you must speako de espanish at home

Dear Chicken Nugget,

Your mom and I have been trying to figure out what language to teach you and when.  You see, I grew up in a household that only spoke Spanish.  English was spoken only outside the home.  The result is that I grew up bilingual.  Your mom is fluent in Spanish because she spent a year living in Chile and loved the language. 

So, we decided to speak only Spanish at home.  We started this a few days ago and we've been having a hard time making it stick.   For one thing, we simply forget to switch languages when we come through the door. 

The other, harder part, is that we're surrounded by English.  The labels on food, the magazines we read, the TV we watch are all in English.  It's that much harder to stay in Spanish when your brain is being forced to process the English language. 

She and I can go home to your grandma's place in Brooklyn and speak Spanish all weekend long.  No problem.  But, we're finding it hard to do it here on our own. 

Well, we're setting the expectations early and starting to practice now.  When you're born you should be able to hear both languages and understand what's going on.  And our hope is, you'll grow up bilingual.

We hope this doesn't cause language confusion, even if mom and dad forget and break out into English every now and then.


Te queremos siempre,

Tu papa