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Ephraim Klassen

ByChantel

November 17th was court day.

We got to the home early and got to meet Tracy (the Newcastle social worker). Then the workers all said their goodbyes. One of them really teared up when she said goodbye to Ephraim, he’s been there since he came out of the hospital at 2 months old and you can tell he was special to her (and he liked her too), she gave us their email address and asked us to send lots of pictures (which you know there will be a lot of).

Then we were off! We went into the court building not knowing what to expect. We went through a metal detector and placed our bags on top of the scanner because of course it didn’t work, that’s so Africa. They took all our cameras except Robyn’s, she says they just seem to know when people are not from around there.

We sat in the waiting room for awhile waiting for the judge to show, when he did he took Robyn and Tracy to his office. They were there for about 20 minutes while we sat and waited. Finally at 9:25 they called the other couple we were with in. About 10 minutes later they returned with their son!

Then it was our turn, we went in and the judge asked us to read over a paper (with our personal information) and showed us where to sign on three copies, which we did. Then the judge signed, dated and wrote the time:

9:40 am
that’s when Ephraim became our son

The judge continued to sign a couple more papers and made sure everything was spelled correctly then he thanked Robyn and us for helping to give families to their children. And it was done.

We stopped to get some gas in the car and then back down to Durban we went.

The drive back was stunningly gorgeous, it was something I missed in the nervousness of Saturday morning, the Newcastle landscape is just breathtaking. As we got closer to Durban it was more grasslands and hills, it kind of reminded me of English country or even southern Alberta.

The kids were both great on the way back, Rae had a good nap and Ephraim had 2! It felt great driving back with both of our kids in the backseat.

Court Day

this photo got a comment on my Facebook page about the carseat not being safe because it’s not a 5 point harness, for the record, we are in South Africa and this is the carseat we were given with our car rental, with as many kids as we’ve seen sitting in the front seat with no seat belts on I’m just impressed it’s as good as this! glad I got that out of my system 🙂

Court Day

two kids!

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23 Comments

  7. So cute! And what is people’s deal with the car seat? No need to comment about it. Good grief! haha. Glad you got that out of your system too 🙂

  8. Um 5-point what? Obviously I have been out of N. America too long because I don’t even know what that means. And I bought my car seat at a garage sale. N. Americans are obsessed with safety, which is great, but sometimes you just gotta do what you can. So happy for your family 🙂

    1. Ha, love that Whitney! I mean, we aren’t going to through caution into the wind but there is a point where you’ve got to just trust God, right?

  9. Oh man, guys. This gives me shivers. So happy for you guys and your beautiful family. E is so so cute! Congratulations times a million! <3

  10. So exciting! My husband and I lived an hour north of Durban for a year and are adopting from South Africa too. I saw the comment about the carseat on your FB and almost chimed in. You aren’t letting your children ride unrestrained in the back of a truck, so that’s pretty good for African standards! We are adopting an older child and she just passed the American Pediatrics Associations recommendations for age and booster seats. We weren’t quite sure how we were going to go from never ever wearing even a seat belt to having to sit in a booster. Oh Africa, gotta love it! Have so much fun soaking up “Funsunzi” in Durban. If you need some suggestions for fun family things to do let me know. Blessings on your sweet family.

    1. Haha, I’m glad there were others on my side about the carseat thing 🙂 When do you get your daughter?

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