Bible verses and stories about adoption that have touched me.

Well, we are almost packed … we got 2 carry-on!

We are very excited to go tomorrow and as we do, I just wanted to share with you some of the scriptures I am been looking at, that speaks directly about the orphans.

Jesus said many things that implied He will honor the good deeds His followers would perform towards people in need. While we were in Brazil this February, I got confronted with Jesus words: “… once I was a stranger and you received me …Lord, when were you a stranger?”

Of course, there is the even more direct statement (for some of us who have a harder time to see the calling on the one above):
" ...whoever welcomes in my name one child such as this, welcomes me." Jesus (as found in Matthew 18 v.5)

I found these portions of the Psalms to be very insightful towards the orphan and the barren women:

Psalm 113: 7 - 9: This Psalm is a promise to me:
He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap;
He seats them with princes, with the princes of their people.
He settles the barren woman in her home as a happy mother of children.
Praise the LORD! David -

"God sets the lonely in families..." Psalm 68:6a

Psalm 27:10 Though my father and mother forsake me, the LORD will receive me.

Psalm 68:5 A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling.

Psalm 82:3 Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless; maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed.

Interesting Old Testaments commandments and truths related to orphans and widows:

DEU 10:18 He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow,

Deu 26:12 When you have finished setting aside a tenth of all your produce in the third year, the year of the tithe, you shall give it to the Levite, the alien, the fatherless and the widow, so that they may eat in your towns and be satisfied.

13 Then say to the LORD your God: "I have removed from my house the sacred portion and have given it to the Levite, the alien, the fatherless and the widow, according to all you commanded. I have not turned aside from your commands nor have I forgotten any of them.

27:19 "Cursed is the man who withholds justice from the alien, the fatherless or the widow." Then all the people shall say, "Amen!"

Jer. 49:11 “Leave your orphans; I will protect their lives. Your widows too can trust in me."

And finally, in the New Testament we find a very direct definition:

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this:

• to look after orphans and widows in their distress and
• to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. "
  James 1:27

God saved the life of Moses using an adoptive mother, Pharaoh’s daughter – not just an adoption story but a trans-racial adoption story.

The most moving one to me is the story of Jesus in the cross and John and His mother Mary crying at the foot of the cross asking (I imagine) why? Why do you have to die?, why so much pain? ...
Jesus did not answer their questions – He just looked at them and said “son here is your mother, mother here is your son” and the Bible says that from that day forward, John took Mary to his house as his own mother.

What a beautiful adoption story!!
As I visited last February with older orphans in Brazil I realized that the kids are also looking for parents to adopt.

I have learned that, even today, the best place to meet your adopted son or daughter, your adopted mother or father, is definitely at the foot of the cross: I have been there, asking about my pain … He did not answer my questions "my way" but instead, He asked me to look next to me … also with lots of pain and hurts, the little ones that are missing a mom and a dad …

The world is hurting … I was awaken one night by the Lord with a new song in my lips and it was an eye opener for me .... “if I am sited in Heavenly places with you I should see the world the way you do, I should see a world in pain and suffering, I should feel the urge to bring them Hope “

The Hope of His resurrection!

It is official! we are leaving for Moscow on the 21st. of April.

“Many things can wait: the child cannot. Now is the time his bones are being formed, his mind is being developed. To him, we cannot say tomorrow: his name is today.” Gabriela Mistral

We were waiting for the "official" appointment in Moscow. We just got confirmation that we will meet the MOE on April 27th. We will also meet the children that day. We will travel to Moscow via Milan on Friday the 21st of April.

I got to get organized!!!

I am so excited!!!!!

What does an American look like?

A tribute to my sister Debora who became a US citizen today!

The USA is a great country!! And Debora is a wonderful girl!! Congratulations Debora.

Love you puchis!

Well, I remember this one day before elections, I was at the office and the guys were talking about not even getting registered to vote! These very bright software engineers were complaining about the country situation and .. the story of, well, our votes really do not count and … they were Not even going to register to vote!

I could not ignore it anymore, so I got up and said, “You know what, I became a USA Citizen by choice, I used to be a Permanent resident and now I am an American Citizen; you know what changed the day I became an American citizen? That now I have the right/privilege and the responsibility to vote! And I don’t take that lightly!" I am proud to be an American.

It just happened to be the year our Florida votes were counted … how many times?

Debora, we live in a great country but it takes all of us to do our part. A great country is made up of a bunch of great people following the great principles established by our founding fathers. Make us proud.

p.s. I am already so proud of you!!

It takes a Farm!

Brian and I are waiting anxiously for our appointment date with the Ministry of Education. We don’t have it for sure yet, and I was hoping to write this blog with the great news, but we are still waiting … We pray we’ll know tomorrow for sure. In the mean time let us talked about a more mundane subject.



Brian and I decided to start another blog; It is called “It takes a Farm”
An honest review of Miami Area Restaurants and other cooking chronicles. We have not started quite yet thought. Brian is a great restaurant critic and friends and family are always asking him for a good suggestion/recommendation. He thought of the name as we were at an Argentinean grocery store shopping for some meat. Can you envision the moment? It really takes a farm to cook stuff and somehow we forget that meat comes from animals. I think that Brian was thinking more of how food really shows how diverse we are as humans but at the same time no matter how different we are all of our diversity lives within the same one “farm”.

When we were dating we would talked about the foods we ate back in our countries and it sounded pretty much the same; once we got married, we realized we bought ate rice but we cooked it differently!

If you look at our profile, you’ll see that most of our hobby interest revolve around food: Cooking, Going to ethnic restaurants, entertaining friends, reading gourmet magazines and books, watching cooking shows, walking to the restaurants in Lincoln Road, chocolate (Brian) and Coffee (Rebeca).

Food is fun for us but it really relates to much more than to our stomachs; I could tell you stories of how food taught me about compromise in our marriage; made us aware of new ways and new cultures, helped us to exercise God’s gift of Hospitality and service, etc, etc, etc.

So, I will share with you one story about how food has taught us a lesson on compromising in marriage: yes, there is the common story of “we don’t know where to go for dinner and then one of us decides to yield to the other’s desires”; but this particular incident was different: it occurred on the first year of our marriage. We were lying in bed together and Brian was reading a brand new cook book, so, every time he would find a recipe that sounded good to him, he would read it to me as if he was reading a poem – I am not kidding!! So, I was getting kind of bored, but then, I got this great idea: I turned over in bed and said “Darling, why don’t you give me a foot massage as you read the book?” it worked great!!! I got a long foot massage and he got to read to me the best recipes from the book.

My father in law is the best cook I know. He lived in Brazil for more than 35 years and he mastered the Brazilian national dish: Feijoada. It is delicious. Brian is a good cook but Dick’s Feijoada does not have a rival! Feijoada is a dish made out of black beans and pork – everything from the pig! (it takes a pig J) and it is served with garlic rice, sauté Kale, farinna and Orange Slices.

If you come to visit us to Miami, we will take you to a Churrasqueria – How many of you, our blog friends have experience the Brazilean Rodizio? It is a very different way of eating. No vegetarians allowed. Some of the Churrasquerias in Brazil could serve 20 different types of meats!

Introducing Lola

Lola is our four-year-old Maltese. She is not 28 years old in people years, she is just 4.

Lola understands English, Spanish and Portuguese and she communicates with different voice sounds, kisses/licks, head movements, back steps, and of course with her tail.

She is a blessing to us; one of the biggest lessons we have learned from Lola is well said by my eblogger friends Jen and Caroline: “think like a dog thinks and life will be great. Or in other words- as long as my basic needs are met I need to be very flexible with my expectations. That is a good lesson.”

Let me tell you an amazing story: One day I was talking to my mother while Lola was in the room, Mom just asked me for my opinion on certain subject and I got very passionate about it so , you know, I have the tendency to raise my voice when I feel strong on a subject, is just the Colombian/Italian/middle eastern in me. So I look at the stairs and I see Lola with the saddest face!!!

I went over and talked to her and nothing would make her change; she did not want anything to do with me, no kisses, no tail, not even eye contact and she kept looking towards my mom. Suddenly I realized, I have raised my voice talking to my mother… “maybe Lola thinks we are fighting!”

I went over to mom, and explained to Lola that mom and I were not fighting and then I gave mom a big kiss; can you believe that she changed immediately? She came over and licked my mom to pieces. My mom literally cried, so did I. Mom said, “Lola really cares for me”.


Of course there are the times when Lola does not get simple stuff, it is kind of funny, like “sit”.

I have some friends (who am I kidding?) most of my friends think I am crazy because of how I interact with my Lola, but once they spend some time with her, they start understanding my craziness have some reason to it.

Well, getting back to our “think like a dog thinks”subject, let me tell you some more about our little baby Lola: Lola has her own bathroom in our house, yes, she does.

The whole bathroom is hers. When is time for me to clean it, she follows me to her place, checks everything I do and when I am finish, she does this little walk/jump of excitement. Last week, a friend was staying with us, and one morning she decided to use Lola’s bathroom to dry her hair. When I came home, my friend said that Lola stayed at the door looking persistently at her and "no tail" movement. I think my friend was actually scared of my 7-pound Lola!! Nothing to worry about, Lola was probably trying to figure out what was going on, after all, she is expecting for someone to clean up her mess!!

She is very obedient, but if we leave her alone for too long (1 whole day with no aunties or grandma’s visit) when we come home, we’ll find little “gifts” in strategic places. Is like: she goes and holds it and goes and holds it and goes!!
As we approach the house on any of these memorable occasions, she will have this special “complaining”voice … right away we know what to expect! Well, that behavior does not seem to go well with the conclusion above of “think like a dog thinks and life will be great … as long as my basic needs are met I need to be very flexible with my expectations” I guess Lola’s luxuries have become basic needs for her!!

AndI think that’s what happen to us sometimes. We forget how blessed we are, how much love is poured into our lives by family and friends, how much care we get from them … and then that one time, things go different because … “life happens” and we forget to be flexible so, we: 1. complain and 2. make it into a relationship problem.

The other thing I have learned with Lola is to be forgiving and loyal; no matter how upset she is, once she sees us get home, she gets sooooo happy! We open the door and she licks us, move her tail … I think she just instantly forgives our "offenses"; and, you can tell that she actually feels sorry for leaving her “gifts” all over the house.

Thank you to our new friend Caroline

I actually was at my husbands office that one day … very tired, frustrated, disappointed and very confused.

We tried to adopt an 8 year old boy, Bryan, from Brazil and it did not work out. It is hard to explain how going through so much pain for us and for the 8 year old boy could be part of God’s plan but .. we have no doubts … we don’t understand it all but we know God’s hands were there. We love Bryan dearly but we know we are not his parents. We got to learn on our trip that God is really the father to the Fatherless.

Anyways, we had been back for almost a month, we were re assessing our decision to adopt and … you know what? I think I got to see Caroline’s post on the week of my birthday!!! Now that I think about it … yeah, I just checked .. it was on Friday March 3, and my 40th birthday was that Tuesday February 28th.

So, Brian and I were ready to sign papers for adopting in Hungary and we were supposed to send a good chunk of money that next Monday but I was not feeling peace at all. We were even taking MAPP class … (I know, can you see how confused I was), MAPP is the required training for the willing to foster-to-adopt domestically. We wanted to make sure to investigate all the possible adoption routes.

In my devotional one day that week, I felt that God was asking me to look back at the beginning, when we started this process and not just ask Him for what I thought could be possible, logical, easier, etc but to ask for what I really wanted the time He first talked to us about adopting. So I remembered, we wanted a 2 year old boy from Russia and then I would love a girl form China. I now understand that asking that way you really are asking out of faith.

So, that Friday, I was on the internet, since someone asked us to help this summer to start a hosting program in Miami, yes, we even thought of hosting to adopt!! and that person pointed us to go to this one Yahoo Group called “2HostKids” and there I found Caroline’s post and her blog !!…I just kept remembering that day that God had asked me to go back to my original desire; I started reading and became more and more interested in her story on adopting a boy from Russia … I could feel her excitement and it was very contagious. ..so, I kept reading and reading and found out the agency she was using: Lighthouse, I sent an email to the agency right away and the director, Lorien who is very efficient, answered my email back right away.

Thank you to our new friend Caroline! She really helped us in a big and unique way!

Remembering our Brazilian “nieces” and “nephews”

I just wanted to add some thoughts of our February experience which I had written on our last blog. As many of you know, we were in the process of adopting an 8 year old boy in Brazil and it did not work out at the end.

We had some great experiences in Brazil at a very special orphanage last February. We spent around a month visiting with the kids and the director. We celebrated 3 birthdays there. There were 24 kids total on this orphanage. This is a special needs orphanage because it houses siblings and children with disabilities. I love that place!

I fell in love with the kids so quickly, and I wanted to take at least 10 of them home. I could not find a good reason why not to …. Except that most of them are not quite paper ready. That is the sad truth of most of the orphanages, the kids age there while waiting for either parents to give up their rights or the government to finish their paperwork

The top shows the pictures of some of my friends – my forever “nieces” and “nephews”

I had so much fun holding them on my lap and playing with them – one of the social workers told me how sad to see how much in need these kids were for a mother’s type of affection, love and care …. And it made me think …. I realized I was starving for the love of a child to call my son or daughter also.

Do you know who these are? The director asked as we were at the gate of the orphanage, “these are “Tio” Brian and “Tia” Rebeca!”

We were able to meet all the 24 kids!!! While my husband Brian went on playing soccer with a group of boys, the rest of the kids just kind of surrounded me, came by to say hi, specially 2 girls (Jasmin and Beatriz) and a little boy (Gabriel), they just got a hold of me. I just sat at a bench and the three of them sat next to me, Gabriel (4) got on my lap, Beatriz (6) and Jasmin (7) sat next to me each in one side and hold my hands.
Beatriz and Gabriel are siblings and they have two more sibling in the orphanage. Jasmin is the sister to Ivan(9) and Aletea, a very cute 13 year old.

Do I have to say it? Or did you figure it out by now? Yes, I wanted to take them all!!
My Brazilian friends will never be forgotten!!! I cannot wait for our next Missions trip to Brazil and see them all again!!!

The director of this orphanage is a great human being! Brian gave her a copy of “the purpose Driven Life” devotional book as a gift.

We love her dearly - she quickly became our friend. She is honest, loving, so hard working and has such a big heart!!! Still, a type “A” personality – yes, the character combination does exist! And she is a living proof of it :)

We are already gathering gifts and donations for our next trip – We bought some school supplies and got some blankets also. Brian’s parents are going there in 14 days and we might be able to send some of these with them.