Saturday, August 8, 2009

Blessings

In Venezuela, it is traditional for children and even adults to ask their older relatives for a blessing every day or every time they see them or talk to them on the phone. Traditionally, the children would actually kneel to ask the blessing, but nowadays it is more common for them to just fold their arms in front of them. The response from the older adult is "Que Dios te bendiga" (God bless you). We have tried to teach our kids about asking for the blessing, but it's hard when we are not around extended family very much. But while Abuelita was here, she appreciated the kids asking for her blessing every day.

In the days before Abuelita left (she had a really great trip back to Venezuela, btw), she actually wrote out a blessing for each of the kids and even for JD and Miguel and I. She read her blessing to each child and then prayed over them. I'm not sure that they understood everything that she said, but it was a special time with Abuelita and I think that every child appreciates being prayed over. :) Here they are getting ready to start...



When Micah's turn was over, he came over to me
and whispered, "I loved that!"


Gracia had a little trouble concentrating,
but since she spent many nights upstairs sleeping
with Abuelita, I think that they had some
special times together.


Jojo's smile says it all...


Jkaile was super-interested in playing with his castle
when it was his turn, but we got him distracted
with a candy and then he was able to settle down
and listen. :)

And then it was JD's turn!
Oh, JD...
Here they are...finally serious. lol!

4 comments:

Cindy said...

It must be really hard for Delia to
leave her son behind....even though Miguel is the older brother...
I can just imagine she might have been rather emotional about leaving two sons.

Rebecca Conduff Aguirre said...

Cindy, I think it was really hard to for Delia to leave JD, but knowing that he will have a much better life here is huge for her...she has been praying that this will happen for a long time! I imagine that it was also hard to leave the grandkids, that's a biggie for her, too, because she's never really spent that much time with them...but then, neither has my mom, just the life we live...

Unknown said...

how precious!! muy precioso! :) (I think that's right... need some spanish practice!)

Terri :o) said...

JD is quite a character! :)