Ruth Estrada's Obituary
Ruth Mercedes Estrada died after a brief illness on Dec 14th, 2021 at the age of 100 and 11 months. She will be dearly missed.
She was born in Ecuador, South America on Jan 6th, 1921, to Sotero Oquendo and Mercedes Bazante, both deceased. Her two brothers and one sister are also deceased.
She was married for 68 years to Dr. Gilberto Estrada Espinoza who preceded her in death in Aug 2013. “Mechita”, as she was lovingly known, is survived by her six children: Myriam (Lee), Xavier (Rogers), Cecilia (Garey), Juan (Rebecca), Antonio (Norma) and Marcelo (Carina); nine grandchildren: William (Jessie), Eric, Christopher (Amanda), Robert, Stephanie, Michael, Jonathan, Isabel and Alejandro; six great grandchildren: Jae Marie, Aubrey, Nellie, Quinn, Abigail and Hailey.
In 1982, Ruth and Gilberto relocated to the US to be near their children who had emigrated earlier. They loved their “new adopted country” and later became US citizens.
Mechita enjoyed travelling to several countries. Highlights included two trips to the Vatican, meeting Pope John Paul II and visiting relatives overseas. Here, at home, she loved spending time with her entire growing family and delighted entertaining them as well as friends with her “special recipes”. Her main hobby was gardening and spent countless hours taking care of her plants and flowers.
A devout catholic, she was a member of Sacred Heart Church in Bowie, Md. She served God first followed by her extraordinary love and dedication to her family. She instilled in her children faith, confidence and the belief that they could achieve whatever they wanted and fulfill their dreams. She, along with her husband, provided their children with an upbringing full of love, kindness, compassion, wisdom, good example and unwavering faith. The family finds comfort not only in the length of her life, but how she lived it. She was the peacemaker with a heart of gold and an unmatched soul who gave love endlessly to all her family and friends. The greatest comfort now is knowing that she is, once again, at her husband’s side in heaven.
Due to the pandemic, we have made the difficult, but prudent decision to keep the funeral services and burial private and limited to the family. A memorial service will be considered at a later date.
Those wishing to honor her memory may make donations to:
Arthritis foundation
curearthritis.org
Give Kids the World Charity
gktw.org
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