Tithen

I only use "The" if the place isn't the actual name of the place. Walmart is Walmart. Our Bank is "the bank" or I'd use it's name. Honestly if someone said "I'm going to the walmart" I'd probably poke them about it for a very long time.

Even back home I've never heard "the walmart"

Thanks folks.

I'll try and not worry about it, instead I need to figure out a way to teach DH to quickly convert the speed limits (since they don't quite match up)... he's already had a panic attack about driving 50mph in a 50kmph zone. lol. I keep telling him he'll know the difference since you don't do highway speeds through the middle of a town

I rescheduled mine, for a totally different field office too. Original date was Feb 2nd, rescheduled date was feb 27th and I had my EAD 5 days later. I still AOS'd within the expect time frame too.

yeah, I worked for an auto glass place and we did a lot of removing tints... but never from a non resident vehicle. I think it'd be pretty crappy to pull someone over on vacation for tint that was already applied, I know our insurance policy states the insured vehicle is tinted, so it's not like we're pulling a fast one.

I guess I may have to look into getting the medical reason after all, if they take the tint off the windows, DH can't even sit in the front seat of the car (his skin's too sensitive), bad enough his hands burn trough the windshield when he drives.

I know where I'm from that you cannot tint your front windows (pass or drivers). But down in the US we can.. so of course, DH's windows are tinted.

Does anyone know if this is going to end up being an issue for us this summer while on vacation? You can still see into our car quite well, I won't let him tint them any darker, I already have to wind down my window to see at night at some poorly lit intersections when it's raining.

lol we live in one of the Yellow counties in Wi... so it's Soda there, but DH grew up in southern Illinois. His county seems to say no one says "pop".. but we lived there last year and "pop" was the majority of what I heard.

I go back and forth at home... but I still tend to specify flavor, since sometimes we have more than one option and it's easier to ask "do you want a rootbeer?" cause if I ask if he wants pop, he'll ask what kind. LOL

My family says I sound more American than I did before (I worked in US based Call Centers, I lost my accent rather quickly). Yet DH can always tell when I've called home, because my Canadian (NS/NL) accept comes out in full swing.

I find myself feeling less secure when going out at night. Even if it's just to the van, the sirens go so often here (in a small town of 7000 in Ohio) that I find myself sprinting back and forth with groceries. considering I used to wander along at 2am in Downtown Halifax... it's rather amusing.

I gained 50lbs. At least half of that has to be from food, the other half from a defunct thyroid that I had problems finding someone to treat for me.

I refer to soft drinks by their specific brand to avoid getting weird looks when I say "pop" or the slight accent I have when I say "soda".

we applied while DH was unemployed. When we interviewed he was employed, but they never asked for anything regarding employment at all. They were more worried about things in both our names and photos.

Good luck!

I only did one booster of the MMR and I AOS'd with no problems.

yeah Mac and cheese down here is so fickle. No matter how careful I am, it always turns out like mush. It's like it goes from raw to overdone in the blink of an eye. I know KD can too.. but there's no middle ground with mac and cheese!

I haven't tried to eat freezies... My step son wont eat them, he likes popsicles instead.

Ketchup I don't personally notice the difference in. DH can eat the Canadian Ketchup, but the US version is a lot cheaper so we will take up at least one large bottle with us. And I figure since I have to cook special meals for him because of his disorder, I may as well take up what I know he likes so I don't have to feed him nothing but pizza (hmm... can't even get his pepperoni up there I don't think.. anyone see Hormel turkey pepperoni in Canada recently?).

I'm sure I'll find a list of things to bring back with me! I'd rather wait and do with out until I go home (I will drive home every 2 years for sure, every year if possible) than have someone mail it to me... since it's so expensive. My grandmother mailed me a box of sugar twin and it cost $8!

I bring large amounts of groceries back to the US the other way when I visit my parents in Canada. Condiments are high on my list as is Cdn KD.

If it's packaged and not opened you're generally just fine. The US border simply asked what we're bringing back and I say some groceries that we can't get in the USA. They ask if I have fresh vegetable and fruits and sometimes they peak in the back window and then shake their heads at my grocery bags

Items I've brought in the past include:

ketchup

PC jams

PC pancake syrup

cereal

Knorr Alfredo sauce pkgs

Swiss Chalet Sauce

No Name onion rings

PC salad dressings/ sauces

Chips

Krap Dinner

baking items - flour, baking mixes etc

Campbell's soups

V8 Go! juice

other canned items.

I bring a lot of snack items up to my family in Canada - most notably Cheezits

oh you're giving me so many ideas!!!! We might need a bigger trailer.

Everything will be packed in clear plastic containers. I'm assuming since I'm moving my things down from Canada they're going to stop us and poke around, so we are going to make it as easy as possible for them to view what we've got. I'm not looking forward to making that list AT ALL.

My cooking sauce and KD are my two big misses. I'd like to find some deli style honey mustard too... but that was hard to find even when I was living there! Ohh.. and Purity hard bread... hadn't though of that one. I need to make a list!

Madam, did you know you used the word "ghastly" in the same sentence as A1 sauce ? eh?

Steak is not steak without A1.

I hate the stuff. I can't handle the smell. I had to buy a bottle for my husband to put in his lunch box so I could stop putting it in little containers and gagging while doing the dishes. I don't like the Cdn or the USA version, I don't like HP sauce. I'm a bbq sauce on my beef kind of girl. LOL

Yeah, I'm sure the boy can handle eating Canadian Beef... It's a pretty good step up from American beef.. he's just going to smother it in that ghastly A1 sauce anyway. It would all be processed foods, unopened etc. It makes me feel better that it shouldn't be a huge problem! I'll be sure that we dispose of our fruits and veggies before we hit the border. I've got a friend requesting some food too... Wonder if I can write that off as a gift? lol. Her husband wants some peanut butter cookies and she wants something called goober...

I was hoping to get a cozy coupe for my little cousin for her birthday, but it costs more than the gift limit and I really don't want to pay duties on it

That is completely and entirely not true. Just sayin...

If a bank cannot run a credit check on you, they can deny you as a customer, we had a lot of them do so including two very large national banks. We eventually gave up and he opened an account of his own with out me at a bank near our home. Even Walmart wont give you a card with out your SSN (you can buy the card and load it once, but you can't register it and get your own name on it, with out a SSN). Something to do with the Patriot Act.

thank you so much for the responses that was really helpful

answering question, better prospects mean pay raise in the first two weeks of work, he gets just as much money as on the job he has now, which is about 5000 a year over the poverty line. Hope thats enough but his mother, who worked or the government and recently retired is gonna be a second sponsor so i dont think that we will have a problem with that. I was just cheking that the empolyer changes from paperwork to interview but we will take another form to the interview.

I know this is a little off topic but when it comes to approving the paperwork how important is it to have conjoined bank accounts, life insurance or phone bills together? cause since i came here on a tourist visa i have no phone, or bank account (getting me in my husbands bank account is being very difficult because my visa has expired) or anything like it?

i have plane tickets, photos, emails, my visa says i came to visit my then boyfriend, etc. in the end i have a lot of proof of bona fide but not a lot of legal background, will this become a problem?

All we had was our lease and our tenants insurance in both names. Our phone are both pay as you go. It wasn't a problem at all for us. You can always bring things to your interview that you didn't have available to submit in your packet. Are you applying for an EAD? as soon as it arrives go get your SSN, and start combining things then. They know you can't be on his bank account right now, in fact a bank that gives you a card with out an SSN can get in a lot of trouble (that's what the bank told us). Submit what you have. Accumulate the rest as you can and take it to the interview (original and a copy in case they want to keep it). If they RFE you, you just get what they're looking for. I really do recommend getting onto his lease. If he owns the home, get on the insurance for it.

We are spending 3+ weeks in Canada this summer. When he came to visit me, he was miserable. He has a sensory disorder that involves food, and as we all know, foods taste different across the border.

I'm just wondering if anyone has a link that will tell me how much food I can take across for him? things like Ketchup, A1, taco sauce? I don't want to have it packed into the car and have them take it at the border. I'm pretty sure he would cry. If I can't take it, I'd like to start shipping it up now.

Also... anyone got a link on how much food I can bring back with me? I really miss my Honey Garlic cooking sauce and would love to bring a bunch of it back! lol. Oh and Kraft dinner.. I would give anything for KD! Mac and Cheese just doesn't cut it. It's so not the same. I'm bringing all my belongings with me (I have that form), I just wasn't sure if food would count because I haven't owned it for a year.

Everything in both directions would be unopened.. heck I'll even cart the garbage back to the US if I have to. It would be larger quantities coming back to the US if allowed.. but still for personal use.

I have browsed the border websites, but I'm guessing at least one person on here has actually done it, and will have some answers for me that wont confuse me!

We had planned a 3 week visit regardless... my husbands way of making it up to me for keeping me away for so long. A few extra days wouldn't upset me, since it will be another year before I get to go back again. If I can have it sent to our apartment that'd be great, I'll just drop it in the mail after I see my guarantor that way DH doesn't have to mind my little cousins in the car while I go and drop it off at the office.

Green Card arrived, no troubles in my married name. I was one happy girl yesterday when it was in the mail box. Next hurdle.. the drivers license. We call Wi home (we are in Ohio right now)... their site isn't 100% clear on what they do with immigrants and getting a Wi license. I'm really hoping I can walk in, pass the vision test and go with my license. I really don't want to retake the drivers test. I know DH didn't have to do anything special to exchange his out of state one for a Wi on when he moved there.

We filed while my husband was actually unemployed. He's a contract worker, so there is always work, he just has to wait for it to start. A month later he had another job. They didn't ask us anything at all about it, I took all the information to the interview, told her we had it she said it didn't matter, what we'd submitted would get it approved.

We moved in January. We rescheduled our biometrics for another city, which put us in a new queue for interview (from Milwaukee to Cincinnati). It delayed us 3 weeks for metrics. Everything was still completed within 4 months.

congrats!

I had the exact same question.. since the "follow the instructions" made me think that there was something we still had to do!

We kinda had this happen after change of addresses. My maiden name wasn't on our hotel suite (we lived there for over a month) and one employee was sending all the mail back despite the fact there was a note pinned to the computer not to. In all she returned 5 pieces of USCIS mail... I was so livid since 3 of them were after we changed the reservation to have my maiden name on it! So it wasn't the post man, just the front desk person who seemed to have it out for me (in total, she returned over 25 pieces of mail, including a package that was so damaged by the time it got back to the sender it coudln't be resent)

I hope the paper comes quickly for you!

Green Card officially in my hands! Not bad since I got the email it was picked up by USPS only this morning (email arrived at 3am), it was waiting for me in my mailbox when I got home from errands. From Interview to my hands in 10 days

I'm excited. But now I really wish I could go home and see my family!

I do have one question. They issued it in my married name (yay!).. but it's signed in my maiden name (from my EAD)... is this going to present an issue since I'm changing my passport and drivers license to my Married name this summer?

I had no problems AOSing on my VWP. I didn't come here intending on getting married. I knew we had plans to be married, but not on my trip. I was very honest with the border guy about that. Yeah, I had to do secondary... I said the same thing. They asked me why I didn't just get married and stay.. I informed them that it wasn't allowed to go down expecting to marry and stay. They stamped me and off I went.

5 months 4 days later we got married. On the same trip. Things changed, we now could go get married. So we did.

My intent never changed. Our circmstances did. I wanted to go home at the end of my visit.. but the reality was... I'd be stuck out of my loves arms for 6 months if I did. I'd break his son's heart by leaving him. So.. we got married.

USCIS didn't really have much to say about it.

However, I have been told that getting married before you're in the country 90 days can raise eyebrows.

lol thanks. I didn't know if it needed to be returned or what not. I wouldn't mind keeping it since they lost our airline tickets (stupid lawyer for sending them in in the first place)... would give me something to hang on to.

Since she couldn't approve on the spot, they didn't keep my EAD...

What do I do with it once my GC arrives?