This Christmas was a special one for us - each time we celebrated! The Christmas season began with Hyatt's work party, then we celebrated it just the three of us on the 15th, followed by The Gang on the 16th, the "real" one with the Moore family on the 25th, and lastly a get together with my parents on the 27th. Actually, I'd like to think that we're still celebrating as we're over here in the States and Canada visiting with friends and family. One of the things that we are going to remember this Christmas the most for, however, is the fact that this was the miracle Christmas that my passport arrived just in time. For those of you who haven't already heard the story (which is probably very few of you, as I think the whole rest of the world was praying along with us), allow me to fill you in...
March 2008 has been one of the key days in my mind for the last few years, because I have always wondered how I was going to get my passport renewed before it expired when I tend to need it fairly often. This past summer I filled out my renewal application, but had a question about what form to fill out, as our situation was rather unique. As I have my US Green Card and an American mailing address, I could qualify as a Canadian living in the US, but my physical location was Japan, so I could fit in the Canadian Living Abroad category as well. After asking around last summer, I just went ahead and picked one and figured that even if it wasn't the right one, that the situation was special enough to warrant extra grace with a new passport regardless of whether I had submitted the form they needed. This long story is becoming longer than it needs to be, but let me just say that we ended up waiting at the last minute hoping that my passport would arrive in time for me to go back to California for Christmas. The passport actually arrived in Japan the afternoon before we were to fly out. It was a new kind of faith for me to be packing my bags and readying to be away from our house for 2 and a half months, not even knowing if we were going to leave the next day. So, the end of the story is that it did arrive, but God is definitely a just in time God.
Hyatt and I were very thankful for Kaiya this Christmas - somehow she made everything more festive and fun as we got to see everything through her eyes and cheer her on as she tore the wrapping paper on her gifts. Now I will share a few pictures from our Christmas celebrations... (the family photo at the top and the one of Kaiya were taken by Hyatt's sister, Acacia, when we were in California - she's an incredible photographer... www.acaciaphotos.com)
