DaveAndAnastasia

Mini-Dave got his first haircut, years ago, after PRG got one too many comments about our cute little girl. And pretty much makes sure he gets his hair cut every month (since Covid, she has done mine too). Nephew-Dave (who's in his last year of middle school, IIRC) has very long hair; PRG always tells me whenever we see him (though back in our hotel or whatever and far from sister-Dave) that she'd never let her son keep his hair that long ...

PRG's grandfather passed a couple years ago without ever seeing mini-Dave in person. She still has one grandmother alive (if grandma-PRG were ten years younger, she'd be far more likely to visit us on this side of the Atlantic than mama-PRG, but not really up for a long trek to Moscow and another long flight for a third-country meetup at her age). And apparently Russia changed the law, so now in order to go back to Russia PRG needs to get her name changed on her Russian passport (still has PRG's maiden name, not my last name, because changing it would have been a pain) which requires doing some stuff in-person at the Russian embassy. At least from here getting to DC is a half-day drive or very short flight instead of an adventure, but probably won't do it without definite plans to go (which until the war ends and you can at least fly to major European hubs nonstop from Moscow again, if not to the US, is a nope).

Dunno; PRG cuts the grass here (acquired new electric mow-lawner a few months ago now that we have an actual house). I'm the one with the allergies, but it's really that PRG has more free time in the morning on weekdays. Mini-Dave will get stuck with the job eventually, but he's still got another year until kindergarten (one day too old to apply to get in early; sure he'd be academically up to it, socially, probably not) so it'll be a while. Checking county school district web site every week or so to see when we should start filing paperwork. Want to get him in year-round school (a 3-week-ish break in late spring or early fall should in theory be more convenient for visiting PRG's family than a long summer break in peak tourist season and also when it's very hot nearly everywhere in the Northern Hemisphere), but supposedly year-round and magnet applications here have only about a 50% success rate, though with better odds for first year at the school (so K is the best time). Have pretty much decided to do everything in our power to make a meetup with PRG's mom and sister happen next year, as that will be six years without seeing her family in person. Idea is to go from Raleigh to London*, spend a night or two, spend a week in Turkey, spend a night in London again on the way back, and then come home (hopefully at a time that I can avoid returning to work for a few days). * also nonstops from RDU to Paris and Frankfurt, but London is cheaper and British isn't too different of a language from American

If you're doing a spousal visa so they have a green card right away, no there aren't any travel restrictions other than ensuring you spend enough time in the US to maintain residency between entering the US and applying to remove conditions, renew a green card, and/or US citizenship. If you're doing a K-1, you need advance parole or a green card before leaving the US if you want to return without starting all over with a new visa.

Your immigrant spouse doesn't adjust from a CR1 to a IR1, (s)he removes conditions on a his or her permanent residence. You always have to do this on a fiancé(e) visa; on a spousal visa if you've been married for two years when you enter the US you get an IR-1 visa and a non-conditional green card that you don't need to adjust status from. Back when we did things it was taking about 9 months from filing petition to visa issue for a K-1 and about 18 months for a CR-1. Plus there were no Utah zoom marriages then and given that I couldn't realistically spend a month in Russia to marry there and Anastasia couldn't realistically get a US tourist visa to marry here (even pre-war in Ukraine, young single Russian women rarely got tourist visas approved) we would have had to marry in a third country to do a CR-1. And we wanted to have a child soon (and our son was born a little over a year after she arrived in the US), so working ASAP wasn't a huge priority. And this was pre-Covid when we didn't really know or care that the state department basically wouldn't care about fiancé(e)s in an emergency. So we did a K-1 then, and I think it was the right decsion then. But now, for any couple that can overcome the logistical hurdles to make a US/Russia relationship work these days, I wouldn't advise doing one.

Perhaps Lot understands and accepts points in p-Math, but Southwest does not. 🤣 Actually have a decent collection of my own stuff despite not being much of a DIY home improvements guy (and, y'know, living in rented housing until two years after I married PRG).

Five years of marriage with PRG today. Still contemplating how incredibly implausible my non-work life now would have seemed to me before we met (prior romantic attempts on my part being ... really unsuccessful), and very glad she's part of my life. For some reason mini-Dave's daycare seemed to think "he'll be four soon" meant "he's four now" (corrected them on this a few times), so he was in a class with slightly older kids for a few weeks. Seems happier with new class (though this is only day 2). Also started soccer, which he seems to be having fun with. Watches some British cartoons on YouTube, so will need to make sure he doesn't start calling it football (nothing wrong with soccer, but futbol no es football). Met up with a couple of guys I know from an online college football fans group over the weekend. Despite rain, and a baby shower taking up the room with the kid-height tables, was good to meet some other people here. Also have an old college friend in town; need to catch up with him again (did meet while I was here over Christmas break). Arranged for parents-Dave to visit for mini-Dave's birthday (have been to every one but his 0th); paid for tickets entirely with airline points that had been sitting around unused (because buying points isn't very efficient, three transcontinental tickets was way more than I had in points, and it's usually a good idea to get all tickets in one transaction when traveling together). Wonder if papa-Dave will do more minor household repairs and upgrades this time; won't be able to bring his tools when flying instead of driving.

Closed on old place on Friday because county recorder's office has meetings today. Closing on new place on Tuesday. Staying here until Friday anyway. Trying to get away with only taking one day off of work because the movers say they should be here on Monday and I have President's day off work, but we'll see. Going out for dinner tonight with neighbors. Haven't seen them much since they had their second baby, but they've been good friends to us here. Papa-Dave has put together long list of stuff from the inspector's report that he says he can fix; will be there later next week with mama-Dave (who gets to play with mini-Dave, though we've already found a new preschool for him). NC law apparently means he needs to see a doctor in NC or a neighboring state before starting preschool in NC, so have an appointment with the closest pediatrician I could make an appointment with online for a holiday. Anything he can't fix we'll need to call professionals.

There are a few countries where US permanent residents can normally visit legally without a visa, but they're in the Americas.

And that's probably a short-term thing. After we move, will no longer be starting work at 7 am and so have some free time between signing off for the day and picking up mini-Dave from preschool. /though PRG's job won't let her start earlier than 7 Pacific, so I think I'll be making dinner every day we don't go out instead of just most days //not really a problem; I like cooking; made some Hungarian goulash yesterday because mini-Dave decided he didn't like stroganoff so tried to come up with something else to do with the meat and that turned out well, even if I used cheap store-brand paprika despite recipe calling for imported Hungarian sweet paprika

Also pro: You fill out a USCIS-supplied form to use a credit card. It cannot be made out to the wrong person, have some missing or incorrect information in the memo box, or anything like that. /I used a credit card for everything without issues.

In California they don't send a response unless your request for excuse / rescheduling is denied. Anastasia has gotten 3 summons for jury duty. First one (while still an LPR) - checked "not a citizen", mailed back. Second one - filled out request to delay online Second one - filled out request to delay online even though we'll have moved out of state by the summons date because requesting a delay is simpler

Dunno, only one I ever had many dates with was PRG despite how old I was when we met. And "hope the girl who looked really cute on one of the few non-scammy Russian dating sites in existence, had a nice profile, and seemed nice in one email was busy and not blowing you off and so will respond to a follow-up" doesn't seem like a replicable plan, even if getting back and forth from Russia wasn't a pain right now. Also, much more likely to find a brunette that way.

I mean, if they paid us like we lived in San Francisco, we could afford to stay in San Diego (we want to see my family more than 2-3 times a year, and PRGs at least once a year*). However, no one seemed willing to do this. New job is going pretty well three months in, and both PRG and I are fully remote (and I mostly work with people in Eastern time anyway). So that's fine. One time thing. * If flying from 'Murrica to Russia becomes possible again. If it's third-country meetups or workarounds to get into Russia (and as long as I'm working for a defense contractor, I think the latter is likely PRG traveling alone or with mini-Dave but without me) indefinitely, I think it'll probably be every other year, but want to make a third-country meetup this summer happen because it'll have been five years. Mini-Dave still has one living great-grandparent in Russia who we'd like to get to see him in person at least once, but that'll take going to Russia (if she were fifteen years younger, would be easier to convince to go outside of Russia than PRG's mom).

So since my last check-in here, we've - Visited the Raleigh area between Christmas and New Years (mini-Dave was informed that Santa knew we would be flying early Christmas morning and so stopped at our place on Christmas Eve) to evaluate potential relocation (we want a house with a yard, to be closer to my family, to save money, and we don't really have close friends or family out here). Parents drove up from Florida to meet us after Christmas morning with my brother and his wife and kid (even more mini than mini-Dave) and so got there the next day. Saw many houses (generally accompanied by papa-Dave while mini-Dave got some grandma time), checked out things to do for mini-Dave (children's museums, indoor playgrounds, parks). Had a good time, really liked the area, and concluded we could in fact get a nice many (2*2) - bedroom house with almost twice the square footage of our townhouse in a good school district for less than we paid for our townhouse. Found a couple places we really liked, though as the one we liked the most had the highest list price, we wanted to see what we could get for our place before making any offers. - Talked to realtor we used to buy our place about selling, concluded we could probably get $many00,000. Did a bunch of touch up work and minor repairs, got pictures taken. Realtor suggested we could raise listing price based on interest levels. Got multiple offers for $many many 0,000, and accepted one after just one weekend with our place on the market. - Made an offer for the place we liked the most (still on the market, yay), but ended up needing to slightly revise that upward to get the place (which we did). - Made all sorts of arrangements with movers, car rental places, hotels, and such to get ready to move - So now after almost many (2*2*2*2 + 2*2*2 - 1) years in San Diego, I'm leaving. With as much as I moved around between middle school and two years after college, I never really expected to be in city that long, to be honest.