EmmillJ

Btw, reading over AFFIDAVITS OF SUPPORT ON BEHALF OF IMMIGRANTS it is this part that concerns me most "(2) If the sponsor relies on the income of any other individual, the sponsor must also attach that individual's Federal income tax returns for each of the 3 most recent tax years."

Hi VJ!

My brother (a USC) is filing for my mom, I-130 and I-485 concurrently. He does not make enough money to sponsor her on his own so I am going to file as her joint sponsor.

I AOSd this year so I did not have a lot of income last year, but I got a really good job and I now make well over the poverty levels. I have been working since October, 2011, will my pay stubs from this period be enough? My husband and I made enough together last year, would it be better for both of us to sign on as joint sponsors?

Thank you for your answers!

Thank you, and yes! I guess it was just bananas....

My DH held my hand through all of this, because I was worried! It feels so good to be done with all of this for a while, we can really start living!

Good news, everyone!! We received the email approval letter today, I'm so happy I feel stunned! When I first read the email I called USCIS just to make sure that it was not an unrelated message like the last one. The agent just laughed and congratulated me as I cried all over the phone. The DH and I are going out to celebrate Good luck to all of you that are still in the process, and keep hope alive!

We got an email and a physical letter this week. The email simply restated that I was approved for work authorization and that I should have received my card already. That was a mean trick because all my eyes saw was "Card/Document Production" and I got excited until my husband pointed out that it was not the GC. We then got a letter in the mail saying that our petition was approved, but that this letter did not confer any legal status, etc. an our online status on uscis.gov is the same. Still, we're keeping our spirits up.

Kristal, good luck on your interview! Wishing you a smooth experience and an on-the-spot approval

Victory loves preparation!

Very, very true!

Wow!! Congrats!

We live on the top floor of my father in law's house and the utilities are included. We didn't have a signed affidavit from my FIL either because he went to China and ended up staying months longer than expected. Still, our IO was satisfied since we had phone bills, cable bills, our tax returns and bank statements going to that address. One thing that may help is if your driver's licences also have your address on them. Our IO asked my husband for his ID which he lost in a cab 2 months ago and hasn't replaced yet. When my husband explained the IO said "How do I know that this is really your address then?" Funny since this is his dad's house and he's lived here for 5 years now.

Good news this week!!!

Congrats!! Still no word yet for us though

Yet, we've waited this long, I guess we can wait a bit more. The IO, I believe, was also from the West Indies. He knew a lot about Antigua's culture and sometimes spoke with an accent. That said, who knows? I don't think they can deny us for this, though. The point was to prove legal entry, and I think we did that sufficiently.

Wow, that was some intense questioning! And if they had asked us for a letter from his job we would be hard pressed since he works in a hospital. His co-workers obviously know but he doesn't interact with management too often. And you needed all this by 3:30 pm? Wow. I'm really happy for you, now you can relax

Also, since everything is computerized now, as long as you have something (in this case your I-94) they should have a record of it in the system.

Hi guys! My husband and I had our interview this past Wednesday at Federal Plaza. Here's how it went:

The agents in the office, security guards, etc. were very nice and polite to us. We got there just in time (security took a while as expected) and we decided not to bring a lawyer.

When we got into the interviewer's office he had us take the oath. He then became serious and said to me "Who are you?" and asked the same of my husband. We each gave our names. He then proceeded to flip through our files and ask us random questions like each others' birth dates, parents' names, do we have children, where do each of us work, where did we get married, what do we do, etc. He would chat with us and, just when we felt it was over would shoot another question at us as if we wouldn't know the answer. Thing is, my husband and I have known each other for almost 20 years so even when he asked me about his high school (he was sent by his dad to boarding school) I could tell him the name and where it was since we had kept in touch. He did not ask us nearly as much as I thought he would, but that's ok. He took our huge pile of bills that we saved (we had taken them out of the envelopes and laid them flat in a file), and some of our pictures. He asked me the yes or no questions, asked me if there are any communists where I come from (I had no clue, but he knew one guy), and asked me if I knew about the island's politics (I did not).

That was the easy part. Now for the hard part.

I came into the US on a B2 visa as a child and so my visa is in my mother's passport. I brought the original with me. He flipped through it and asked me the last time I entered the country and I told him 1991. He asked me if I was sure and I explained, well I was 5, it was Carnival (which happens in August in Antigua), and I came back for school (which starts early in september in NY). He asked if I've ever been back and I explained that I had not. He then typed the visa numbers (or so he said) into the computer printed out a couple of pages and then said, it says here you entered in 1994 as well, which I hadn't. This was the line of questioning for a while and it was intense enough that I almost started wondering if I had ever been out of the country again as a kid. He then said "We have a problem, because it says here that you left in 1994." As I explained to him, I may have been young and may not remember much but I think I would remember that. He then proceeded to ask me to prove that I was who I said I was, made a show of taking my passport and turning it around and asking "Is this real?" That didn't bother me because it is and I could tell he was trying to scare me. He then said "well, I cannot penalize you because you were a minor". I looked at my husband and thought "Penalize me for what?" He asked if I could prove that I was in the U.S. between 1991 and 1994 and, funnily enough, my mother saves EVERYTHING so I have my school attendance records, report cards, and immunization records from 1990 onward. I gave him my immunization record which shows me getting vaccinated in 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, and 1998 and told him I could bring in my school records as well. He seemed satisfied. He made extra copies of my mother's passport before walking us to the door and shaking our hands where he said "I won't need anything else from you, I think this is fine".

I feel....ok. What bothers me is that I don't know if he was lying about the 1994 visa or not. I don't think he was but my husband does. Hy husband's take is that, for all we know, he typed "bananas" into google and then printed out a copy of the page and held them up to us as official documents since we could not see what was written. As far as my husband sees it, we passed because we obviously know each other and each others' families well, have a life together and I did not waver on the 1991 vs 1994 question which was just a ploy to test me. Still, we've had no updates (I've been checking constantly) and the whole thing just felt strange.

Of course, the second I know anything concrete I will share it on VJ

EmillJ.... how was your interview ???

It went...wellish? I'm posting a complete review now!

Also vetoed: Gchat transcripts, old emails, and presents that we gave to each other back in high school

Do you think we have enough???

Yes! You and Up and Away both sound like you are in pretty good shape

Great to see that the NYers are moving along! Congrats!!

I've been putting our interview file together and I have a tendency to over prepare. We've known each other and have been together for such a long time that I have a lot of photos, but we do not have joint insurance, no lease (we live on a floor in his father's house), and had a small wedding ceremony followed by a party. We have a cable bill and some con ed bills from back when the electricity was separate (the whole house is wired onto one bill now). I was concerned about the lack of photos with each others' parents but we never thought to take pictures together..I guess it's not too late? My DH vetoed bringing our wedding photo poster with all our friends' signatures on it, saying that it was over the top and looked like we were putting too much effort into it.

What are you guys bringing to your interviews?

Congrats! It's coming up! My husband is the same way --not worried at all. It makes me worry even more! He's not exactly good with remembering dates.

Seriously, his attitude is always "we'll cross that bridge when we get to it" which is so not my style!

BigDaddyKane, you probably can expect your interview to be scheduled late Feb or early March. I expected ours to be in late January so Feb 1st is not too far off.

Congrats on the successful walk ins, guys! I understand not wanting people to just flout the rules but if they're not busy why not let people do their biometrics early? It is still at their discretions.

By the way, we got our interview letter alert via email today!! It is set for February first. I am nervous but excited, the DH isn't worried at all (of course not, he never is). Time to start brushing up on those questions and getting our documents together...

Anyone still waiting for an interview letter? I'm wondering how long ill be waiting ... I'm expecting 2 months but that might be optimistic...

We still haven't received an interview letter yet. You can check out my signature to get an idea of how long it has taken so far.

BTW, you may as well try a walk-in. It does not hurt your case to try although it may not speed things up either

I proved it by obtaining documents from every country and state that I lived in from 16yrs old till now.

I have records from Florida and Illinois. My mum has received the UK record of non marriage (I will get that also). I also have two letters from the mosques that state that there is no record of me being married or divorced.

So I have six documents proving that there is no record of my being married. Kapow!

Funnily enough there is no way for an IO to obtain these kinds of records but I sure have learned the wisdom in less said the better (Or at least my poor husband has)

Man, good thing you had access to those documents!

An RFE to prove you haven't been married before? How do you prove that? Not to sound dumb but if you were married already wouldn't there be a public record that the IO could easily access? Sorry to hear about your delay, hopefully this gets resolved soon.

WOW. Congrats, you should report that lawyer to the Department of Justice. You could have been a no-show!

so this was my story haha..

ok so my lawyer about a month ago had said that she needed to cancel my interview because of unknown reasons, and well time went on and i kept getting worried because i never got a cancelation letter or anything proving it had been cancelled. so, the day before my scheduled interview i told my husband that maybe he should call immigration because i was not sure they had cancelled and i didn't want to be denied for not showing up. well, he called and it turned out that my lawyer lied and my interview was still scheduled. the next day (day of interview) we went to her office and told them we needed my folder with all my information, and they refused to give it to me because they said the lawyer was not there and because my interview was cancelled. i told them that it was not that my husband had called and it was still on, so they were very rude and i argued with them for about 10 minutes and i told them to at least give me my visa and the permit that i entered the us with. they ended up giving me only that.

i went to my interview, and of course i was on the list!! and they checked me in. the sad thing i was so nervous because i was so unprepared, i only had our insurance with both names, pictures, and the birth certificate of our daughter. the good thing is that we got an awesome immigration officer, and got approved!!

so good luck to everyone, and be very careful with immigration lawyers..

I got a job!! Start date on Monday

Now we're just waiting for the interview letter. I'm not sure if we should bring a lawyer to the interview with us. We had planned to but we fired our last lawyer and we're not too excited at the thought of hiring another.

It's amazing how fast the process is going, at the beginning it seems like it will take forever...

Wow, the last time I checked this thread January filers were finally getting interview dates. Now May filers are getting dates!! And soon July filers, too *crossing fingers*

Congrats!