Plus, there’s no way to measure the impact of creating lasting and loving memories for your daughter.
To quote José Feliciano — and now Tito El Bambino, as well: “¡Feliz Navidad!” and may the Christmas spirit be a true reflection of who you are.
Ana Lilian Flores is a truly bicultural and bilingual mamá, who grew up between El Salvador and Houston. She´s been a TV Producer by profession, but now also is a mamá bloguera fortunate enough to have co-created a loving community of parents raising bilingual kids at SpanglishBaby.
Un poquito mas:
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Beautiful, Ana!
Even with my extended family nearby, I, too, remember that moment when I realized it fell to me to create the corazón de navidad in my own home. What an awesome and worthy undertaking. But obviously, you’re up to the challenge. =D
Feliz Navidad!
Marta
Well said, my friend! I’m sure Camila will really appreciate all you’re hoping to do. And, please save me some of that turkey cooked a la salvadoreña – I’m sure it’ll be delicious :)
You can do it Ana!!! I would love to try your pavo!!
Beautiful post, it’s so true, about being a little scare to start your own, it happens to me too every time. But you will have fun and Camilla will remember this beautiful traditions forever.
Abrazos
Completely agree! Great post! It sounds like you will make a beautiful Christmas at home with your family!
Ana, thanks for sharing! What a nice Christmas!
This is the fourth year in a row I have not started our Advent tradition — a new one, as I did not grow up with it. My nena will not grow up as I did, with lots of tias and primos and abuelos eating and dancing and yelling during the holidays, but for sure, it is up to us to create the memories now.
I hope you have a beautiful and memorable holiday, and the beginning of lifelong traditions.
Gracias for contributing your words and heart to the Tiki Tiki.
Completamente de acuerdo! Now it’s up to us and we didn’t really know this up until the moment we have to do it! Good thing we moms are born for this stuff and this is how the tradition in your family will start. How exciting!!! I can see now that I’m not the only one that feels too ambitious! Que bueno, no soy la única. I like your list and it gives me even more ideas for mine, je je je!
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I don’t even have my own kids and I squirted out a tear reading this. hehe
Thanks for all the beautiful and encouraging comments. It feels good to know I´m not alone in my overwhelming mom-ambitions.
Although, to give an update, since I wrote this we got invited to a our friends´ house to spend la Nochebuena. So, no pavo salvadoreño this time..although I have vowed to make it next year-maybe Thanksgiving?
It will be fun to spend it with our friends since she is Mexican-American and he´s from England. They´re both amazing cooks and foodies and he´s in charge of preparing a Mexican-style Navidad feast for the first time! Should be a very fun and bicultural tradition in the making.
Hope you all have a wonderful holiday season. Carrie-thanks for inviting me to share my locuras with the Tiki Tiki friends!
Hello, Ana,
I’m trying to teach a 13-year-old El Salvadoran boy to play guitar. I’d like to use some simple songs that he would already know.
Could you list a few very simple villancicos that are well-known in El Salvador? If you know of a website that has the dots (sheet music) and words, that’d be fantastic, too. I know some villancicos from Spain, but don’t know any from El Salvador. Or maybe they’re the same?
Thanks, Art