Thursday, March 1, 2012

the final step

Today at 2pm we appeared in the Rutherford County Court to readopt Hope and Benjamin and officially change their names from...

Habimana Benjamin to Benjamin Habimana Rutledge 


AND

Ineza Honorine to Hope Honorine Ineza Rutledge

This process allows both children to receive a birth certificate issued by the state of TN and now we can move forward with getting social security numbers.

We kept both of Hope's names given to her in Rwanda, they were given at two separate times.  Honorine means honored or honorable (also associated with esteem and integrity) and Ineza means kindness.  And not to leave out Benjamin, Habimana means God Exists and Benjamin means son of the right hand.

One detail that made the day even sweeter is that the lawyer who represented us was my brother, Paul.  His father-in-law, Jim also came to support us (we have known Jim a very long time and he and Paul share a law office).

Enough with the explaining, here are some pictures...





Chancellor Corlew was so nice.  He talked with all the kids and took time to answer Benjamin's MANY questions.  My brother had him as a professor in law school and said he would be like a grandfather and indeed he was!

Benjmain soptted the court reporters area and headed straight over, hands-on!  She was so sweet as well and she even allowed B to look through all the pictures on her i-phone.  It is crazy how he knows how to operate those things, neither of us have one!


While Rusty and Paul were taking care of paper work with the clerk, the rest of us hung out in the hallway.  This picture is a real representation of how much he loves her.  It is so sweet. He takes ownership of his sister.

Hope checking out the cars going around the square.  And, yes, Elmo went to court too!

When we left we celebrated the event at Culvers:)  First time the kids have ever been, they loved it!

This was a good day, besides the stress of trying to leave the house with everyone clean and getting to court on time.  Thankfully the traffic was not bad today!

We do still pray for all the waiting families in the Rwandan program, today was yet another reminder to do so.  This morning I read a blog that had news that I did not expect to hear...  a file had been closed due to the 6 month mark passing.  What a sad day for this couple but we pray that God has better plans then they could have ever imagined for themselves. 

3 comments:

Beyond Blessed said...

Love the pictures...and Judge Corlew is amazing...we've had him for both of our adoptions! That picture of B and H is priceless!

Oh and YOU looked stunning! (As usual.) ;)

rutledgeramblings said...

Yea! Yea! Yea! We are SO blessed to "officially" have them as Rutledges! My heart is beaming with pride for all 7 of you.

Victor came home ranting and raving over those 5 kids and how much he loves them :)

Benjamin's smile is great in the first pic! He's come a long way :)

Much love!

Unknown said...

Yay! I LOVE me some final adoptions! The pictures are so sweet. Congratulations!