6 Months

It has been 6 months since Kara flew back to China. I have been asked for an update so many times, I apologize it has taken so long, our hearts were hurting.

When Kara returned to China she was adamant that she did not want to be adopted by a family in the US or ever return to the US for that matter. We spoke with the adoption agency that we hosted thru and requested that she be counseled on adoption and what that means. Our hope was that she could get some counseling and after returning to China change her mind and decide that living in the US with a loving family would be okay.

We received MANY inquiries on Kara, but after learning that she wasn't open to the idea of adoption, families moved on to looking at other children. In China when an older child is adopted, they are asked if they want to be adopted at the consulate for finalization. If they say no and continue to say no despite counseling, etc, they are not adopted by the family. The family loses their money and leave with a broken heart. As you can imagine that is a VERY hard leap for a family to make.

Kara is still saying that she is not interested in being adopted and returning to the US. It's heartbreaking for us, but we hope and pray that because she doesn't have any medical needs she can make something for herself after she is released from the orphanage in a few years. I honestly don't see her ever having a family of her own and that is hard.

I wish I had an exact number to report, but I would guess that approx 80%-90% of the children that came for hosting have families in process to adopt them. Without the opportunity that hosting presented them, they might not have found a family.

Today China released some new rules. One of which is to close their hosting of children from China. We were lucky enough to have participated in hosting, that will no longer be an option.

Thank you for following along with our journey this past winter. Here are some photos....I may have shared some of these already, but a post is better with pictures :)

PICTURES!!!

L&H Photography was so generous to offer her time and talents to capture some great pictures of Kara! Thank you Alexaundrea for capturing this super special little girl!!

She sent them to me last week, this has been a difficult and busy week, and I apologize for the delay, but here they are! We took these pictures when it was snowing like crazy and about 10 degrees. She wasn't very excited about me making her leave her coat off (I left mine off too, for what it was worth), but look at how cute she is!!!

THIS is Kara, joyful, silly, spunky and a little sassy! This girl is still waiting for her family, could that family be YOU?

For more information about adopting Kara contact meredith@gwca.org

Saying Goodbye

This is a hard post to write. I know so many people are wondering what was it like saying goodbye....

Saying goodbye wasn't the hard part.....

Kara was so excited to see her friends. She came to America knowing that she would only be here for one month. She left the only family she has ever known behind to travel for days to meet strangers that didn't speak her language or cook her food. She was excited to get back to what she knows, school, friends, foster family, people that speak Mandarin, etc.

Our family knew no matter what the outcome of the month, Kara was returning to China, there were no other options. We had prepared ourselves for this, as a family (Kara included) we kept track of the days until she would be returning to China.

When she left from the airport there were no tears, the other boy that flew with her was visibly upset, but Kara was prepared. I think this helped both me and her. I hugged her before she boarded the plane and told her I loved her. She walked down the jet way and waved and said goodbye. She looked back multiple times and waved, but always with a smile.

Kara just arrived (approx 60 hours from her flight out of Chicago) at her orphanage.

The hard part is now. The hard part is folding her clothes that she won't ever wear again. The hard part is hearing Audrey say she wants Kara to come back forever. The hard part is wondering how she is doing.

I don't know how Kara is doing, but my guess is that it will be the same for her in the days to come.

For us, this month was a crazy, wonderful, emotional roller coaster. For Kara, she came scared, experienced things she would most likely never experience in the orphanage, she visited a Dr, eye Dr, and dentist in the month that she was here, she hadn't seen any of those in the last 5 years (that we know of), felt the love of a family....But it's not over, we all still have feelings to sort through. It's complicated....she's worth it. Every child is worth it.

Here are a few pictures of her the few days before she left.

Kara :)

 Mom and the girls!

 It's hard to take a family picture of 6 without a selfie stick ;0

She's Gone.....

Kara headed back to China this morning. She had a connecting flight and won't arrive in Beijing for some time yet. She was excited to see her friends that spoke the same language!

We sent her home with a new backpack and a few extra clothing items, some markers, colored pencils, glow sticks for her friends at the orphanage, a gift for her caregivers, a photo album with photos from our adventures and of course a bunch of glasses that she can wear for fun!!

I know I sound like a broken record, but please, please keep sharing her story. I know her family is out there, perhaps viewing my blog, her pictures, maybe they can't get her out of their head.

One person can't change the world, but one person can change Kara's world.

I am going to keep updating the blog, I still have lots of pictures to share and stories to tell!!! I pray that I can update our blog soon with pictures of Kara's family that is working on getting her home forever.

If you want more information about adopting Kara please contact meredith@gwca.org

Here are some pictures from her departure and our overnight in Chicago.

 Me and Kara the night before she headed out from Chicago.

 

I had a hard time waking her up for her flight!

 

Parker, Kara & Ms Zhou (Chaperone). We had a small group leaving from Chicago, but they met up with many more friends at other airports. 

 Kara showing Parker her photo album.

 Kara & I - Rebecca & Parker

Just Videos

This post consists only of the videos of Kara posted previously on the blog. Some people have not been able to view them so I uploaded them to youtube.

Kara Being Helpful

Kara Counting

Kara Swimming

Please contact meredith@gwca.org for more information about adopting Kara.

My contact info is Risa@rogercarlsen.com If you have questions about Kara or want to learn more about hosting.

All Smiles!

A HUGE thank you to Kopper Family Dental, not only did they donate her exam and x-rays a week ago, they also donated Kara's filling and did some awesome preventative care for her teeth today!! Kara did awesome, she was such a rock star. We were able to successfully fix her cavity she had. There is one other tooth that is chipped, but when we finished the first side she was ready to be done. The chipped tooth isn't as big of a deal as the cavity, we were just going to fix it for her if we were able. Because of the amazing people at Kopper Family Dental, Kara can go back to China and not have to worry about this cavity causing further problems or pain!

I noticed the other day Kara had mastered the scissors! When she first arrived she didn't know how to hold them correctly and had a difficult time using them. While watching her the other day, it hit me, she couldn't do this when she got her!

I included a video of her helping me with breakfast the other morning. Raya likes to choose the fork she wants to use (spoiled) so you can see Kara showing her two forks and letting her pick and then starts to hand out the scrambled eggs! She is such a great helper, always one step ahead of me, ready and willing to help any way she can.

If you think this sweet girl could be yours reach out to me or contact Meredith@gwca.com

 

Kara with Marin & Kevin Kopper, they do such a great job with kids!! 

(Below) Watching Barbie Life in the Dreamhouse (Netflix) in Mandarin while getting ready to have her cavity filled. 

 Video of Kara Being Helpful

Supergirl turns 11!

Kara turns 11 in January. This weekend we celebrated her birthday. We drove up to my sister's apartment in Minneapolis and went swimming in her pool. All the kids LOVED it! Kara and Audrey were in the pool for a long time. Kara loved the water even putting her face in with no problems.

After swimming we ate some cake, Kara had two pieces! She had another piece for breakfast this morning :)

Here are some pictures and a video from our adventures yesterday. The bottom picture is from Friday, Kara colored the picture and then wrote her name in English (she did pretty well without any help)! On the right hand upper corner of that picture she placed a sticker that reads "adopt me." She had no idea what it said, but her family is out there, maybe this is the sign you were looking for ;)
Video of Kara Swimming

Why the little things matter.

We've been working on two things for the last few weeks....having Kara say "Please" when she wants something and "No thank you" when she doesn't. Last night she did both!! I wish I had a video of how excited I was and in turn how excited she was when I praised her and told her how awesome she is doing!!

These little things might seem so silly to celebrate, but all these little things add up to a bigger picture!! All these little things I am sharing with you show us that she is capable of bonding and intigrating into a family, they show us that she is mentally capable of learning a new language and more, they show us that she has so much potential with the love of a family!

Her world is so different, we really have no grasp of what it has been like for her and we probably never will. All these amazing victories show us that love is the ultimate language. When we focus on loving one another we can do so much, not only for the one we are showing love to, but for ourselves.

She is literally growing EVERYDAY, she has come so far in a month, can you imagine what 3 months, 6 months, 1 year or a lifetime with a loving family could do for this girl!

We are doing our best to advocate for Kara. Together with the help of our family, friends, donors and strangers who have shared our story we can help, we can make a difference. Everytime you share her story you are potentially leading her to her forever family. Please keep sharing...

We are looking for someone to take professional pictures of Kara. My camera (phone) picture taking skills are not the best, we want to highlight her personality! If you know of someone that does mini sessions (soon) or someone willing to donate some time to take pictures please reach out to us. You guys are AMAZING. We have someone willing to donate her time next week!!

Here are some pictures from Burger King last night. We found out that Kara doesn't like cheese on her burger. She also loves ice cream cones, but not the actual cone part. I had to show her how to lick the ice cream so that it didn't drip on her :)

Thank you for all your support, please don't stop sharing our story, and following along!!

Background....

Kara has told us a little bit about her life in China. She looks at pictures and tells us those are her good friends etc. Finding out all we can is so helpful in understanding her.

Here are some of the things Kara has told us. I was also able to connect with someone that had knowledge of Kara's orphanage and met her and was able to give us some insight to her life over 6,000 miles away.

"The orphanage (she is in) is a great orphanage in my opinion. It's still an institution so it's no comparison to a family, but overall it's a good place with loving staff."

"I actually used the word "spunky" to describe her"

"This orphanage has a special needs school that allows local children whose families did not abandon them to attend."

"A firecracker is a great way to describe her!"

"I live with a mom, dad, brother and sister, I don't like my brother." (She lives in a group home type setting, and she calls these people her family, it is all she has ever known)

"I love my supervisor"

She told us she is in 1st grade in China.

She likes school -music, sports, Chinese, mathematics, art, poetry. 

Unfortunately a lot gets lost in translation, but I hope these little tid-bits of information touch your heart like they have mine.  


Today was such a good day!! Kara is bonding, she hugs me, wants me to hold her (which is a little more challenging being that she isn't that much smaller than me), haha. I made an extra effort to let her sit in my lap, tickle her, etc today.

She's learning (and finally wanting to learn)! Today she was counting and couldn't remember number 5 so she looked to me to help her. I jumped for joy inside, before this moment she didn't want to learn. I am including a video of her counting today. I am also including a lot of pictures from the last few days!

 Audrey and Kara goofing around.

Kara, Siri and Audrey ....still goofing around.

 Kara and Raya saying (yelling) "bye, bye" to one of the daycare kids leaving.

 Kara LOVES the babies!

 Kara showing Colton how to play mahjong tiles on the kindle.

 Kara feeding her baby some of her yogurt.

Kara Counting

$2,000 Grant

This is so amazing!! Someone has donated a $2,000 grant for a family for Kara!!! Please keep sharing her story.

We had a nice long weekend. Spent a lot of time at home just being together. We visited the local Chinese restaurant again over the weekend. I know I have said it before, but this girl can eat!!! She is a healthy, happy and pleasant girl!

Here are some pictures from our time together this weekend.

 Eating popcorn and playing games on the kindles. Please ignore the popcorn all over the floor!! Yes, she really does have big feet ;)

Helping dad in the kennel!

Playing Crazy 8's at grandma Lori's house.