Having acquired all of the necessary supporting evidence to make my case for being issued a spousal settlement visa by UK immigration, last week Tuesday James and I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to submit my application online and see if we could make an appointment at the British Consulate in Chicago for Monday morning given that we would be in the vicinity anyway on our way back from a weekend with my family in Iowa. We were able to schedule an appointment for 10:00 on Monday morning, even at such short notice. So at the appointed time we made our way to the Wrigley Building on Michigan Avenue, took the elevator to the 13th floor of the south tower, made our way through security, and sat ourselves down in the rather stark waiting room, listening for our number to be called.
When they called our number, we went up to the window and turned in our packet of evidence, then sat and waited for another 20 minutes or so. We had Martha Stewart for distraction, cooking up some lovely looking cauliflower orrechiette and cucumber salad with her guest chef. (Mmm. Must give those recipes a go...) We were finally summoned for a second time only to be told that everything looked in order but we were too early. They are unable to issue visas for more than three months out which wouldn't be that much of a problem, but since we've been married for fewer than four years, the visa would be a provisional one that would have to be renewed after two years. Thus I'd essentially have two months of a valid visa that I wouldn't be able to use. I appreciated their desire for me to get as much use out of my provisional visa as possible before having to renew it, but I wish they had been a little more clear about the timing limitations on their website. In any case, we were told that I wouldn't have to reapply (or pay again, thank goodness, given that the application fee is a hefty USD $520!) but we still need to bring our packet of evidence back to the Chicago consulate in a few months to get the actual visa.
In other happy news, we managed to snag 18th row center seats for The Arcade Fire at the Chicago Theatre on Sunday, May 20th. WOO!!!
I can hardly believe it, but it's already time to make plans to go the other way.
Yep, James and I are moving to England. So just a few short years after navigating the UK-to-US immigration labyrinth, we now get to experience the joys of US-to-UK immigration. I've been told that it's not as complicated or time consuming as immigrating to the US (in fact, I was amused that the British Embassy website admonishes applicants to submit one's application in good time since not all visas are issued on the same day that the application is received), but I guess we'll see, eh? The application instructions and requirements are, I admit, a little intimidating. But hey - we were successful with James' US immigration, and that certainly had its intimidating forms and procedures too. Not to mention the hulking guy in the little cubicle at the Detroit immigration office.
So over the next ten months or so we need to get the house ready to sell, decide which furniture and other belongings to take and which to sell or otherwise get rid of, sell our car, find a place to live in the UK, find jobs in the UK, hire an international moving company, and take care of that pesky settlement visa. There will of course be many other details to think about. And to complicate matters, we're also planning a trip around the world that will take up about six weeks of next summer. Tentative stops include cities in New Zealand, Australia, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand. We'll send our stuff east, and we'll head west to the other side of the world, meeting back up with our stuff in England sometime in August, of course in time for Greenbelt.
Don't expect a sudden rash of blogging from me, but over the next year I hope to be cataloguing our onging immigration adventures. And then there will probably be plenty to write about as I adjust to life as an expat.
Today was the day that James had his Adjustment of Status interview in Detroit (the adjustment being to Legal Permanent Resident). I am happy to report that it all went swimmingly, and eleven months after marrying me (and just over ten months after submitting the application), James is now the possessor of a provisional green card.
We did lots and lots of preparation for this. We assembled all of the paperwork that they said to bring and then some, plus duplicates of everything. My main cause for worry going into it was that I have somehow misplaced the copies of my federal tax returns from 2002 and 2003 - documents that they included in the list of 'what you should bring'. We were hoping that the fact that we had already submitted them would be sufficient. In the end it was.
Since our appointment was set for 8:00 a.m. in downtown Detroit, we decided to stay overnight in Detroit rather than getting up at 4:00 in the morning to drive there. This worked out well especially since it appeared that the location of the interview was less than two miles from our hotel. As it turned out, we had the wrong location. Note to anyone who is going to Detroit for an interview with Citizenship and Immigration Services: 333 Eliot is NOT the same as 333 Mount Elliott. They are in two completely different parts of the city. We accidentally walked to the first - arriving there promptly at 8:00 to discover that there wasn't a 333 Eliot. There was in the general vicinity a Hospice of Michigan branch and outside of it was a lovely gentleman who was clearly accustomed to redirecting lost souls who were looking for the Immigration Office. Seeing my distress, he very kindly ushered us inside and asked the receptionist to call us a cab. The cab arrived not soon after and ferried us to 333 Mt. Elliott, getting us there by about 8:15 a.m.
Here's another tip about going into Federal Buildings: they don't let you take camera phones inside. Since James had his, we didn't have a car to put it in, and security guard was not being very helpful about the situation, James walked outside to find a place to store it. Thinking that it might not be a great idea to have the outer security guard spot him hiding a small electronic device outside a federal building, he asked what he should do with it, and they suggested bringing it to a shop across the street and asking if they would hold onto it for him. James reports that the shop owner must do this a lot because he took one look at James' phone and put it in a drawer.
Since we arrived at the Immigration Office late, we were afraid that we might have a long wait, but in fact it was only about 20-25 minutes of tense anticipation before we heard the name "James Stewart" called out. I had another moment of panic when I saw the rather gruff looking man who had called for us, but it turned out that friendly immigration officer Steve was just dealing with a little morning grogginess as we were his first interview of the day. He walked us back to his cubicle (which immediately reminded me of Bob's cubicle in The Incredibles - big guy in a tiny, cramped space), sat us down, and I pulled out our piles of well-ordered, well-labeled documents. As it turned out, the only things he ever asked for were James' passport, state ID, social security card, and employment authorization card. None of the other documents that we had so painstakingly assembled! Sheesh.
Steve had in front of him a thick file folder containing all of the forms and supporting evidence that we had previously submitted. He flipped through that a bit, made notes and checked boxes on some forms, looked through all my federal tax returns (the ones I had freaked out about not being able to find) and nodded approvingly, re-asked James all the questions about whether or not he planned to engage in polygamy, illicit drug sales, or overthrowing the government and stuff like that. After not more than 15-20 minutes of being in Steve's cubicle, James had his stamp in his passport and strict instructions to remember to file for his permanent green card 90 days before the provisional one expires (which happens on April 18, 2007).
We walked out looking at each other with both great relief and more than a little disbelief. Was it really that easy?? Apparently it was. We walked back to our hotel, got our car, and took the tunnel to Canada to take James' new stamp for a little test drive. They let us in and even told us where to find some good restaurants for lunch. We ended up at a lovely little cafe called Chanoso's and had a very nice celebratory lunch. We also observed that Windsor (at least the part we saw of it) is much nicer than downtown Detroit. (Side story: as we were pulling out of the parking garage in Windsor, the attendant exclaimed, "We have a new pope!" She had a little TV on in her booth and saw the white smoke. That's how we found out about the election of Pope Benedict XVI.)
We are now home, exhausted and relieved to have this part of the process completed. And very much looking forward to arriving in the UK on May 25!
As James has already blogged, we at long last have a Permanent Residency interview date!
The very quick processing of James' Employment Authorization got our hopes up that the Permanent Residency process would also be expedient. Our receipt letter had stated that Permanent Residency processing was taking 120-180 days. In actuality, from the time they received our petition (June 29, 2004) to the day we got our Notice of Action letter (February 3, 2005), it took 219 days. Our interview will be on April 19 (another 75 days). And there's no telling how long after that we'll have to wait to get the actual green card. A Permanent Residency petitioner used to get an "Approved" passport stamp at the interview which allowed for travel out of the country in the intervening time while waiting for the actual green card to arrive. We're not exactly sure what the procedure is now, and at the rate things in this racket change, even if we knew how they were doing things now, there's no guarantee that they would still happen that way in 2 1/2 months.
Still, we're better off than our friends Jenna and Trevor in Nashville who are looking at more than 2 1/2 half years wait for their permanent residency interview. The fact that processing times in different states vary by that much is absolutely indefensible. Trevor and Jenna are working with their congressman and starting a letter writing campaign. If you're interested in helping out, let me know and I can get you in touch with them.
James and I are now considering a trip to England in late May but much depends on finances (i.e. what kind of work James can get ... need someone to do web development??) and also whether we're up for taking the risk of purchasing flights before the permanent residency interview.
As always, stay tuned and we'll keep you posted. Maybe.
James just got an email notifying him that his Employment Authorization has been approved! That went really fast. The timeline was as follows:
Ironically, the USCIS website states that they are currently processing EAD applications received on February 1. Which renders the USCIS processing times table pretty much useless.
Oh well. We're pretty excited! And have renewed faith in the timeliness of the USCIS.
There is a lot of confusing information out there about whether or not someone who is in the U.S. on a fiance visa can get a Social Security Number. The bottom line is that you can.
James blogs about his adventures getting an SSN here.
...the more confusing they are!
As the USCIS keeps changing the process for securing employment authorization and getting permanent residency, we weren't quite sure what to expect when we mailed in James' applications on June 16. When we sent in our fiance visa application on December 17, 2003, we had a notice of receipt within five days. Twenty-three days after mailing the I-485: Application To Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status and the I-765: Application for Employment Authorization we still hadn't gotten anything notifying us that our application had been received. What's more the checks we had sent with the applications - $315 and $175 respectively - hadn't shown up in our account.
Needless to say, we were rather relieved when we arrived home Saturday evening from a trip to Chicago to discover two envelopes in the mail from the USCIS (actually, I think the stationery they print everything on still says "Department of Justice" and "Immigration and Naturalization Services"): one receipt for the I-485 and one for the I-765. We think the hold-up was the new procedure which requires the Detroit field office (to which we mailed our applications) to forward everything on to the National Benefits Center rather than processing the applications themselves. Anyway, we now have a case number which we can use to track the status of our applications.
According to the USCIS website, the employment authorization process is currently taking 30-90 days and the permanent residency process is taking 120-180 days. While we wish those numbers were smaller, it's still less time than we were told it could take.
Of course, everything could change again within the next sixth months. Or tomorrow, for that matter. With bureaucracy you just never know.
James has blogged about his visit to the US Embassy to get his fiance visa. You can read all about it here and see the actual visa itself.
Only two more days until he comes!
James was issued the fiance visa by the US Embassy in London yesterday. Yippeeee!!
He said there was a lot of sitting around and waiting - some of it which felt rather pointless and inefficient. But it all went smoothly, the embassy official who interviewed him just asked a few routine questions, and James was done with everything (the medical and interview) in just over four hours.
So where are we going from here, you may ask?
James is planning to fly to the US on May 23 (details yet to be worked out with Expedia). My father will marry us in a little ceremony on our back deck on May 29. James' mum is also hoping to fly here on May 28 so she can be with us for the weekend. We're so glad she's going to be able to come!
We're still planning to do the big ceremony and celebration on October 22 complete with wedding dress, attendants, flowers, music, vows, and the whole bit. We'll just be legally married before then. We see ourselves as fitting into traditions - both current traditions from other cultures (including Persian) and more historical Western traditions - that stretch out the wedding celebration and often include more than one ceremony. James promises to blog about it at more length soon.
We're going to do our best to be intentional about celebrating each step in the process and making each special in its own way. With our families and dear friends by our sides, we're confident that we will and excited about what's to come!
UPDATE: James' mum has reserved her ticket and is in fact going to be flying to Chicago on the 28th, going back to the UK on the 31st. It'll be a quick trip (not much hope of adjusting to the time zone...) but we're really glad she can come at all!
6:23 a.m. Saturday morning. The phone woke me up.
I looked at my alarm clock and thought, "That had better be James and he'd better be calling with good news!"
Sure enough! James got his packet from the US Embassy on Saturday morning. (Well, it arrived at his parents' home and his mum called with the news.) His interview is scheduled for 8:00 a.m. this Friday - May 14. Yay!! What a good way to wake up on a Saturday morning! :-)
He's pulling together the last of the bits of information that he needs for that such as vaccination records. And £125 for the medical, £10 for them to post the visa and £60 for the interview - all of which comes to nearly $350 at the current exchange rates. (!!! Sometimes this feels a little bit like extortion, but you do what you have to do...)
We've read enough online accounts of other peoples' visa interview experiences at the US Embassy in London, so we're not feeling too nervous. Still, it will be good to have this over with and James to have the visa in hand. The current plan is for him to fly here on May 23 although he won't book that flight until he's completed the interview and knows that everything is in order. In any case, it's good to have a date to count down to ... yet again!
What a flurry of activity and information the last two weeks have brought us! And the emotional roller coaster has just gotten that much more intense!!
A few days after getting our fiance visa approval letter in the mail, we talked to Nancy, our immigration contact at Rep. Vern Ehlers' office, who informed us that the Adjustment of Status process (i.e. the process by which an immigrant obtains Lawful Permanent Resident status) had changed yet again. Now rather than being handled through regional consulates and requiring a 90-day wait from time of application, AOS for the entire country is being handled through the National Benefit Center and because of the backlog, can take up to a year. Because employment authorization (EAD) and freedom to leave and re-enter the country (parole) are typically tied to AOS, this means that after we get married it could take up to a year before James would be allowed to get a job or leave the country. Bad news. Nancy did give us some reason to hope that because of this change in the timing of AOS processing, the USCIS may make it easier to get EAD and Advanced Parole separately from AOS. We don't have solid information on that yet. So whether or not James will be able to go to Greenbelt is still uncertain, as is when he'll actually be able to work.
Just before James came over two weeks ago and as we were starting to panic because of USCIS' speedy processing as indicated by their website, James looked up the list of documents that he will need to provide at his American Embassy interview (where he gets the actual visa). The only thing he didn't already have was a Police Certificate listing all of his arrests and convictions. (That list will be pretty short...) He filed for that immediately on April 13. The information he was able to get at the time indicated that the certificate could take up to 40 days to arrive - which would put him at May 24. And he needed to have it in his possession before he could let the Embassy know that he was ready to schedule his interview. Not really what we wanted to hear.
And then things started happening dramatically more quickly than we could have ever hoped.
The letter from the Nebraska Service Center indicating that our application had been approved and forwarded to the National Visa Center was postmarked April 12 and received by us on April 16. We were told that the NVC processing usually takes 2-4 weeks to process. But on April 26 we got a letter from them (dated April 22) that they had received our information and would be forwarding it to the American Embassy in London. So now we were just waiting for the Police Certificate and word from the Embassy.
I brought James back to O'Hare on April 26 for his flight back to England. It was a really hard goodbye as we really didn't know how long all this processing would take or when we would see each other again
And then I got a call at 6:45 EDT this morning. It was James telling me that he had gotten the packet from the Embassy this morning. Hooray! And then he called me back 10 minutes later and said, "Promise not to scream in my ear". His mum had called while we were talking to let us know that the police certificate had arrived!! WOOOHOOO!!!
So now I've pulled together most of the documentation needed for the affidavit of support (they need to know that James won't become a dependent of the state) and will send that off to James ASAP. And as soon as he has his interview date I guess I'll be going to get a marriage license.
Things haven't worked out exactly as we'd originally planned. But they are working out somehow. And I guess that's the important part.
Well, the good news is that James is here (i.e. in the US). Thanks to all of you who sent thoughts and prayers our way! I managed to give myself a momentary heart attack on Wednesday by being in the wrong waiting area for James at the International Arrivals area at O'Hare and thus thought his "where are you" call was a "they aren't letting me through" call - especially when I couldn't hear anything of what he was saying and the call was almost immediately dropped. James now tells me that they don't allow the use of cell phones until you are past customs and immigration. Had I known this earlier, I could have saved myself the heart attack.
The "we're not quite sure what to do with this" news is that the 2nd Notice of Action from the Nebraska Service Center came through notifying us that our fiance visa petition was approved. We were expecting that when this letter came we would meet it with overwhelming joy, but the timing of it kind of throws things off. We're still working out exactly what to do from here. Stay tuned for forthcoming information. This does make it likely that we will actually be getting married before October 22, however, there will be something on October 22 and we are going ahead with plans for that.
In October 22 wedding/celebration/whatever it ends up being planning news, we picked up the bridesmaid dresses today (those took 6 1/2 weeks to come in!) and also got all the paper for making the invitations. James is designing those and is doing quite a smashing job of it. I can't wait to see them put together!
The saga continues. At least now we know that the U.S. wants James. Which is certainly happy news for me. :-)
As of Friday the NSC's website said they were processing applications received on or before December 15, 2003. That's just two days before they received ours. We've been reminded that we can't go by what the website says and that even if they are indeed processing applications received on Dec. 15, it could still well be another month or two before they get to ours.
Nevertheless, it's been an emotional and draining weekend as both James' and my thoughts - and conversations - have been full of "what if"? We've discussed all sorts of possibilities and eventualities. Another wrench has been thrown into the mix: it takes up to 40 days to obtain the police certificate that James needs to have in his possession in order to get a visa interview appointment with the American Embassy in London. All of this leads to the very unlikeliness of James actually being able to come to the U.S. on May 18 (and he already has purchased that plane ticket) if our application gets approved before then.
The lesson here is that if your plans are dependent in any way on the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, either don't make plans, or don't cling to them too tightly.
James is flying to Chicago this Wednesday. If you are a praying person, please pray that Immigration will let him through. Thank you.
Apparently my "Go, Lincoln, go!" cheer worked a little too well. Today their website is reporting that the Nebraska Service Center are processing fiance visa applications received on November 30, 2003.
Which now has me freaking out a little bit. At this rate we could very well get approval before May 18 which would not be good because then either James wouldn't be able to come for the summer, or if he did he wouldn't be able to go back for Greenbelt at the end of August (unless he was able to get Advanced Parole which costs a lot to apply for and, we're told, is a long shot if it's not an emergency). Neither option is a situation that we're very thrilled about.
I like surprises and spontaneity in my life but there are some things that I would just to have be a little more predictable.
On pins and needles...
A week ago, the Nebraska Service Center's website said they were processing I-129f (fiance) visa applications that they received on July 24. It had said July 24 since at least January 26 which is the last time we checked. Today it says that they are now processing applications received on September 30. Ours was received on December 17. While we are not putting all of our trust in the NSC's website, we are hoping that this at least represents some progress and are taking it - albeit cautiously - as a good sign.
Go, Lincoln, go!! (that's my inner cheerleader coming out)
*positive vibes being sent toward Lincoln, Nebraska*
I've been getting asked a lot lately how things are going with this fiance visa and immigration process. So for those of you playing along at home, here's an update...
We've submitted the fiance visa application to the Nebraska Service Center (NSC) of the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services (which is part of the Dept. of Homeland Security). All we can do right now is wait.
In this regard, I have the great misfortune of living in Michigan. The Vermont Service Center takes about 15-20 days to process fiance visa applications. No one really knows why the NSC takes so long, but they do, and since I live in Michigan, this is the way it is, no doing much about it. The communication from the NSC states that this type of visa application takes 150-180 days to process (about 5-6 months) but it seems that the current timeline is closer to 7-8 months. Since we submitted our application on December 17, eight months would bring us to August which would be cutting things close, but still okay. We'd prefer to get approval in June or July.
What happens once we get approval from the NSC, they send everything over to the US Embassy in London. We get notified that London has received our paperwork and they give us a list of documents that we need to gather together to present to them. Once we have that list completed, we let them know and give them the date by which we would like to have James enter the country. Based on that, they assign us an interview date.
At least that's the process currently (as we understand it). Things can easily change.
James will be coming here mid-May and staying until the end of July. He'll be going back to England for the month of August to do his Embassy interview and get the fiance visa, spend time with friends and family before moving over, and participate in Greenbelt. As soon as the US Embassy lets him (we're hoping it will be by the end of the first week of September), he'll enter the country on the fiance visa. From that point he won't be able to leave again until he gets his green card which, if things stay as they are currenlty, will happen about 3 months after our wedding.
And just a bit of trivia. Green card holders are no longer called Resident Aliens. The new official term is Lawful Permanent Resident. No more martian jokes. Sorry.
Disclaimer: We love the USCIS. They are just super. We've not had anything but lovely treatment from anyone associated with them and neither have our friends. Just in case you work for the USCIS and found your way here somehow. We're big fans. Hurrah!
Seriously, I have no complaints about any individual associated with the USCIS - they're just doing their jobs like you and me - and strongly suspect that my beef is more with the Bush administration and the culture of fear that they have engendered in the United States since 9/11 with things like the Patriot Act and taking photos of every foreigner to enter US soil. (Plus I find it cathartic to just randomly blame things on the Bush administration sometimes. Especially when I've been reading Anne Lamott...)
In the past month we've found out some more things about recent changes in the immigration process that have blown some of our plans to shite. To start with, James had planned to enter the US in July on a visa waiver, return to the UK in mid-August for Greenbelt and his K-1 Fiance Visa interview at the London Embassy, then enter the US on the fiance visa in early September. Well, we found out - and really this does make sense when you stop to think about it - that James can't enter the US on the visa waiver in July if the London Embassy already has been notified of our application for the K-1. Which, if timing is similar then to what it is now, they almost certainly will have by mid-July.
So that leaves us with three other options. Either James can arrive in the US before the London Embassy gets our paperwork which would most likely mean leaving his job early. Or he can come in July as planned and skip Greenbelt (which would be nigh torture for him). Or he could stay in the UK until after Greenbelt (which would be nigh torture for me). Not a great choice to have to make.
The other problem is that unlike less than a year ago when couples could go get the greencard (via Adjustment of Status, or AOS) the day after their wedding, now we need to go file for AOS as soon as possible after our wedding and wait 90 days for an interview at which we then would - if all goes well - get James' greencard. Which means we probably will not be able to go to England as planned for Christmas '04. The only way that James can leave the country and then reenter after getting married but before getting the greencard is to get Advanced Parole, but we've been told they only give those out in emergency situations and also give themselves 90 days to issue those. Which brings us back to where we started. We've been strongly advised not to even risk leaving the country until James has his greencard. So while not being able to spend next Christmas with James' family in England is not the end of the world, it is disappointing.
Sigh...
On the good news side of things, wedding plans are coming along swimmingly. We've started registering at a number of stores near you (or maybe not so near, but at least easily accessible online). We've reserved a block of rooms at a hotel for our out-of-town guests. (More details about all of that coming soon.) And James has now seen the Post Family Farm and likes it. Just need to send in the deposit and reservation form for that.
And perhaps the best news of all. I found sandals for the wedding that are tres wonderful. I adore them. Now I just need a dress to go with them!
(p.s. the tres above is a reference to Eloise, not me trying to be pretentious. Just in case you rolled your eyes for a second there. Really. ;-) )
The first Notice of Action has been received. The USCIS received our petition for a K-1 Fiance(e) Visa on 17th December 2003. The stationery it was printed on still says "U.S. Department of Justice - Immigration and Naturalization Service." They need to get their act together.
The letter indicates that this type of petition takes 150 to 180 days to process so we will start looking for the next envelope from the DHS around the end of May-beginning of June.
In the meantime, we continue to make plans and every now and then catch our breath a bit.
Woohoo! The K-1 Fiance visa application is in the mail!! It feels so good to have that off my back. Wow. It was quite a process getting everything together, but with much help from James as well as friends Jenna and Trevor (who are now at the back end of this process) and others, it's done.
Note to anyone who is doing this: the USCIS website has lots of helpful and detailed information for putting this stuff together.
This morning I brought the whole packet to Nancy O. who works with citizenship and immigration issues at Congressman Vern Ehlers' office. She looked through it and said it was one of the best put together application packets she had ever seen and thought that we probably have plenty of time to get this all processed in time for an October 22 wedding. She even offered to mail it for me so we could track it. It's very nice when the U.S. Government pays the postage. :)
Now the waiting game begins and we start looking for the first NOA (Notice of Action - this one just telling us that they got it) in the mail.
Our fate is now in the hands of the Department of Homeland Security. How's that for scary?!?
So James suggested that I might want to add an entry early in this blog for those who stumble across it and don't know who we are. Here goes...
I'm Kari. I live in Grand Rapids, Michigan. James lives in Reading, England. We're planning to get married on October 22, 2004 (or if you prefer, 22nd October, 2004).
We met the weekend of March 28-29, 2003 at the Festival of Faith and Music at Calvin College. I work in Admissions at Calvin but also do some work on the side with the Student Activities Office (just because I love it) and had been involved in the planning of the Festival. James has friends in Nashville, and one of his friends there David Dark, who was speaking at the Festival, invited him to come along. Since then we have spent two weeks together (first week of June and third week of September) and kept in touch by email, instant messaging, and daily phone calls. Maintaining a transatlantic relationship is not easy but we've decide it's worth it! We realized pretty early on in our relationship that we were meant to be together for the rest of our lives and decided after James' September visit that the rest of our lives was going to start "officially" in October 2004.
Because James is a British citizen, there is all kinds of legal stuff that needs to be done in order for us to marry and for him to become a permanent resident (aka get a green card). Some of the websites that we have found helpful in this process:
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
I will (hopefully) be recording much more about this process and about wedding plans on this site as we move along. If you're curious, keep an eye on this space. Cash contributions may be sent directly to me. Thanks for your time!