My First Blogger Conference- I'm Such A Virgin! Latism '12

For years I have been so jealous of people when they get to go to blogger conferences, especially BlogHer. I long for the day when I too can go to that conference and rub elbows with all the awesome wonderful women bloggers is cyberspace.

Well my dream has come true! Tomorrow I get to join my fellow Hispanic/Latino bloggers here in my very own home city of Houston for Latism '12 and I am so excited!! I know that to you non-bloggers and non-social media savvy people I sound like a total nerd and that's okay. I understand.

If a few years ago you had told me that you were excited about doing the same thing I would have probably thought, "Nerd!" Now that I am not only immersed in blogging but that I understand what impact this is having on communication and marketing I am the nerd.

I'm actually going for two reasons. One is because yes I am a blogger, on here and on skirt! magazine, but also because I work in Hispanic media and marketing. I am also a research nerd and I thrive on knowledge about what makes people, consumers, readers, tick. I want to know how we are going to take our product, our publication to the next level in this great digital shift.

So I'm going tomorrow as a blogger and as a Hispanic marketing specialist. I'm looking forward to learning a lot and meeting a lot of interesting people. Updates to come on Twitter! Follow me @shoegirl1970!

The Invisible Mom

A couple of weeks ago I read a story on the Huffington Post that really struck a nerve. It was "The Mom Stays in the Picture," by Allison Tate. I shared the post on Facebook and I immediately started getting "likes" from friends and honest open comments about how they felt about the topic. It was interesting to read their feedback. In fact Katie Couric even picked up the story on her show because there are so many invisible moms out there who are not documenting their existence.

Me, age 35, and my kiddos in 2005, when they were 1 and 4.

I love this picture of me and the kids. I'm so glad my then husband took it of us. It captures the moment of my motherhood so perfectly. My son in his 1 year old cuteness and my daughter in her 4 year old adorable self.  Even though I love this picture, when I look at it I see how fat I am. I see my double chin and the fatness of my arm. Isn't that sad?

What's even more sad is when I realize that we never took a professional family picture when their dad and I were married. I will never have those years or that opportunity back again. When I look back through pictures I see that there are a lot of gaps when I'm not in the pictures with my kids.

I read some of the comments after Allison's essay and one was so sad. This one woman said she only had one child and that she never took pictures with her because it was just a reminder of how ugly she was. Poor woman, but the saddest part is that many of us feel the same way.

On my Facebook post one of my best friends who lost her mom to cancer when she was 19 said that when they go back and look at pictures they have very few of their mom. Another friend admitted that she stays out of pictures too. We all agreed that this article was a reminder that we shouldn't be doing that.

The truth is that when we are old or gone and our kids are adults they won't care what we looked like when they were little. They won't care if we were too fat or too skinny. All they will care is that they have a picture of their mom, a memory of what we looked like when they were children. We are their mom, we're beautiful in THEIR eyes and really that's all that matters.

Raising Bilingual Kids

In his blog Juan of Words, Juan posed the question: "Is it becoming more acceptable, even more popular maybe, to raise bilingual children in this country?" According to the Hispanic marketing journals and books I've read, the speakers I've heard on the subject, the answer is YES. There is actually a movement called "Reacculturation." Acculturated or Assimilated. Hispanics want to learn Spanish or they want for their children to learn Spanish. I know because I'm one of those Hispanics.

Image borrowed from Greenberg Art.

Twelve years ago I was a young pregnant woman so excited to embark on giving birth to my first child. I would drive around on sales calls listening to classical music hoping that my unborn daughter was listening and that this was somehow making her smarter. (I think it did.)

If you would have asked me back then if I planned on teaching my children Spanish my answer would have been a definite YES, no doubt about it. In fact, I frowned upon Hispanics who did not teach their children Spanish. I grew up fully bilingual and probably learned both languages at the exact same time, so I am a firm believer in raising bilingual children. I speak, read and write Spanish fluently.

Then I had a child. Easier said than done. I made arrangements with this wonderful babysitter who agreed to take care of my baby every day while I went to work. The best thing about her? She spoke Spanish! I was so excited! Yes, I speak Spanish, but my husband didn't speak Spanish so we didn't really speak Spanish together in the home. I figured that by having a sitter speak to her in Spanish all day my daughter would naturally speak Spanish like me. Wrong.

It didn't quite work that way. By the time my daughter really started talking in full sentences (at age 2 for her) they were all in English. I realized that she was speaking in English to the sitter and the sitter was responding in Spanish. That's how it went with them all day long. Then she came home to Mommy and Daddy and all we spoke was English.

Somewhere along the way I read an article that said that children identify with the language spoken by their mother. Well, there went my plan out the window! I had been speaking nothing but English at home, thinking that my children were hearing Spanish all day.

Here I am years later. My daughter is 11 and my son is 8. They do not speak Spanish. But do they understand Spanish? I think so. Somehow they always seem to follow along with the conversation when I'm speaking to someone in Spanish and without even realizing it they follow up with a comment in English afterwards regarding my conversation. I know that if I can just make myself speak to them in Spanish a few days a week they will start speaking Spanish.

I keep telling myself that deep in the back of that smart brain of theirs they remember. They know Spanish. I will keep telling myself that until they do.

Thoughts of Daddy

My dad is 88 and all the funny and eccentric that you would expect from someone who has lived as long as he has. I guess he's earned that right when he's only 12 years from 100.

Picture by Loida Casares

I love this picture I took of him reading his Houston Chronicle, like he has all my life. Next to him on the wall is my son's birth announcement right below some gory pictures of one of my kids coming out of my stomach. I love the way he just has them pinned on the wall for any visitor to admirer. Thanks Daddy!

Picture by Diana Casares

I just sent this picture to my cousin recently. I knew he would love it. Even though you can't see all of my father's face it captures his mannerisms so well. This is my dad telling a story, with his hands out. I totally get my talking with my hands from him. He is so animated when he's telling a story, one of the reasons we have always loved hearing him. And I love the look on my cousin Oscar's face and how he's smiling at my dad, so obviously loving whatever he is hearing and just being with my dad and being able to enjoy still having him with us.

My dad turned 88 in March. We just went to our family reunion around 3 weeks ago. (That's where the picture above was taken.) We hadn't had one in over 30 years and he didn't get to go to the last one, when several of his brothers were alive. This reunion was especially special because my dad was there and he was the only original child of my grandfather and grandmother who could make it. I have one uncle left, but he's 93 and in a nursing home in California.

Yesterday my dad woke up feeling short of breath and like something was sitting on his chest. My sister took him to the hospital. They admitted him and decided to keep him overnight because his heart was accelerated. I went by to see him last night and my sister went to pick him up today. Instead she called to tell me that they couldn't get his heart regulated so they are keeping him another day.

Yes, I"m scared. He's 88, he already has a pacemaker, and if his heart is accelerated that isn't good. It shouldn't be doing that. All I can do is try to be positive, hope for the best, and appreciate the time I have with him.

A Weekend of Reflection

This was a very significant weekend for me. It was a turning point in so many areas, but mainly in the area of making my own decisions and moving on with my life post-divorce.

Sometimes it's scary making decisions that you know others won't agree with. Sometimes it's scary speaking up and telling others that you don't agree with their idea of how you should live your life. It's also scary letting others into your personal space.  I know this and more. It's all part of moving on with my life and getting it back in order.

As many of you know I'm not going to BS you, most of the time :), and I'm pretty much an open book. I am very open about my hatred for cleaning and housework. Well, this week I completed my goal of getting all main rooms clean. I have even kept them clean for one whole week. I see this as my post-divorce clean-up. Yes, 9 months later, but a clean-up none-the-less.

Now it's time to start on the biggest post-divorce project of all- my bedroom. I'm calling it "Project Mayhem." I know the definition of mayhem is "Infliction of violent injury on a person or thing; wanton destruction." Well that's what has happened to my bedroom since my divorce. It has become the dumping ground for everything in the house. It has been violently destroyed over the past year and it's not a place of refuge or escape. I feel like I am restoring my bedroom and nursing it back from mayhem.

So this week I move on to the second part of my project and my strategy of taking on this housework piecemeal. I need to do it this way so that I won't lose my mind and become overwhelmed. It's the only way that I can do housework.

Baby steps!