We're married, and currently in the US. Now what?

[Taetag girl 0]

I am Canadian, and my husband is American. We have just recently gotten married and between the two of us we have four children (he has two, I have two and we are the only living biological parents of our children). Our goal is of course to live here in the states and raise our family together as soon as possible. It's been difficult on the kids travelling back and fourth over the border to get to this point and being ripped apart after staying for weeks at a time when my kids and I go back to Canada, and we are concerned about what things will look like for our kids when we have to go back to Canada now and wait out the CR1 process, which is what we have been intending to do all along.

Now that I'm here, especially after observing my children and the attachment they have formed for my husband (who they now really know as daddy) and their brothers here, everything in me wants to stay. Other than the fact that my husband and I are Christians and want to do things honestly and legally, I have no reason to go back to Canada at this point! What I'm wondering is if it would actually be illegal to decide to stay here at this point and file for an adjustment of status, since we were not actually intending to stay originally when we came here. Is that dishonest? I was very upfront with the border guard when I crossed, explaining that I was coming to the States to marry, and that we planned on filing for a CR1 visa afterwards and that the kids and I would return to Canada after a month. The month is almost up now and I'm not even sure based on these boards when the next time I'll be allowed to visit my husband and sons again once the cr1 is in motion. I know that legally, Canadians are supposed to be allowed to visit the states for 6 months out of the year... is that still true for cr1 applicants? It seems after reading a lot of the stories on these boards that people have trouble getting over the border to visit their spouses for even a few weeks at times, let alone months. My husband is now supporting us financially as I am a homeschooling mom and putting the kids in school/keeping a steady job would have been nearly impossible for me with all the back and fourth we've been doing visiting the states over the last year we've been engaged. As a result I do not have a lot of ties to Canada and I am pretty concerned about trying to make frequent visits.

Any advice/help???

Edited September 5, 2012 by canadianjoy

[Darnell 8,478]

http://www.visajourney.com/content/i130guide2

Read a bit, refactoring as you wish.

[Taetag girl 0]

http://www.visajourney.com/content/i130guide2

Read a bit, refactoring as you wish.

Okay thank you - that's pretty clear then. No adjustment of status for us Can anyone tell me if they've had luck visiting for more than a month at a time or up to 6 months WHILE the CR1 visa is processing? I know I need to return to Canada for the interview at the American embassy, but other than that, we'd like to be here as much as we are legally allowed to be. Would it be okay with the border guards for me to come to the states for long visits or will I likely be turned away due to the pending cr1?

[l j m 3]

We have had no issues crossing through the CR1 process, and we were nervous at first. Having said that, we live in border towns (45 minutes apart) and my husband has strong ties to Canada (up to date paystubs, heat & electric bills to his house, visa statement with transactions that happen in canada for proof that he uses his visa IN canada. He carries this with him every time he crosses the border, even before we started this process because we were married--and he has been asked for it multiple times and told multiple times to always make sure he has it...)....again, we live in border towns so he's coming over for a night twice a week and not three months at a time. We did take a trip in the middle of July and were away for 10 days and had no issues. If you have no ties to Canada, it would be a different story, I think.

[Ryan H 3,813]

Moved from IR-1/CR-1 Process & Procedures to Canada regional forum; OP is now asking about travel to the US from Canada while a spousal visa petition is pending (see post #3).

[Krikit 1,164]

Ugh. That link Darnell gave needs to be revamped. There is absolutely no reason why you cannot stay and adjust status. Check out the Adjustment of Status from other visas forum. (Link below.) You will learn a lot in there. Also be aware that Canadians have a special relationship and status with the US, so take advice from non-Canadians with a grain of salt. Their situations and abilities are completely different than ours.

http://www.visajourney.com/forums/forum/130-adjustment-of-status-from-work-student-tourist-visas/

Welcome to VJ.

[Darnell 8,478]

Ya, Krikit, I was hoping she'd read it, and then SEE THE PATH that's available to her.

I guess she saw the warning message and got spooked a bit.

[Taetag girl 0]

Darn - I wish I had seen the other posts after I left my last reply. We are back in Canada now and trying to plan another visit for Thanksgiving and Christmas. We haven't started the cr1 process yet because we were waiting on our name changes. (My kids have just been granted a legal name change to my husband's name, and I am getting my own id changed to my married name now as well - but now we are waiting on the documents such as birth certificates for the kids and passports for the three of us, etc to be returned to us)

Is it going to be a problem going back in to the country in mid-November when we just returned to Canada the end of September??

We crossed the border by car at the beginning of August and planned to stay until September 11th, but we ended up staying almost two weeks later and drove back to Canada on the 27th.

An AOS is out of the question now that we have already made it known that we got married the last trip (we were totally honest with the border guards about my intent to marry and then return to Canada, which is exactly what we did). I wish there was a faster way to do this though - I miss my husband so much, and it's so hard on the kids. Not that anyone reading this wouldn't get that it's a tough process!