Happy New Year

In Brazil, at least, this New Year's Day is celebrated as International Day of Fellowship. So, people get together or call their friends most of the day. Our telephone was quite busy, from morning til night. In addition, we had a slightly modified traditional southern New Year's Day lunch. The traditional part was black-eyed peas (not a great hit - I think I was the only fan), cornbread, green beans and baked ham. I added in rice pilaf and barbequed ribs, in addition to lots of fruit and fresh juices. You will see a pitcher of watermelon juice that I made just before lunch. That was so good!
Our lack of sleep didn't seem to keep us from eating. I was glad to be able to eat again, after last week's prolonged semi-fast. There were seven of us, which is a good number for conversation and to fit comfortably around the table. After lunch we enjoyed a couple of rounds of UNO and I loved that, of course. Lots of talk and lots of laughter and lots of fun. It's quite a handsome group, as you can see. Just so you know who we are, if you look at the picture on the right and start with João and follow it around clockwise, you will see Juliana and Elio (our youth minister and wife), Sissy (her boyfriend couldn't make it), Elly and Bernardo (her boyfriend). We are all perky, as it was before we started eating! After the meal we ate chocolates, chocolate-chocolate chip cookies and expresso coffee with whipped cream. Ah... the good life! They say whatever you do on the first day of the year, you will continue doing the rest of the year. I think that means I'll eat lots of good food and have lots of fun.