Since my last post about this, the stakes have been raised. Before, our biggest fear was that Wayne would have to fly to Seattle more than once, in order to do the fingerprinting appointments. Now though, the risk is that an agent with Immigration could take issue with the fact that we're not officially living within the U.S. and therefore, take away Wayne's green card. This is much worse than it sounds as this means Wayne cannot return to the U.S., it would void the $4,000+ we have invested in this process and it would be very difficult to start the process again (and there's no guaruntee he could ever get a Permanent Residency card again).
Essentially the stakes have been raised in that before, we were merely having to "re-prove" that we are, in fact legitimately married. That part's easy. Now, however, we are ALSO attempting to prove that we legally intend to reside in the U.S., that will still have a life there and that this "situation" in Dublin, Ireland is only a temporary move. (temporary for 4 years, so you can imagine, that's hard to explain)
Here's a shot of 43 dividers I organized and labeled. These include about 120 photocopies of every document known to man - to prove that we are married and that this is not a "marriage of convenience". I've taken a shot of the paper with our Table of Contents for the "Evidence" packet and as you can see, it's a little over one page long.
List of Evidence - proving we are married and proving we intend to Permanentlly reside in the United States.
Packet, List of Evidence and 26 family photos, individually labeled with date and explanation for each picture.
So, this morning I mail this packet and pray, pray, pray that the lawyers in Seattle are able to secure Wayne's Green Card. We owe a HUGE THANK YOU to our pastor, Laurie Rudel, our friend Luke Green, and my sister Mimi for writing the affidavits and mailing them to us here in Dublin. Perhaps the biggest thank you should go to Mimi, who paid $50.00 (!!!) to make sure her letter reached us in time (and it has yet to arrive after 9 days). SO sorry Mimi. I'm in the process of hatching a scheme to punish the Irish Post, as we speak (type).
And here are a couple happy pictures from this Sunday - Irish Mother's Day. We took a nice walk out to the East Pier and even got Norah some ice cream. It was a beautiful day and we got a sneak-peek for how busy Dun Laoghaire will get in the Spring and Summer.
Doesn't Wayne look like Nick here?? =)
GIMME that!
And finally, a cute video of Norah enjoying her ice cream.
2 comments:
love the video! more norah! can't believe what you are going through with immigration. they've got to understand that people study abroad!!!!! have you sent them some of the emails or your blog detailing how horrible it is for you? I think you should. If they want to attract great brains to this country and stop the brain drain that we currently experience here, they'd do right to folks like you alone!
Sarah,
That's so funny you just wrote that. I JUST went into my email to send you a link to the new post so you could see it and there was an email from you!! Haha! Thanks for the support. Yes, it's a nightmare. Just spent $100 mailing the packet to Seattle... sheesh. I just keep hearing "Cha-ching-cha-ching-cha-ching" as the costs add up (and as the bank account drains).
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