We Have a House!!!

We have a house!!! We are so very thankful. Thank you all for praying with us in this. Steve and our business manager were able to meet with the owner on Saturday morning, and the meeting went great. We will be able to move in on schedule (barring any delays in the "fixing up") in February. It has been a long 3 months of searching, and we are ecstatic to have a home to move into now.
Steve is on his way home now and hopes to arrive by 10 pm. Please pray for safety as he travels and also that he would start feeling better as he is currently having some stomach trouble (par for the course when you travel here and sometimes end up eating at less-than-sanitary places). Tomorrow morning (the 31st), we will leave to spend New Years a couple hours from here with some friends. We hope you all have a wonderful New Years! You enjoy your chilly evening by the fireplace, and we will enjoy our lounging outside on a pleasant tropical evening under the coconut trees! :)
Praise Him with us for our new home!

House Update

Just talked to Steve on the phone. Thank you to all of you who prayed at 6 am CST, and please keep praying. The owner has not yet arrived in Bicol; he is currently enroute. However, they were able to talk to him on the phone at the appointment time, and the phone call went very well. He is very interested in meeting with us which is a great sign; Filipinos are non-confrontational so if he wasn't interested, he would rather avoid meeting than have to say it in person. Steve is very encouraged that it looks like it will work out. That being said, he now has to wait another day so he can meet with the owner tomorrow morning at 9 am (that is 7 pm CST on Friday evening). He hopes to be able to leave Iriga, Bicol by noon which puts him home late tomorrow night, probably after 10 pm. Did I mention we leave the following morning to spend New Years with some friends a few hours away? Never a dull moment around here... :) Thanks again for continuing to pray with us that this house would come through. We know if it doesn't, it is because He has another plan, but it would sure make life less stressful if this one were the one. I am sure you understand.

Hagen Family Christmas

Ok, I admit that the next few posts are mainly for the grandparents and other equally-interested parties. So all of you out there who don't have the time to read about the Hagen family Christmas traditions, please feel complete freedom (free of guilt :) ) to skip this post (but if you have not see the post I did about Mikayla and my trip recently, you should definitely check it out - located after the Christmas ones). Also, if you opt to skip this post, be sure to check back with us in a few days for a new one; I try to update fairly often. A few years ago we started the tradition of sleeping "under the Christmas tree" (translation: in the living room) every Christmas eve as a family. We set up the mattresses, the kids get to open 1 present (new pajamas) and watch a Christmassy movie while eating popcorn and drinking hot cocoa. Family fun for everyone! :)
When the kids wake up the next morning (they made it to almost 7 am this year!), they open up their stockings that are stuffed with little toys, treats (like grapes - treats change once you get overseas) and a little candy too.
After the stockings, we do living room clean up and get dressed then have coffee cake for breakfast. Then Steve tells the Christmas story (this year Ben did somersaults during most of it) and we talk about the real meaning of Christmas.

Then it is time for presents! We have tried year after year to keep the number of presents "reasonable", and I think we finally pulled it off this year (being so far away I think helps with this). Here's a pic of the kids with their loot.
After opening presents as a family (this year it culminated with a treasure hunt for the kids to find their big presents from us - see the following posts for what those were), we do Christmas on skype with video with grandparents in the States. Then we just enjoy family time the rest of the day, including a dinner and an all-important nap. Oh - and we answer the door a LOT. Caroling here takes on a whole new meaning - people come to your door all day long, some singing, some just saying that they are "Christmassing" (in Tagalog of course). You have to go give them money or food or they will stay there all day calling out. So our front door gets quite the work out all day as well.Well, there you have more than you probably wanted to know about our Christmas. Do you have any family Christmas traditions you can share with us?
Hope you all had a very Merry Christmas!

Our new house

Unfortunately, I am not talking about our new home in Bicol (though we do appreciate your prayers about that this week as Steve is down there right now attempting to meet with the owner of the home we would like to rent). I am talking about the new doll house Steve and I made for Mikayla for Christmas. I am sure most of you couldn't care less (fair enough) but some of you asked to see pics. I had trouble loading this one with the next post (where you will find some more if you want to see them) so here it is.

Our Christmas

Steve and I worked together in our free evenings for the last 2 months to make Mikayla a doll house for her Polly Pockets (a little kind of doll for all of you who don't have a little girl :) ). Mikayla absolutely loved it, and we had a blast making it.She even got 2 Polly cars for Christmas - one from the Raush family in Kansas and one from our coworkers here. She was thrilled.
The boys got matching "twist cars". You just twist the steering wheel back and forth and the car moves. The 2 have been having a blast racing around our house and have had only a few collisions in the process.
The kids got these foam disc guns from my (Jen's) parents, and they have been chasing each other around the house with them ever since. Ben didn't quite have them figured out at first though - he kept shooting himself in the face.
After all the present fun, we sat down to a family dinner of grilled salmon and twice-baked potatoes and salad and more. It was a great family day.
We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas as well, celebrating our Savior's birth with loved ones.

Our trip

I had a few extra pics that I couldn't fit on the next 2 posts. This first one is a great shot of the 2 cousins enjoying some time together under the fountains. For more pics of our time with them and how it went, check out the next post. Aren't they adorable? This one is of us at the top of a tower shaped like the CN tower (tall and skinny with a ball at the top) that overlooks the awesome twin towers. For more pics of these amazing towers, check out the pics in the post after the next one.
Hope you all had a great Christmas celebrating our Savior's birth with loved ones. Ours was a quiet time at home with "just us". We were very much in need of some down time as a family after all the recent craziness. I will try to get some pics up of our time soon. Love you all!

Fun with the cousins

It had been more than 18 months since we had seen my sister and her family so their 2-year-old did not remember us, and we had never met their baby. But we all had a great time together. We went swimming...Look at her jump!
and played at the playground...
and tried to duck through the fountains by the towers (see the next post for pics of the amazing towers)
and read LOTS of stories - actually, just the same stories repeatedly...

and made a cool gingerbread house...
and worked hard too.
Mikayla was such a massive help; I was so very glad that she came with me. She worked her little tail off - doing dishes, switching laundry, changing diapers, dressing and bathing her cousins, and more! I think my sis and her husband are now considering adopting a 6-year-old... :)

We had a great time as mother and daughter on our trip. I am so proud of our little girl - who's not so little anymore.

The Towers

We got to see some amazing towers on our trip to visit my sister. They are the tallest twin towers in the world, and they are connected by a "sky bridge". They were gorgeous. There is a great mall at the bottom of the towers where we spent some time at Starbucks. :)

The first time we saw them was at night, and they were lit up beautifully. Who needs Christmas lights when you have these towers?My brother took this picture below while lying in a ditch looking up at us! That was right by all the guys selling watches - just one watch per guy and no box or price tag. Makes you more than a little suspicious... And makes you want to watch your stuff around them!
One day we got to go up to visit the sky bridge. It was a great experience and had a gorgeous view of their amazing city. I am not a city person, but if I had to choose a city to live in... the puddles after it rained had CLEAR water in them! I guess you would have to live in a dirty (regular) city to understand the significance of that. And it was so colorful. And no traffic (at least not in comparison to Manila!) It was a great city. The pic below shows the girls enjoying the view from the sky bridge.

We're back!

Just wanted to let you all know that Mikayla and I arrived home safely last night. The trip was tiring but pretty uneventful - except for when we almost ended up going to Jakarta by accident! It was almost time to board, and Kayla needed to run into the bathroom for a sec so we hurried there. When we got back, we had obviously missed an announcement, and there was a group lined up at our gate so we joined the line, showed our passes, and went through. As we were walking across the runway to our plane (things work a little differently in the 3rd world), I became suspicious because no one we were with seemed to be Filipino, and we were going to the Philippines. I started asking around and discovered it was the plane to Jakarta, Indonesia, NOT the one to the Philippines after all! It could have been bad because the plane is "free seating" so there would have been no one to fight with me about a seat assignment and no way to know we were on the wrong plane! Anyway, we headed back to the terminal - only to discover we were now locked out. It all worked itself out in the end, and we did arrive safely - in the PHILIPPINES! :)
Upon our arrival, we were pleasantly surprised to discover several packages awaiting us - and even more pleasantly surprised to discover that the boys had waited for us before opening them! It was so much fun to get Christmas in a box and such an encouragement from home. Thank you so much, O-Hills and Rauschs!

You more observant ones out there may have noticed that Ben is wearing "big-boy underwear". Yes, we are TRYING to potty train him, but we think it is going to be a long process. He is interested and doing ok, but I think he is going through nearly as many underwear as he did diapers. :)

We had an early Christmas with Steve's family on skype this morning, and I thought you might like to see how we manage to share Christmas with our family across the ocean. The kids get to open their presents from Grandma and Grandpa while they watch via video! Skype is great. Notice Ben in his underwear again - that is pretty much his uniform nowadays. :)

I will try to get some pics up soon of our time visiting my sister and her family - so be sure to check back in a couple days for some very cool pics. Thanks for praying for all of us during that time - the surgery and the time went well, and we were so thankful to be able to be there to help them out.

Merry Christmas to all of you!

Not Again!

This makes two broken bones for Zach in under a year. Last time he was bucked off of a horse and broke his wrist, this time he put his foot down on a porch swing and the force cracked the tibia (thats the big bone in the lower leg for those of you like me who forgot middle school anatomy.) Thankfully our coworkers son was with him and heard the crack so I brought him in for an X-Ray, just in case. He really looked fine, esp. after some tylenol for the pain, but sure enough they found a crack. He was brave for the whole thing, although he is understandably nervous about having a cast on again after the reaction he had to the last one. For about a week he woke up crying every night, complaining that it was itching him then when we finally had it removed, we found open, bleeding sores on most of his arm. Pray for him that he will not become fearful of his cast and also for Jen who is not able to be here with her little boy who just got hurt.

I guess he comes by it honestly enough, I (His Dad - I actually do know how to post a blog, I just don't very often - ie. this is my first!) broke my leg when I was young as well, and my wrist when I was a little older. He does have me beat in time wise though.

The Christmas Tree

In the midst of the craziness of life, we have not forgotten to do the important things - like set up the Christmas tree as a family! :) Just thought you may like a few pics:

Update on Ben

Hello again, everyone. Just wanted to let you know about Ben's appointments this past week. Thankfully, the speech therapist was able to get us in on Thursday for the 3rd appointment, so we ended up having 3 appointments in 3 days. We were very impressed with the therapist, and he spent a lot of time evaluating Ben's speech - his comprehension as well as production. He found that he is doing great, even is ahead of the game, in his comprehension. His production ability though is significantly delayed. He is 2 yrs and 10 months old, but he speaks as though he is just under 2 yrs. There are 2 possible causes for this - an oral motor problem (oral apraxia) or a simple articulation delay. In an oral motor problem, basically his mouth (tongue etc) doesn't listen to what his brain says to do. So when he tries to produce speech, the signal gets messed up between his brain and his mouth somewhere and it doesn't come out right. This would potentially be a lifetime problem that we would need to help him overcome. The other possible cause is basically just a delay that will resolve itself in time.

Right now, the therapist is leaning towards it being just an articulation problem, but he cannot yet rule out the oral motor problem since Ben is so young (if it is not a severe case, it is much easier to diagnose once they are a little older and their utterances are longer). He is working on developing a home speech therapy program specifically for Ben. I will work with him everyday, and then the therapist wants to see him every 3 months to monitor his progress and adjust the home program as necessary.

Basically right now he is not sure why Ben is delayed in his speech, but a home therapy program will be a help to him regardless of the cause of the problem. We are praying that the program is able to resolve the problem in time and that it is not an oral motor problem which will require more extensive therapy as he grows. Please pray with us in this, and thanks to all of you who have expressed concern and support with this situation.

In "other news", Mikayla and I will leave on Tuesday the 12th to go help my sister while she has her surgery. I am bringing Mikayla with so that I have a companion as I travel (it is safer when the men see me as a mom rather than a young woman) and because she will be a big help with the two little ones. Please pray for safety as we travel and that we would be a blessing while we are there. Please pray too that the surgery on the 14th goes well. We fly home on the 21st, just a couple days before Christmas.

The Destruction part 1

Steve arrived safely home last night after a very tiring 12 hour drive. We are so thankful to have him home today. He said the destruction down there is absolutely unbelievable and indescribable. The whole province is in utter chaos. At least a thousand have been confirmed dead with many, many more still missing. Thousands upon thousands more have lost their homes and livelihoods.
Our partner churches down in the Albay province of Bicol region (the province where the vast majority of the devastation was) were exceedingly thankful for the immediate relief that he was able to bring. And we are thankful to be working with an organization who is ready with funds to help people in the midst of disaster, and thankful for our partner churches and individuals in the States who give to make that a reality. The main 2 things Steve brought down were tarps to be used as temporary shelters until they can rebuild and drinking water (those were the 2 things the pastors in that area said they needed the worst). Here are a couple pics of the tarps already being put to good use.

In addition to bringing the supplies down, Steve also did what he could to help out those affected down there. Since he is good at fixing things, he was able to be a big help. He repaired a generator, a vehicle, a freezer, a water pump and a washing machine while he was down there (I think that is all...)

Water is obviously a huge problem down there right now - ironic after the disaster is due to too much water all at once... Some missionaries down there have a water pump in their back yard so he helped pump gallon after gallon of water to be used in the clean up process.

Steve was able to be a huge help and blessing to the Allens while he was down there (the missionary family whose home flooded there). He stayed with them and was able to help coordinate the clean up effort there (they were understandable a little overwhelmed with all that has happened to them and were thankful for his leadership in "directing traffic" as it were). He was also able to help them get several of their appliances up and running again. Please continue to be in prayer for them as it will be months before they have electricity or water again and they lost so much of their personal belongings. I did a post on their behalf to their blogspot, and you may want to check it out www.allenupdate.blogspot.com to know how better to pray for them. They are going to work for another week then will take a few days off in Manila to re-group. They aren't sure yet where they will spend the holidays...

On the way home, Steve was able to stop through Iriga, the city where we hope to locate, and check on the 2 houses that are options for us to move into. We are thankful to report that neither one of them had flooded! While there was some wind damage on the outside, they both looked pretty much ok. Here is a pic of "House #1" that I failed to get a pic of last time...

Continue on to the next post to see a few more pics that Steve took down in Bicol.

Thanks to all of you who sent notes after our last update - it was SUCH a blessing to have an inbox full of encouragement from home. It has been a rough week (month!), and that meant so much. We head up to Manila today for Ben's appointments. Please pray with us that the doctor will work with us so we can get all 3 appointments in before I have to leave to go to help my sister with her surgery - I leave on the 12th.

The Destruction part 2

Here a few more pics Steve took while he was down in Bicol... Power lines litter the roads and are draped over the houses. It will likely be months before they have electricity there. It looks like even when we move down in February, it will still be out then.This hill is covered with coconut trees, but they wind has denuded them all of their branches. That is some incredibly powerful wind!
Massive power line poles just bent in half or broke in two like toothpicks.
The roads are debris-covered and barely passable. Steve said that there are some long sections of 2-lane highway that were covered entirely by the volcanic mud and there is only a one-lane ditch dug through the middle now to allow vehicles to pass. He was unable to get pics of the worst stretches because he could not stop along them.

You can see where the road here was washed out by the river. There was actually a squatter tenement in the center of this photo before the typhoon. There are no known survivors. Please continue in prayer for this area.

The devastation is complete, but we are confident that God will transform it into something good in the lives of many. Please pray that many lost souls will be saved as a result of this. Please pray that as we continue to reach out in that area by bringing relief goods and helping them get back on their feet that our efforts will have a lasting spiritual impact not just a temporal physical one.

A note to the tooth fairy

Just thought you guys may enjoy something on a little "lighter" note than what all our posts have been of late. If you have been keeping up with our blog, you saw Mikayla's big event for the week. Well, apparently she doesn't trust her parents to play the tooth fairy role because here is the note she left on our pillow before she went to bed...

I am happy to report that we did not forget her present! :)

As far as an update from Bicol - for those of you watching the news, you know how devastated the region is. The government was saying the roads were impassable when Steve made it through in our 4-wheel-drive pick up truck with relief goods for our partner churches down there. It was a long trip, but he made it safely and has been working his tail off from dawn til late at night. He is exhausted but doing well, and he has been able to be a huge help down there. The churches were so thankful for the supplies (he brought mainly drinking water and tarps to use as temporary shelters - those were the things they said they needed the worst). The Allens have been thankful for the help as well. Yesterday he was able to coordinate a cleaning crew who came by to help them out and also get their car and generator up and running again. Today he hopes to work on the refridgerator and freezer and a few other things. Please continue to pray that he will have the energy to be able to accomplish a lot during the days he is down there. He plans to leave tomorrow morning at 4 am so he can get through the really bad stretch of road (the highway was covered with chest-high mud so there is a one-lane ditch dug through the middle) before the traffic picks up. He plans to stop through the city where we hope to move in February (looks like we will probably be without electricity even by then) and check out the damage there, particularly to the houses we are hoping to rent. He hopefully will arrive home late tomorrow night. Please pray for his safety as he travels, particularly since he will be so tired.

On Tuesday morning, I will leave for Manila with the kids to take Ben to his speech therapy appointments (see our update for details). I hope to return Friday afternoon.

Thanks for praying for Zach's boil - it is looking better now after 2 1/2 days of antibiotics. It still looks pretty bad, but it has not gotten any worse and the redness does look more contained (it was about 9 inches in diameter). So it looks like we will not need to get IV antibiotics, but we are still watching it really closely.

My sister (see the post after this one to get up to speed) has surgery scheduled on December 14 to get her gall bladder out. Her husband has been sick, they have 2 little kids, and they have only just recently moved to their city so don't have many contacts yet. Some of you know my brother lives in the same city, but he and his wife have to leave the country for a 10 days for a visa run so they will not be there. All that to say, they could really use some help while she has her surgery and recovers. So I will be flying there for about 10 days, leaving on the 12th. I am so glad for the chance to help them out this way, but please be in prayer for us all though as these are busy days.

We survived!

The typhoon lost a lot of power as it crossed land so this one did not end up being as bad for us as previous ones. Not even any trees on the house this time! :) However, the people in Bicol were devastated by this one. Hundreds at least died from the flooding, and everything is destroyed. Steve left this morning to drive down there to bring a load of tarps for people to use as shelter for the nights ahead until they can rebuild their homes. He will drop them off with the pastors of the churches in Legaspi. Then he will go to the Allens home to help them for the weekend (they are the family we stayed with while we were down there a few weeks ago - check out the blog below the one about Mikayla on this page). He hopes to be able to help them get a lot done before he heads back home. He will also stop through Iriga to see how the 2 houses we are looking at fared through the storm and so we know if that neighborhood floods or not (we have been told it doesn't, but now seems like a good time to check on that...) Thanks for your continued prayers for us! Amazingly, we were only without electricity for about 15 hours this time! It is wonderful to have it back on already.

Another prayer request - my sister who lives with her family here in SE Asia (in a country not far from here), just found out this week that she has 100 gall stones! Her husband has been sick with either a virus or with Dengue fever. They have 2 little kids (a 2 year old and a baby), so they will need some help if the surgeons say she needs to have her gall bladder out. The first surgeon said as much, and they are getting a second opinion tomorrow (Saturday morning). So it looks like I will be flying to their country this next week to help them out. Steve will come back in time to take the kids from me before I head out.

Also please pray for Zach as he has a staph infection on his hind end. He is on oral antibiotics, and we are hopeful that will be effective enough that he will not need IV ones in the hospital.

We covet your prayers...