Today we celebrate Christmas in a country that doesn’t have Christmas. For unbelieving Cambodians this is just a normal work day…they don’t know about the JOY Christ brought to the world. They have no reason to celebrate.

 Since there are a lot of expats in the city, many restaurants and stores have some decorations for Christmas. It’s a good way to make money and nice for the expats. But Christmas to the unbelieving Cambodian is what we call the “commercialism” part of the season.

Last Saturday we joined our helper (Yayyi) for her church’s special Christmas program. She really wanted us to come and see her 18 year-old son dance (think choreography with a traditional Khmer flavor). The program started at 8AM and lasted 2.5 hours. It was a mixture of Scripture recitation and worship dance. The pastor spoke and they showed an edited version of the Jesus movie in Khmer. (Isaiah cried during the crucifixion.)

Today we’re planning to deliver Christmas cookies to some of our neighbors and some businesses we frequent (copy shop, seamstress, hardware store, and rice shop). Please pray with us that we can continue to build relationships with these people and show them God’s love.

Becca was delighted to have snow in Cambodia.

Cambodia might not celebrate Christmas, but International Human Rights Day is a national holiday. Not wanting to be left out, we ate humans for dinner.  (We had leftover bacon from a special breakfast Josh prepared the weekend before.)

This past week, Josh and I celebrated the 8-year anniversary of our first date. So thankful to be dating for life. We split a meal and dessert at a nice little place not too far from our home (called The Shop Too). It’s always nice to take a little vacation in the midst of the pressure of language learning.

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We’ve been busy celebrating Advent. So thankful for the tree we were able to buy with money from one of our supporting churches. The kids were so excited to decorate the tree. Before we moved to Cambodia, Becca cried because she didn’t think we could have a Christmas tree in Cambodia. Thankful the Lord provided both the money as well as stores that cater to expats who celebrate the holiday.

Smiles celebrates her 8-month birthday today. She continues to be a bundle full of joy, giggles, smiles, and mischief. She is a wonderful distraction in the midst of language study! Anna Grace loves army crawling all over the place and is up on her knees quite a bit, though she is not actually crawling on her knees yet. She hasn’t started eating solids, but she loves sitting at the table with us during meals.

In our home we’ve celebrated the changing from autumn to winter. We might still be sweating, but we have “snow.” The kids were really excited to make snowflakes. (The man in the picture below is Yayyi’s husband. Our kids love to visit with Dta when he comes to pick up Yayyi.)

Thanksgiving Day we had a family birthday party for Becca. She made panda and lion cupcakes and we had her favorite meal for dinner: stir-fry pumpkin (so we actually ate pumpkin on Thanksgiving Day.

One of Becca’s gifts was five dolls I played with when I was her age. She was thrilled to get them.  (Saturday she made them all passports.) Becca didn’t want Isaiah to feel left out, so she made him a book. He was thrilled with it and listened intently as I read the story to them. He then wanted to read it to me several times. Becca’s last birthday treat was staying up as late as she wanted (she stayed up until we went to bed).

The Friday after Thanksgiving we gathered with our EMU team members to celebrate Thanksgiving. It was a full traditional meal, including turkey, dressing, potatoes, pumpkin pie, etc.

After we ate, we gathered for a Thanksgiving service including Scripture, singing, short homilies by each head of household, and thanksgiving to God from each person. It was a joy to be able to celebrate God’s goodness with our family in Cambodia.

Saturday we had some friends over for lunch. We met Mary on my first visit to Cambodia when we were all stuck in Shanghai together. Mary was on her way to visit her daughter’s (Elizabeth Trotter) family.  The Trotter’s blog was a great help in preparing us to transition to Cambodia. Elizabeth visited with me our first week in our home. It was good to see Mary again and to fellowship with their family. (Mary brought us an Advent book that I’m very excited about. Wasn’t sure how to get it here in time for this Advent season – thank you Mary!!)