Referral For Norah!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is the Referral Photo we got for Norah.

This photo we got in an update, the day after we sent in our letter of intent to adopt her.


Norah is now three years eight months old and just got into foster care a couple of months ago. She had heart surgery thanks to LWB when she was two and recovered well. She was born with severe congenital deafness. After she recovered from heart surgery she was fitted with hearing aids and for the first time she could hear. Having only been able to hear a couple of months her speech is behind, so LWB has her in foster care and a special language school. At last report she was just learning how to say Ba and Ma the first sounds of Baba (dad) and Mama (Mom). According to her report she can’t hear without her hearing aids. She will be deaf at night when we have to take her hearing aids out for bath time and to open them and put them in the hearing aid dryer to dry out over night. So Lori and I have been learning some sign language so we can teach it to Norah and be able to communicate with her after bath time and as a bridge for her to communicate with us until her speech is better. I am also pushing to learn some more Chinese so I can speak to and comfort her. Being older she may want to keep her Chinese name, if she does that would be fine with Lori and I, we will combined them so she can deceide what name she wishes to use over the years. The name she wishes to use may change, we don't know. I hope to find some people who have met her over the years or that have gone to Kaifeng so we can find out as much about our little girl as we can before we go to China. I just mailed off a care package to her. We had to wait for PA to send it, that came today, and we put her care package in the mail today, she should have it by 1-8-09. I wrote a letter to Norah, her orphanage and to her foster family and Annie and her uncle took each line of English and translated it into Chinese underneath. I can't thank them enough. We are so thrilled and working on getting to China to Norah as soon as possable.

Glen & Lori
Very Happy Parents!

Fundrasing Information below this line.

We hope to be in China in mid March so we are trying to raise the rest of the funds needed to bring our daughter home. I have already started the ground campaign here in our hometown. It is a wonderful place to live and I have seen our small community move mountains before.We are hoping to find that spirit again. Here is the break down of where we stand. I compiled this list with the help of someone who has recently traveled to complete their adoption.
Shipping Signed adoption papers back $25.00
Embassy of PRC Visas for passports $300.00
Visa Courier Fees $50.00
post adoption Fee $500.00

(Three over four back) Airline tickets $3,865.00

In- China Travel & Hotel Cost $3,795.00 I

n China food & Government Fees $2,610.00
Orphanage Donation Fee $5,000.00

Misc. Hotel Fees for three differen Hotels $546.00
Misc. things I didn’t think of $309.00 ___________________________________________________

Total Est. $17,000.00

We have already paid about $7,000.00 dollars for the first part of the adoption and we were well on our way to saving the $17,000.00 need to complete our adoption, when in April 2007 I had to have my spine fused in two places and was off work for three months.Thank God for good insurance and the savings we had set aside for this adoption, it saved our home. Still we were responsible for a huge chunk of the cost of surgery, and physical therapy afterwards to regain the strength in my legs and back. We just got done paying the neurosurgeon off two months ago. We stopped hemorrhaging savings in June when I went back to work and have managed to save $7,500 more dollars towards the adoption. That leaves us $9,500.00 short of the estimated $17,000.00 needed to bring Norah home. People who have had their paper work logged in in China as long as we have we think that it will take three months to get travel approval. I know we cannot save $9,500.00 in three months so we are left asking, begging, and praying for help. What we are hoping for is to find 1000 families that can donate $10.00 to help us bring our Norah home. $5,000.00 of the $9,500.00 needed will go to the Orphanage our daughter is from to help support the kids left behind. This fee went from $3000.00 to $5,000.00 at approximately the same moment we got our referral. I am going to be pounding the pavement here in my home town trying to work and save and trying get donations and I am going to be using a Chip-in wiget to try to raise the other $5,000.00 over the internet from this blog. I realize that this is a huge amount to raise in a good economy let long a recession, but I must try. If ANYONE is willing to put our chip-in widget on there blog to help us get noticed it will help, also if you can not donate to this adoption because you are in a pinch yourself, you can still help move mountains by emailing this post to a friend or family member. In order to find 1000 people who can/will donate $10.00 I think I need to get our story viewed by 100,000 people. If you have an extra Christmas card and stamps lying around Lori and I would love to here from you. Mail cards and donations no matter how small! If at night you pull the lint filled change out of your pocket and put it in the mail I will pick the lint out and put your first name and last initial in the thank you to the people that have helped us bring our daughter home. I am not kidding every little bit helps. Know that if you donate to our adoption we will continue to pay it forward to the orphans in China, for the rest of our lives.Please check back often to see and hear about our daughter, to follow our progress,

and to watch us go to China to finally bring Norah home!!!!!!!!!!!!

Glen & Lori Cook
P.O. Box 1114
Cabot AR, 72023-1114

Fund raisers updates will be posted in the side bar at the top right. This number will change as Lori and I save more funds and as people donate through the mail or over the internet. Thank you, Thank you Glen and Lori