Huzzah! The Government Has Sent Us More Mail!
The D’orsays have gone into a flurry of activity. Mr.D is filling out forms in duplicate and I’m…blogging about it.
The cliff notes version of our journey so far – fill out I-129F forms, the G forms that accompany them and send these (along with $455) to the immigration folks, wait 6 months, receive a letter saying the petition (not the visa) is approved and is being sent to the State Dept., wait 4 weeks, wait on hold at international calling rates to find out your package was sent to the embassy in London the day prior, wait 2-3 weeks and receive a letter from the embassy directing you to two internet links. Set up medical appointment in London (£300 {approx $435} in travel for us to get to London and £180 {approx $260} for the medical appointment). Contact the police for a police certificate (pay £35 {approx $50}, get my tax returns notarized ($75 approx $110), find Mr.D’s birth certificate, passport photos (approx £15 {approx $21}), mail a letter and several forms in duplicate to the embassy, wait, wait, wait and receive an interview date.
Since I’m more efficient than the US government I’m going to give you the two links, though I’m sure if I had searched earlier I would have found them after awhile. This is the link which has the forms you need and this is the link to the medical appointment info (you have to click the link on the right for any real info). I had been tipped off about several of the forms we’d need from WB readers (thanks blightygirl!) and from Visa Journey.com. Because of my fears of not making enough money to sponsor Mr.D my mother has graciously agreed to co-sponsor him to ensure that we’re actually able to be married.
What I wish we had done in retrospect? Applied a year out for the whole process, we thought the second half of the process would be much faster than the first part. Boy were we wrong! We budgeted 6 months for the first step and 2 months for the part we’re in now. We should have budgeted 4-5 months for all the paperwork and mail to go back and forth before the actual interview at the embassy takes place (when Mr.D would hopefully receive his visa). Since the K1 visa is good for 6 months we would have still had plenty of time to use it, AND Mr.D could fly back with me in June.
The way it’s currently looking is that I’ll have to fly back alone in June and Mr.D will have to wait a few months before he can join me. Have I mentioned our wedding is in August? Yeah…. thankfully our wedding is at the end of August which should hopefully allow the government time to approve our upcoming nuptials.
We only budgeted $455 for the K1 visa and $1,100 for the Adjustment of Status part, it’s looking like we should have budgeted $2,000+ for the whole process (bye bye videographer…).
What are some surprise costs that you’ve faced in wedding planning?
April 27th, 2009 at 10:20 am
so i dont actually know you, but managed to stumble across your blog and thought i would comment… immigration is awful!!! by the sound of it, i am in the opposite situation as you. I immigrated to the UK for marriage. Us or UK…man its awful, and expensive!! i feel your pain. People always talk about wedding expense and secretly i think ‘you people have no idea’
hopefully it all works out for you.