My day in Santa Cruz

I had one of the rare days that feels like a holiday, but isn't! Today, on our day off, we were invited out to a church member's country home (about 60 km from our house). It turned out to be one of those bright, perfectly blue sky, hot summer days that only Brazil can produce. After a week of rain, we were glad to see a little sunshine. And in our little car that scoots down the road and has freezing cold air conditioning, with a great stereo system, we had a nice little trip!
Our lunch was something right out of a magazine. Our hostess made one of my most favourite brazilian dishes (now hang on to your hat, because it sounds nasty to your ears, but it is wonderful): pumpkin with salted beef (like beef jerky that's been re-hydrated)! She cooked it in a beautiful pumpkin and it was accompanied with stroganoff and a couple of wonderful desserts!
It was, however, so very hot as the day went on, despite the scalding sun, I jumped into the pool. I am always hesitant to do so even with high factor sun screen because of my sickeningly white skin. But since it was well over 100 degrees I gave in. I had a great time and didn't burn. Hip, hip, hooray for sunscreen.
We had a great visit. The funniest part of the day was their poodle bouncing a beach ball off of his nose into the water. I laughed so much. I just had to share the moment with you all. If you click on the arrow in the screen below, you should be able to view the small video I took with my camera. Then you can laugh together with us. Hope this adds a little sunshine to a dreary day.
Cheers!