Who Is Kari Fuller…

I was born in Seoul, Korea on April 25th. At five months old I was adopted by Dan and Cheryl Hoy. I grew up in a small town in San Luis Obispo county called Paso Robles in California. It was a nice little town to grow up in. There wasn’t a large population of Asians there, but being that I was adopted by parents from Minnesota and Iowa, I didn’t really notice.

We were a Beaver Cleaver family. A hot breakfast was on the table every weekday morning by 7:30 am and dinner was ready at 6 pm after my dad got home from work. We sat at the dinner table and talked about our day while eating my mom’s wonderful home-cooked meals 5 days a week.

My dad was a parole administrator and my mom was a librarian. We were a very tight-knit family and did a lot of things as a family while I was young. Dad used to like to travel across the US in an RV to visit tourist places and family during the summer. As a kid though, that was the last thing I wanted to spend my summer break doing.

Things were a lot safer back then. I loved to ride my bike while pulling a flying kite. My mom always made sure she knew who I was going out with and where we were going anytime I left the house. While I was growing up there were no computers, laptops, iPhones, iPads, or any other similar distractions. I had an Atari play station that I played Burger Time and Pong on, but that was about it. I would stay outside playing until I had to be home when the street lights came on. Even though both mom and dad worked, I was rarely left at home alone.

In the 8th grade, I began playing volleyball for Flamson Middle School, and for SLO Jr’s, a volleyball club that traveled and played in tournaments twice a month, year-round. My mom and dad were very dedicated to making sure I never missed a practice or tournament. They were drivers for the team. Every tournament we crammed 3-4 girls on the team into the family Aerostar van and took off to play ball.

When I graduated from high school, I moved down to Orange County. I was recruited to play volleyball at Cal State Fullerton which was around 4 ½ hours South of Paso. It was a Division 1 team and I couldn’t wait to get out of the area and start playing right after graduation. Although my GPA was excellent in high school, volleyball was my ticket to get into college.

Even while playing volleyball at college, my parents attended every game. They didn’t miss a single game except for the time when my dad was in the hospital for prostate cancer. Not ONE game! I attended college for a couple of years before I decided to move back home to be closer to family. Although I spent pretty much all of my time playing volleyball, I became extremely homesick and wanted to return to my small town in Paso Robles, CA, so I did. I moved back into my parent’s house until my mom passed away in 2015.

In 2006 I met Jay Fuller, my ex-husband. He tattooed me shortly after my mom died. We were married in 2009 and were together until August 2019. We moved to Atascadero, a town around 15 miles South of Paso until 2013 when we moved up to Portland, OR. I had worked at a handful of jobs in San Luis Obispo County over the years but never found a career. One of my jobs was at Starbucks which enabled me to pretty much transfer stores and/or relocate anywhere in the world and still have a job.

When I moved up to Portland I was ready to start a new life in a new state that was definitely different from California. People in Oregon were very welcoming to new Oregonians although they hated that so many people from California had relocated there making the cost of living skyrocket! I am still living in Oregon in a town called Hillsboro just outside of Portland. I have made a good life for myself up here and hope to continue moving forward living the dream!