Christmas in Cambodia

This Christmas we hosted a big crowd--Grandma Phyllis, Grandpa John, Aunt Liz, and Liz's boyfriend David. Less than 24 hours after they landed in Cambodia, we whisked them off to an unusual Christmas Eve--a Khmer wedding!

Somany's mother, Somany (our housekeeper), Senin (our cook), me, and Natalie (Somany's daughter)

The bride, Somaly (sister of our housekeeper, Somany) works in a copy shop and met the groom, an architect, when he kept coming in to make more copies. The wedding party goes through lots of clothing changes during a Khmer wedding. This was one of the 12 dresses that the bride wore for different parts of her multi-day ceremony. The smart bit is that all of the clothes they wear are rentals.

After the dinner, we all tried our hand at Khmer dancing, and several of us even learned what can only be described as the Khmer version of the Electric Slide. Wedding line dances are universal! Here David and Dad get in to another wedding dance, which was basically shuffling in a big circle with lots of apsara-style hand movements. (And yes, that is a silly inebriated grin on Dad's face. He was having a really good time!)

The next day was Christmas morning, and we opened gifts...

Santa Phyllis and Santa Liz

The surprise hits of Christmas were bike helmets (the kids liked wearing them so much we had to make a new rule--no bike helmets at the dinner table) and that perennial favorite, cardboard boxes.

Nathan proves that the best part of parenthood is having an excuse to play with their toys.

...and made a gingerbread house.
Grandma Phyllis and Ellie start decorating the house...

...and get some help from Ben, David, and Aunt Liz.