Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

Wow, what a great year 2005 was for our family! Looking back I can hardly believe that almost the entire year was about our trip, coming home and then being home. We have been home for 8 months now and have had Evan with us for 9 months…that’s almost an entire year, WOW!

Christmas 2004 was very difficult we spent every month thinking that the next month would be it and when it would not be “the month” that we got our court date we would always say "Well at least we will be home for Christmas." And when Christmas was here and no word came that was very difficult.

However, 2005 rolled around and what a great year it was!

January 2005 began with our friend Kirsten traveling to Irkutsk for an “in-between” trip to visit her daughter Anicka. While Kirsten was there she was able to visit Evan almost everyday. The caretakers also allowed her to take Evan with her to private playroom with Anicka. While Kirsten was there she emailed us updates on Evan and when she returned she sent us lots of photos and videos…end of January to February.

February 28, 2005 we received the phone call that we had a court date! Set for April 15, 2005! Praise the Lord! “Like cold water to a weary soul, so is good news from a distant land.” Proverbs 25:25

March until we left, of course we were very busy applying for visas getting plane tickets, packing, etc.

April 4th we left headed for Irkutsk! We arrived in Irkutsk 2 days later on April 6th. On April 7th we picked Evan up from the baby home and took him with us to the apartment. He has been with us ever since. It was so wonderful to be reunited with him after an entire year of last seeing him or holding him. I held him and cried and still do at times. Our lives were forever changed and we praise the Lord for that everyday.

On April 11th (also our 7th wedding anniversary) we met Judge Kotkina to hand over our paperwork. Also on April 11th we met part of our forever family…Mark and Carol Schatte and on April 12th we met their precious Hannah.

April 15th our Evan Denis officially became EVAN DENIS HODGES.

May 1st we left Irkutsk for Moscow.

Leaving Moscow, we boarded a plane headed to Austria…Austria to LaGuardia NY…LaGuardia to JFK NY...JFK to Atlanta GA.

May 6th…Home in Atlanta at 9:00pm greeted by family and friends! It was so great to see everyone!! When we landed in Atlanta we had been awake and either in an airport or on an airplane for 32 hours straight!!!! Boy, were we tired. We certainly were running on nothing but adrenalin fumes. Evan was so sweet and so sleepy. He had taken a few naps here and there, but Clay and I could not sleep at all…no naps for us…we were too excited to be going home and too worried to close our eyes with Evan there in our laps. We did take a short nap after our snack was served on the plane from JFK to Atlanta, but come on the entire flight was less than 2 hours. We were starving and stopped at McDonalds, I remember we were in line at 11:00pm so we must have gotten home around 11:30 or so. My parents and Wesley took us home and Clay’s parents and his brother came over, when they all left and we got into bed it was around 1am.

May 7th Clay was back at work.

And the rest is history!!! ...and much of it is blogged.

Time sure has flown by since we have been home; nothing like time was B.E (Before Evan). (Clay and I often laugh about time B.E.) B.E time sure did seem to drag by, day by day, even hour by hour at times. Some people don't understand, for them I say imagine seeing your child for the first time ever, perhaps, just given birth to your child then spending 5 days and 4 nights with him alone, and then being forced to give your child to someone else for an entire year…a year to the exact week. The wait was an extremly hard wait and made the year difficult for us (which many of our friends are still experiencing). We pray for them everyday!

2005 was a magic year for us and 2006 is going to be the magic year for many other waiting families. Please keep them in your prayers.

Happy New Year!!
The Hodges...family of 3!