La Cristina Dice

I am 35, and I've had my first scare with the big scary C word, cancer. My mom was 42 when she was first diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer...

May 2016 My daughter is only 2 and she is building her vocabulary, but already I can tell from her words the life lessons she is learning. ...

A while back I wrote how Words Matter .  I've always believe in the power of words. Maybe that is why I love to read so much.  In high s...

Sometimes you get signs and you don't know what they mean and sometimes it hits you like a ton of bricks and the point is so obvious, th...

My Dearest Catalina, You are growing up so fast! There are so many memories I want to keep, like this morning when you said "I see th...

There was a lot I never thought about before I had a daughter, like "why are the 'boy' easy-ups Thomas the Engine?"  My d...

This is a great loss to the nation & I'm deeply saddened by this. Professor Julian Bond was an adjunct professor at AU. I didn't...

Dear C, You started daycare today, or "school" as we call it.  It was undoubtedly one of many firsts.  You seemed so confused by a...

It was 8:15 at night, two days before Valentine's Day, and I was washing dishes when I realized I should have decorated the house for Va...

We have survived another year. As 2014 comes to an end, we begin to reflect on the last year. We take a snapshot of our lives and we analy...

I’ve spent a limited time on social media this week.   The news of Robin Williams’ suicide has hit me like a ton of bricks.   I didn’t know...

On July 6, 2014 Catalina attended her first bill signing. Illinois House Bill 5755 was sponsored by her auntie Kelly Cassidy . It is a r...

It has been a rough week.   Actually, every week is a rough week when you have a kid.   No one tells you this before you have kids.   But, ...

Last week I made the trip to Springfield to testify on the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) in the State Senate Executive Committee. I was deter...

Below is the Statement I delivered to the Illinois Senate Executive Committee today on the ERA: I’m Cristina Villarreal and I am Preside...