Saturday, March 30, 2013
Travel Dates!!
We finally got confirmation from the embassy for our visa appointments! I was hoping to get word this soon, but not quite expecting it at the same time. At first I was worried that we might be travelling too soon and that it might interfere with DJ's birthday party, but luckily it all works out. Since the agency is closed for Easter weekend, emails have been sparse, which has been very hard for me. I'm extremely grateful that our agency is still emailing us, but I think I might have preferred them wait until Monday so I could have just called and gotten all of my answers at once. Anyways, the important information that I do have is that our group is leaving on May 1st! Yay!! Now the hard part....waiting until Monday evening to call and talk details! ;-)
Monday, March 18, 2013
Visa updates
I got an email Friday morning and was going to post about it, but personal stuff came up and I am just now sitting down to update. The situation was actually just resolved an hour ago. So, lucky you, you get to skip the suspense of waiting all weekend like I had to! Here's the run-down of what has happened:
On Thursday, I received a form email from the US Embassy letting us know that they have finished processing our Article 5. (This is the day after our agency informed me that it had been picked up, so yay for prompt agency communication!) The email then explained at length what happens next. (In a nutshell, Article 5 goes to headquarters, they issue TA, agency makes Embassy appointments, we travel on those dates) The email was to try to explain that we needed to give our agency 5 "preferred" dates and they would try to honor those, but couldn't guarantee, etc. Also, it mentioned to please make sure we have at least 48 hours after our appointment before our departing flight just in case of any delays. Things I'm sure our agency will explain to us as well. All in all, not a necessary email, but helpful in reading about the details that are going on behind the scenes. (I am SO glad our agency will make the appointment for us!!) At the end, it had a link to the embassy's website. I went ahead and poked around there because I thought, why not. They had a FAQ's page, including a special section just for expats! For the first time, I feel we are trodding familiar ground! However, one of the questions had me very worried:
On Thursday, I received a form email from the US Embassy letting us know that they have finished processing our Article 5. (This is the day after our agency informed me that it had been picked up, so yay for prompt agency communication!) The email then explained at length what happens next. (In a nutshell, Article 5 goes to headquarters, they issue TA, agency makes Embassy appointments, we travel on those dates) The email was to try to explain that we needed to give our agency 5 "preferred" dates and they would try to honor those, but couldn't guarantee, etc. Also, it mentioned to please make sure we have at least 48 hours after our appointment before our departing flight just in case of any delays. Things I'm sure our agency will explain to us as well. All in all, not a necessary email, but helpful in reading about the details that are going on behind the scenes. (I am SO glad our agency will make the appointment for us!!) At the end, it had a link to the embassy's website. I went ahead and poked around there because I thought, why not. They had a FAQ's page, including a special section just for expats! For the first time, I feel we are trodding familiar ground! However, one of the questions had me very worried:
"2. What type of U.S. visa should I pursue for my adopted child?If adopting parents currently live outside of the United States, their child may not automatically acquire U.S. citizenship upon arrival in the United States. For more information on the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, please see the Department of State’s website for intercountry adoption.Children adopted by U.S. citizens who currently reside overseas and who intend to continue residing overseas may apply for a nonimmigrant visa upon receipt of an approved U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) appointment for expeditious naturalization. Information on filing an N-600K to obtain this approval is available at USCIS’s website. U.S. citizens currently residing overseas, and who intend to take up residence in the United States. upon their adopted child’s entry to the United States, should apply for an immigrant visa. Please note than an immigrant visa application does require a U.S.-based address."
I immediately emailed our agency and asked if they knew anything about this. I got a reply pretty quickly saying that they weren't sure, but we were marked for an "immigrant visa", which is what took an extra 2 days getting our Article 5. An immigrant visa is what we want so that Z can gain immediate citizenship and get her passport right away.
Then, the next day (Friday), I received an email from our case officer at the embassy saying that we would be getting a non-immigrant visa and explaining the process of filing the N-600K to obtain citizenship. Basically, this would involve needing to wait for a certificate of citizenship, which I have heard takes 6-8 weeks before we could get her a passport. That waiting would be in the states away from my current children and husband. I do NOT want to be away from home that long! I immediately called and explained our situation. She said that we might be able to switch to an immigrant visa based on the length of time that we have left (less than 6 months by the time we adopt), but that she wasn't sure what the process of switching was. She thought we might have to re-submit forms or submit new forms altogether. This may add time and/or cost, but she wasn't sure. Of course, we could still stay with the non-immigrant visa if it would be too much of a hassle. She would look into it and email me back by Monday at the latest. I am SO glad I called! She was so kind and understanding and genuinely wanted to help, regardless of how much additional work it meant for her. That would be a first for me when dealing with a government agency!! It's been 3 days since I talked to her and I am STILL impressed!! :-)
Well, so all of that build-up and here it is, Monday. She was true to her word and emailed me an answer. After contacting NBC (National Benefits Center, not the TV station) about our situation, they determined that they will be able to adjust Z's visa to an immigrant (IH3) visa at the embassy with NO additional action needed on our part! None! No paperwork, no costs, no delays!!! I cannot tell you how excited I am!! In my eyes, this is just 1 more miracle in this process. A government agency working extra to help someone out and not requiring more jumping through hoops? That just doesn't happen!
Monday, March 11, 2013
Ready
The last time I blogged, I was freaking out about how soon we might be travelling and I didn't think I was ready yet. Well, I have since made a complete 180. On Thursday of last week, I was driving to pick up L & N from Kindergarten and it hit me. I knew our Article 5 was going to be picked up on the 12th. Suddenly, I really wanted it to be picked up sooner so we could travel sooner. Since then, I have been secretly hoping for an email saying that he picked it up early because he just happened to swing by and they had it, or something along those lines. That hasn't happened. Then this morning when I woke up, I was SO excited and I was thinking about what time it was in Crescent Moon and how he might already be picking it up and sending it to the headquarters so they could issue our Travel Approval! Then, I saw the calendar and realized that today is only the 11th. :-( I'm glad that I'm finally excited to go, but I wish I didn't have another month of waiting!
In case I wasn't excited enough, my sister also had a dream about Z last week! In her words, "She was do sweet and just knew English she was telling me how she couldn't see but the one thing she could was gods face and she was so loving hugging everyone it was so awesome:)"
As for our visa, the embassy has recently outsourced visas to another office!! I can't tell you how happy I am to know this! I called them and we will have to wait until we have booked our flights & hotel because they won't even consider the application without that in hand. It seems a bit risky, but at this point that seems trivial. So, hopefully we can get our dates soon and start working on that.
I spent more time than I care to think about on the phone (international long distance at that!) the other day calling various places to try to get some answers about getting Z's passport. Everyone basically confirmed what I had already guessed. We will need to apply in person to the agency in Chicago and will hopefully be able to get it the same day (or at least 2-3 days). It will cost a lot, but we already knew that was going to be the case. The things I did learn and I am SO grateful that I learned are that I need a form filled out by D and notarized stating why he can't be there in person and that he gives permission for me to get Z's passport myself. (That would have been a last minute round-trip plane ticket mistake!) I also need to have a return trip to Germany already booked within 14 days or they won't consider us either. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to risk booking the return flight before I had the passport in hand, but now I know I need to and can do it earlier to save a bit of money. So, I would say the hours I spent on the phone (and whatever the subsequent bill will be) was time & money well spent.
In case I wasn't excited enough, my sister also had a dream about Z last week! In her words, "She was do sweet and just knew English she was telling me how she couldn't see but the one thing she could was gods face and she was so loving hugging everyone it was so awesome:)"
As for our visa, the embassy has recently outsourced visas to another office!! I can't tell you how happy I am to know this! I called them and we will have to wait until we have booked our flights & hotel because they won't even consider the application without that in hand. It seems a bit risky, but at this point that seems trivial. So, hopefully we can get our dates soon and start working on that.
I spent more time than I care to think about on the phone (international long distance at that!) the other day calling various places to try to get some answers about getting Z's passport. Everyone basically confirmed what I had already guessed. We will need to apply in person to the agency in Chicago and will hopefully be able to get it the same day (or at least 2-3 days). It will cost a lot, but we already knew that was going to be the case. The things I did learn and I am SO grateful that I learned are that I need a form filled out by D and notarized stating why he can't be there in person and that he gives permission for me to get Z's passport myself. (That would have been a last minute round-trip plane ticket mistake!) I also need to have a return trip to Germany already booked within 14 days or they won't consider us either. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to risk booking the return flight before I had the passport in hand, but now I know I need to and can do it earlier to save a bit of money. So, I would say the hours I spent on the phone (and whatever the subsequent bill will be) was time & money well spent.
Saturday, March 2, 2013
Waiting
I called our agency the other night mainly to try to figure out how long it will take me to get Z's US passport so we can come back to Germany ASAP. I need to call or email Immigration to figure that out. Ugh! I hate relying on them because the last time I did that we had our fingerprint fiasco where the rep I saw in person didn't care what I was told over the phone. I think I will email this time so I can print it out and bring it with me as "proof". Fun times....
While I had our agency on the phone, I asked about projected timeline. Our NVC letter is in Crescent Moon now. Our Article 5 letter will be picked up on the 12th and taken to the main center for adoption. Once they receive that letter, they will issue our TA in 2-3 weeks. Our agency said that things have been moving very quickly lately, so it may be even quicker than that. Crescent Moon will send the TA to our agency and they will schedule appointments with the consulate in Crescent Moon and let us know when to buy our tickets. We will be travelling with a group and it sounds like we don't have any say over when we go since it's up to the groups' TA's and when we can get appointments. She said we could travel as early as April 17, but it could also be in the next few weeks after that. I am freaking out about that! On one hand, I want to travel and get Z as soon as possible, but on the other hand, this has been so far in the future for so long that it seems strange to have it finally be close. And DJ's birthday is on April 18th and I was planning on having his party on the 20th. It's close enough that it might be ok to risk it but if we have to leave and miss his party, that would be the worst thing I can imagine. As it is, I'll probably just have the party the weekend before just to be on the safe side even though it's a bit further from his actual birthday. I really hope we don't have to miss his actual birthday, but that seems pretty unlikely.
We need to try to get our visas approved before that, but I'm not sure how doable that will be since we don't have details yet. The website for our Crescent Moon embassy says that part of what we need to bring when we submit our application are flight & hotel reservations, which we obviously won't have for a while. I am hoping they can be lenient on this point, but we are in Germany so that would take another miracle. Before we waste a morning travelling to Frankfurt only to be told no, I will try to call the embassy to see what they say. Hopefully the visa department is better at answering the phone than the authentication department, because they NEVER answered! We'll see....
While I had our agency on the phone, I asked about projected timeline. Our NVC letter is in Crescent Moon now. Our Article 5 letter will be picked up on the 12th and taken to the main center for adoption. Once they receive that letter, they will issue our TA in 2-3 weeks. Our agency said that things have been moving very quickly lately, so it may be even quicker than that. Crescent Moon will send the TA to our agency and they will schedule appointments with the consulate in Crescent Moon and let us know when to buy our tickets. We will be travelling with a group and it sounds like we don't have any say over when we go since it's up to the groups' TA's and when we can get appointments. She said we could travel as early as April 17, but it could also be in the next few weeks after that. I am freaking out about that! On one hand, I want to travel and get Z as soon as possible, but on the other hand, this has been so far in the future for so long that it seems strange to have it finally be close. And DJ's birthday is on April 18th and I was planning on having his party on the 20th. It's close enough that it might be ok to risk it but if we have to leave and miss his party, that would be the worst thing I can imagine. As it is, I'll probably just have the party the weekend before just to be on the safe side even though it's a bit further from his actual birthday. I really hope we don't have to miss his actual birthday, but that seems pretty unlikely.
We need to try to get our visas approved before that, but I'm not sure how doable that will be since we don't have details yet. The website for our Crescent Moon embassy says that part of what we need to bring when we submit our application are flight & hotel reservations, which we obviously won't have for a while. I am hoping they can be lenient on this point, but we are in Germany so that would take another miracle. Before we waste a morning travelling to Frankfurt only to be told no, I will try to call the embassy to see what they say. Hopefully the visa department is better at answering the phone than the authentication department, because they NEVER answered! We'll see....
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