International songstress Thalía has one piece of advice for new moms… Stay calm!
“You can’t be a superhero or super mom” she told Tuesday over lunch at the Sony Music office. “We have more tools to help our kids and to help ourselves, but we really have to be more relaxed. That stress that we always carry, they feel it. They’re like little sponges. Why give them that anxiety?”
Thalía, 42, is mother to Sabrina Sakaë, 6½, and Matthew Alejandro, 3, and is especially tuned in to motherhood, on Tuesday the pop star released her first children’s album, Viva kids, in the U.S.
“I think it’s important if you’re American to have a second language and Spanish is the language to have” she shares. “This album and the DVD will help parents to sit down with their kids and just repeat the words and absorb the language.”
As a Mexican-born artist, Thalía absorbs her second language’s culture for herself and can’t help but notice the negative aspects of American celebrity culture.
“I feel terrible when I see Angelina [Jolie]’s kids on the cover of some magazine and they’re saying, ‘Do you like her dress like this? Does she look good like this?’ Why? That’s just so inappropriate and that’s terrible”, Thalía told People. “When you’re a celebrity, it is the most important thing for us to keep them safe from the camera.”
But despite her exposure to all sides of American culture, she treasures the ability to give her kids an international education at home, through her “very colorful family” with husband Tommy Mottola.
“My husband is American but Italian. Then I have the Mexicano side. I see both in my kids. My daughter is more Italian, she leans towards pizza and my son leans more towards guacamole and puts lime in everything” she shares.
“I speak Spanish to them and I celebrate Halloween, but I also celebrate Dia de los Muertos [Day of the Dead]. So I blend everything. The tooth fairy comes but so does El Ratón.”
Next for Thalía is an “album for grown ups” and a Macy’s fashion line for women, both due to hit stores in February.