After a great deal of time and thought, it seemed as though James William Horn was a name more befitting of our boy than James William Durden Horn. Grammy and Poppy had gifted our family an Alaskan Disney cruise for Christmas and I needed to procure passports for the kiddos because we would be traveling to Canada. I felt an urgent need to legally change James' name so that his passport would reflect the correct one. Little did I know how complex the process would be. On New Year's Eve 2019, I started the day at the Alameda Courthouse in Hayward to file the paperwork. I learned then that I needed to place an ad in a local newspaper with our intent to change James' name and have it run once a week for a few weeks. After that was completed, we had a court hearing to finalize the process. With all of the certified documents in hand, I could finally change over his social security card, birth certificate and apply for a passport. Our court hearing was February 21st at the Superior Courthouse in Oakland. James woke up feeling crummy and it was clear he needed to stay "home" from school. I was worried how that might go given my very important date at the courthouse, but it turned out to be a beautiful blessing, because he was present for the judge to officially declare him "James William Horn." We celebrated with lunch and ice cream sundaes at Fenton's, it is a memory I treasure.
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| I illegally snapped a photo of my boy in the courtroom. He was by far the youngest person in there! |
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| It's official! |
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| We colored and cheers-ed to his new name! |
