DaveAndAnastasia

Just a minor nitpick because I doubt this actually applies in Mexico and almost definitely doesn't to the OP, but if your marriage would not be legal where you live, then it's not valid for immigration purposes. There are some cases where marriages that are legal in other countries are not valid in the US (most notably multiple spouses are legal in some countries, first cousin marriages are not legal in all states but are in some countries, and minimum age for a legal marriage varies). FWIW, I'd still saying doing a K-1 was absolutely the right thing for us in 2018. Anastasia couldn't easily get a US tourist visa so we couldn't marry in the US, getting married in Russia takes a lot of time in-country (like over a month) or multiple visits in a short time (neither of which were practical for me), getting married in a third country would have meant choosing a meet-up location expressly for being somewhere two foreigners could marry quickly and easily (which in fact isn't true of a lot of major tourist destinations in Europe -- in quite a lot of European 'destination weddings' the couple actually legally marries beforehand in the US) which meant we wouldn't be able to start the process for another 3 months or so at minimum after when we did, at the time K-1s were taking about half as long as CR-1s from petition to POE, we wanted to have a kid soon so working immediately wasn't a huge issue, our local field office was pretty fast for AOS on average at the time, and Utah zoom weddings weren't a thing in 2018. But generally the CR-1/IR-1 path is better, especially now.

I mean, I did go home and sleep the next night (and the night after) after confirming that they'd let me back in (this being April 2020) ...

A little before mini-Dave was born (aka after midnight), I noted that I was dead on my feet, but PRG was bright-eyed and wide awake. She was having a baby. I was just giving encouragement, keeping family updated, and making snack runs. I don't know how that works.

Mini-Dave turned two last month. I've said a lot over the last couple months that while I remember the day before was born quite clearly (noting that he decided to pop out a little after 1 am*), the last two years, not so much. * Which meant we weren't ready to sleep until 4am** ** also, some idiot didn't realize that if his wife was in labor in late afternoon/early evening he was going to be spending the night in the hospital so he should pack a change of clothes for himself too, not just for his wife

If she's had a green card for over 3 years AND has been married to a US citizen for over 3 years (technically living in marital union with you), she is eligible to apply for naturalization (aka if she didn't get her green card via her relationship with you, then she's not eligible to apply for naturalization under the 3-year rule). Not sure how the other parts work.

My quick summary on why despite all the stories about mail-order-bride scams someone might have heard, Russia and Ukraine are not high fraud for fiancé(e) or spousal visas. Russia is not high fraud because the large majority of fake "Russian mail order brides" are in fact Ukrainians. Ukraine is not high fraud because the women involved in fake "Russian mail order bride" scams almost always have no intention of actually marrying the western guys, or even meeting them (and often didn't provide anything to the scam dating site beyond a picture).

Heck, many of us who did a K-1 and are 100% convinced it was the right decision for us at the time are well aware that a spousal visa is a better visa (and were at the time); it's just that when things were working semi-normally, the K-1 process worked better for couples where the beneficiary couldn't easily get a US tourist visa and marrying in the beneficiary's country was expensive and/or time-consuming (and didn't want to visit a country where two foreigners could marry quickly and easily just to get married, and this was before Utah zoom marriages were a thing).