silvana.toma

Thank you all for your input. I also had the same feeling-it's never late to go back to school, and you will always have an excuse why not to do it. My hubby works as admissions director at senior rehab center, and he is thinking in getting his MBA so he can become an administrator. I told him it will take 2 years or so, but where will he be in two years from now? exactley.... IN THE SAME SPOT, if he doesn't do the MBA. Time will go by anyway might as well do something useful with it.
Harpa ...you are right..(i can only speak for romania) in my country for example we have an exam at the end of each semester but when you do your final exam in high school you have to pass an overall exam from the past 4 years. SO history -4 big books, chemistry 4 big books, romanian -4 huge books...etc etc..AND all exams are taken in about two weeks. so you almost have an exam everyday. Looking back I have no clue how i did it. When my hubby told me how you guys do it i was so happy. Just another example to get your driving licence-omg- you have to study this big book, and the exam is all tricky..like you are applying for a cop job or something...the test here is a joke actually when i did the example online i was laughing the entire time ..i could not believe that is that simple. In romania everything is so complicated, and hard, like they are setting you up to fail.
harpa you are right again, a lot of schools advertise this magic school that gives you a degree in a short time and you will find a job right away that will pay you sooo much money...i was reading how many schools have very atractive offers(meaning very good marketing)and people get into a lot of student loans and when they get out of schools only to find out it is a lot harder to find a job than they thougt it would be. So i think i will probably sacrifice few years and go to school, and not do the online school.
Thank you Bob for sharig the story with me, and thank you all so you much for the advice and wisdom you shared with me.

And when you think of all the billions US put in this country...shame...well...maybe now we understand that no matter what we do we we always be the infidels aka-their nr.1 enemy!

We are suppoosed to close on our house next week, and i was friking out because i thought they will charge us a per diem fee in case for some reason we can not close.
They just called us and told us to relax, the bank extended us with one week, and if it goes beyond that than not to worry about the 100/day charge
Aparently they told us short sales are not how they used to be(at least here in va)the banks are more flexible and they are willing to work with you more...
We will be closing soon, and our time frame will be around 3, 4 months for a short sale, not bad at all.
I will never be able to thank you guys enough for all the help you have given me, i have to say without you i would have been lost, not just with the house, but with the green card journey as well.
You saved me money, gave me great advice, you were there for me, TAHNK YOU!

We are suppoosed to close on our house next week, and i was friking out because i thought they will charge us a per diem fee in case for some reason we can not close.
They just called us and told us to relax, the bank extended us with one week, and if it goes beyond that than not to worry about the 100/day charge
Aparently they told us short sales are not how they used to be(at least here in va)the banks are more flexible and they are willing to work with you more...
We will be closing soon, and our time frame will be around 3, 4 months for a short sale, not bad at all.
I will never be able to thank you guys enough for all the help you have given me, i have to say without you i would have been lost, not just with the house, but with the green card journey as well.
You saved me money, gave me great advice, you were there for me, TAHNK YOU!

My dear friends,
SOOOO.....I'm oficially a green card holder!!!!
It's been a long and exciting journey to green card land, and I really want to thank all of you for helping me make it happen, without you i would have spent a lot of unnecesarry money, or I would have got it all wrong. So i will never be able to thank you enough!!!!!!!!!!!
I am so exhausted, but i can not go to bed before telling you guys how it went, so, if my english is not very good ,please bare with me...it's been a long day.
SO..here is the story:
Our interview was at 9am this morning, in Norfolk,Va, so we woke up at 5am to make sure we will be there early. Left the house at 6:30(even if it was only a 1:30min drive), and 20 min into the drive we stoped at mcdonalds for a coffe. AS we were paying i remembered i forgot my wallet home which had my EAD, social security, health care card, etc...so we had to turn around I said to myself :great.. we started this just great! Went back, got my wallet, and as we got closer to Norfolk my smile was back on my face as we were making really good time then..we stoped...only to notice huge traffic ahead...
Finally, against all odds ..we got there 15 min before our time, so we took a seat and waited to be called. At 9:25 we were called by this IO officer who at first looked very serious, and did not give us the impresion it will be a walk in the park.
SO..first she asked for the ID's ..i gave her my social security, passports, EAD card, and my hubby's driver's licence.
Then she asked my hubby for last year tax return, pay stubs, then the fact my hubby's in the national guard came up, and i think she was in the navy so they started talking about that for a while...right after that she changed her attitude and became very friendly...
Then she asked if we have any pictures...good thing we had an entire album -200 pictures from all over the world...so she looked at those for about 10 min..she looked at ALL of them ...she seemed to enjoy them too..so we started talking about the cruise ship..and she aked us all sorts of questions about living on cruise ships etc...
Questions for me:
What;s my hubby's name, date of birth, place where he was born
Questions for my hubby
same except that my hubby did not know what year i was born
Then she went over the questions with no no no no answers and the funny thing about that was that she asked me if i am planning to kill someone(or something similar) and she started laughing saying maybe i will after this interview, my husband for not knowing the year i was born
Then ..she asked me if we have any evidence of bona fide, so we gave her joint bank account statement,lease with both of our names on it,life insurance on my name, and joint health care insurance.
Even though i knew from the very beginning there is no reason to worry, i did not expected the golden words to come out of her mouth but they did, and i quote:" you will recieve a 2 year green card and in 2 years from know you have to apply for something something form for ROC(removal of condition)...and sha gave us all the papers back and wished us all the best.
we left the building doing this
Then we went to the beach, walked on the board walk for a bit, after that we had lunch at a great sea food restaurant, and celebrated with a very cold beer, and very good sea food....yummy ...
Funny thing is that today i was supose to go to my first job interview, for a receptionist job, but i could not make it so i called them to pospond. However i got to the school i want to go to, and the lady told me the Rn program had 10 students fighting for one spot...but then she looked at me and she said i can do it, if i can speak 4 languages i can do this as well, and there was something in the way she said that...that made me think...if a stranger believes in me ...why should't i?
OMG..ok i have to stop...i am writting a novel here...
Ania, and everyone else who are waiting to do this...all the luck in the world to you, but you will be fine,you'll see!
Again i just want to thank you guys for the time and patience, this is an amazing website, with amazing people, and i am so lucky to have found you guys!!!
Going to bed now, have a good night guys where ever you are...

My dear friends,
SOOOO.....I'm oficially a green card holder!!!!
It's been a long and exciting journey to green card land, and I really want to thank all of you for helping me make it happen, without you i would have spent a lot of unnecesarry money, or I would have got it all wrong. So i will never be able to thank you enough!!!!!!!!!!!
I am so exhausted, but i can not go to bed before telling you guys how it went, so, if my english is not very good ,please bare with me...it's been a long day.
SO..here is the story:
Our interview was at 9am this morning, in Norfolk,Va, so we woke up at 5am to make sure we will be there early. Left the house at 6:30(even if it was only a 1:30min drive), and 20 min into the drive we stoped at mcdonalds for a coffe. AS we were paying i remembered i forgot my wallet home which had my EAD, social security, health care card, etc...so we had to turn around I said to myself :great.. we started this just great! Went back, got my wallet, and as we got closer to Norfolk my smile was back on my face as we were making really good time then..we stoped...only to notice huge traffic ahead...
Finally, against all odds ..we got there 15 min before our time, so we took a seat and waited to be called. At 9:25 we were called by this IO officer who at first looked very serious, and did not give us the impresion it will be a walk in the park.
SO..first she asked for the ID's ..i gave her my social security, passports, EAD card, and my hubby's driver's licence.
Then she asked my hubby for last year tax return, pay stubs, then the fact my hubby's in the national guard came up, and i think she was in the navy so they started talking about that for a while...right after that she changed her attitude and became very friendly...
Then she asked if we have any pictures...good thing we had an entire album -200 pictures from all over the world...so she looked at those for about 10 min..she looked at ALL of them ...she seemed to enjoy them too..so we started talking about the cruise ship..and she aked us all sorts of questions about living on cruise ships etc...
Questions for me:
What;s my hubby's name, date of birth, place where he was born
Questions for my hubby
same except that my hubby did not know what year i was born
Then she went over the questions with no no no no answers and the funny thing about that was that she asked me if i am planning to kill someone(or something similar) and she started laughing saying maybe i will after this interview, my husband for not knowing the year i was born
Then ..she asked me if we have any evidence of bona fide, so we gave her joint bank account statement,lease with both of our names on it,life insurance on my name, and joint health care insurance.
Even though i knew from the very beginning there is no reason to worry, i did not expected the golden words to come out of her mouth but they did, and i quote:" you will recieve a 2 year green card and in 2 years from know you have to apply for something something form for ROC(removal of condition)...and sha gave us all the papers back and wished us all the best.
we left the building doing this
Then we went to the beach, walked on the board walk for a bit, after that we had lunch at a great sea food restaurant, and celebrated with a very cold beer, and very good sea food....yummy ...
Funny thing is that today i was supose to go to my first job interview, for a receptionist job, but i could not make it so i called them to pospond. However i got to the school i want to go to, and the lady told me the Rn program had 10 students fighting for one spot...but then she looked at me and she said i can do it, if i can speak 4 languages i can do this as well, and there was something in the way she said that...that made me think...if a stranger believes in me ...why should't i?
OMG..ok i have to stop...i am writting a novel here...
Ania, and everyone else who are waiting to do this...all the luck in the world to you, but you will be fine,you'll see!
Again i just want to thank you guys for the time and patience, this is an amazing website, with amazing people, and i am so lucky to have found you guys!!!
Going to bed now, have a good night guys where ever you are...

My dear friends,
SOOOO.....I'm oficially a green card holder!!!!
It's been a long and exciting journey to green card land, and I really want to thank all of you for helping me make it happen, without you i would have spent a lot of unnecesarry money, or I would have got it all wrong. So i will never be able to thank you enough!!!!!!!!!!!
I am so exhausted, but i can not go to bed before telling you guys how it went, so, if my english is not very good ,please bare with me...it's been a long day.
SO..here is the story:
Our interview was at 9am this morning, in Norfolk,Va, so we woke up at 5am to make sure we will be there early. Left the house at 6:30(even if it was only a 1:30min drive), and 20 min into the drive we stoped at mcdonalds for a coffe. AS we were paying i remembered i forgot my wallet home which had my EAD, social security, health care card, etc...so we had to turn around I said to myself :great.. we started this just great! Went back, got my wallet, and as we got closer to Norfolk my smile was back on my face as we were making really good time then..we stoped...only to notice huge traffic ahead...
Finally, against all odds ..we got there 15 min before our time, so we took a seat and waited to be called. At 9:25 we were called by this IO officer who at first looked very serious, and did not give us the impresion it will be a walk in the park.
SO..first she asked for the ID's ..i gave her my social security, passports, EAD card, and my hubby's driver's licence.
Then she asked my hubby for last year tax return, pay stubs, then the fact my hubby's in the national guard came up, and i think she was in the navy so they started talking about that for a while...right after that she changed her attitude and became very friendly...
Then she asked if we have any pictures...good thing we had an entire album -200 pictures from all over the world...so she looked at those for about 10 min..she looked at ALL of them ...she seemed to enjoy them too..so we started talking about the cruise ship..and she aked us all sorts of questions about living on cruise ships etc...
Questions for me:
What;s my hubby's name, date of birth, place where he was born
Questions for my hubby
same except that my hubby did not know what year i was born
Then she went over the questions with no no no no answers and the funny thing about that was that she asked me if i am planning to kill someone(or something similar) and she started laughing saying maybe i will after this interview, my husband for not knowing the year i was born
Then ..she asked me if we have any evidence of bona fide, so we gave her joint bank account statement,lease with both of our names on it,life insurance on my name, and joint health care insurance.
Even though i knew from the very beginning there is no reason to worry, i did not expected the golden words to come out of her mouth but they did, and i quote:" you will recieve a 2 year green card and in 2 years from know you have to apply for something something form for ROC(removal of condition)...and sha gave us all the papers back and wished us all the best.
we left the building doing this
Then we went to the beach, walked on the board walk for a bit, after that we had lunch at a great sea food restaurant, and celebrated with a very cold beer, and very good sea food....yummy ...
Funny thing is that today i was supose to go to my first job interview, for a receptionist job, but i could not make it so i called them to pospond. However i got to the school i want to go to, and the lady told me the Rn program had 10 students fighting for one spot...but then she looked at me and she said i can do it, if i can speak 4 languages i can do this as well, and there was something in the way she said that...that made me think...if a stranger believes in me ...why should't i?
OMG..ok i have to stop...i am writting a novel here...
Ania, and everyone else who are waiting to do this...all the luck in the world to you, but you will be fine,you'll see!
Again i just want to thank you guys for the time and patience, this is an amazing website, with amazing people, and i am so lucky to have found you guys!!!
Going to bed now, have a good night guys where ever you are...

I worked on cruise ships, and the only thing i can say is that all cabins are very small unles you get a owner suite or a penthouse or whatever the cruise line calls it. The cabins are small and that was our most popular complaint from the guest.(usually they used to complain when we were already at sea, like we can get a carpenter and make their room bigger, or like we could kick out people from penthouses (that payd 5 times more than they did) and put them )
Also most cruise lines will not accept pets. There are one or two cruise lines that do, so make sure you check with your travel agent before booking anything.
But all i all it's a very good ideea(more expensive than flying, but at least fits your needs)let us know how it goes.
P.S. If you want tp pursue this ideea i would not cross over at the end of season as the sea is very rough, i have been in many cross atlantic storms and they are not fun ..not even for the crew!

I worked on cruise ships, and the only thing i can say is that all cabins are very small unles you get a owner suite or a penthouse or whatever the cruise line calls it. The cabins are small and that was our most popular complaint from the guest.(usually they used to complain when we were already at sea, like we can get a carpenter and make their room bigger, or like we could kick out people from penthouses (that payd 5 times more than they did) and put them )
Also most cruise lines will not accept pets. There are one or two cruise lines that do, so make sure you check with your travel agent before booking anything.
But all i all it's a very good ideea(more expensive than flying, but at least fits your needs)let us know how it goes.
P.S. If you want tp pursue this ideea i would not cross over at the end of season as the sea is very rough, i have been in many cross atlantic storms and they are not fun ..not even for the crew!

Just a small update...yesterday we went to talk to a mortgage consultant, and it took about an hour and a half. She was very knowledgeble, and very helpfull. I have no doubt she can represent us and do a great job. She told us the inbterest would be 4.8, and as far as i know that's about avarage. She said we can do VADH i think it was? where we don't have to make a downpayment...and for me, coming from a country that goes by "what's in your hand is not a lie", i would like to have my savings in the bank instead of giving it to them as a lump sum.
NOW...again...the same problem, i looked on realtor, and found a house i liked, called RE-MAX, obviously they said "someone will contact you....then i got a phone call an hour later just so that lady can tell me: what house are you interested in? i told her the home...then she was like:ok, let me look it up some more and i will call you back...well..guess what?she didn't!
What's funny is that RE-MAX and Joey Schlager are BIG, HUGE real estate bussineses and you would expect the best customer service...obviously they are big for a reason, right? No, not my experience, i just simply guess they don't need my bussines, and that's ok because i will take my bussines someplace else where they need it. AND no matter what realtor comes here and tries to fight me on this one, i would have to say to you sorry, you are wrong!!. WE have been contacted several realtors, i also did what you guys told me -tell them you are pre-aproved, and still we get the"i don't give a flying squerrel..."
When i was working at art auctions on cruis ships...the FIRST MOST IMPORTANT thing in sales that i learned was:NEVER JUDGE PEOPLE by the way they look, talk, or act...cause those could be your millionaires dressed like the hillbillies, that talk and act like them too.
I have been working in the ultimate customer service environment and i have to say- poor customer service it's like cancer for your bussines BECAUSE there is no bigger better marketing than "word to mouth"...and once you get that wrong...well..you're kind of ...you know the word ..it's starts with F..or S
For the longest time i thought America has the best customer service in the world, well...in light of recent events(and not just with realtors), i have come to the conclusion that maybe that is just a mith?

cold feet...
I remember someone told me once he had cold feet, i broke up with him the same day. i cried and cried, and one day i stopped crying , the pain went away, and my life was back on life's misterious and amazing track. few years later i found the best man any girl can ever hope for(sorry girls, i took him, and now he's mine )
I don't believe in cold feet. Cold feet means a very polite way to bring up the break up subject. Because cold feet means he is not sure, he is not sure he wants to spend the rest of his life with you. It's sad, and i'm sure we all at some point suffered from this disease called "brocken heart"...but nobody died, and that's a good thing, because you deserve someone who is sure he loves you, who is 1000% sure he wants to spend the rest of his life and eternity with you.
they say..everything happens for a reason, so maybe just maybe this is for the best? The guy is engaged to be married to you in two weeks and he finds he is atracted to this girl just like that...last minute. fighting for him is not the answer, you already have the answer ...and you know it..deep down in your heart you know it.
you know i heard this thing one day and i sooo agree with it " if you love someone let it go..if it comes back it's yours if not,it never was".
if he really loves you he will realize the mistake, and the fear of loosing you will drive him crazy, and then he will be the one fighting for you.
i really hope he will realize what a fool he is and you two go on and live happily ever after

I also sent my package on the 8th of november and got the NOA on the 23rd of november. Still waiting for biometrics letter. I saw here people waited over a month, even two for biometrics letter.
I was also worried but I realized it's december so maybe that's why is so slow...
good luck, and hope you will get your letter soon!

I'm going to start backwards to answer your questions. As a disclaimer i am going to say i am not an expert, but i just send off my paperwork so i do know a little bit about this process.
1.Yes, you will have to have your I-693 before you submit the package, that goes together with the package(the envelope with the I693 from your doctor remains sealed).
2. With the I-864 you will need: last 6 months pay stubs, employment letter, last year's tax return along with W2, OR tax transcripts if you have
3.form G-325, you will need 3 of them, 2 completed by the beneficiary(your wife)1 goes with the I-485, and one goes with your I-130(your petition), then you will need one completed by you the USC, that will go with your I-130. SO the I-130 will have 2 G325 one of yours and one of your wife.
4. You will need 7 picture of the beneficiary if she will also complete the I131-advance parole(in case she has to leave the country while the green card process is still happening, and one of yours(usc)and they are attached as follows: 2xI-864, 2xI-765, I-131, and 1xG325.
5. the fee for I-130 is $355, and the fee for I-485 is $1010. The amounts have to be exact otherwise they will not take your case.i made 2 checks , but some people do one check. whatever you want to do, i'm sure it will be fine.
6. Not sure where your wife is, but if her birth certificate is in another language than english she will have to get it translated and certified into english.
Also i think you also need to add some copies for the I765 form like passport copy, i added passport copy on biographical page and visa page.
I made 2 cover letters one for I-130, and one for I-485where i included all the copies and the rest of the forms(I-765, I-693, I-131,I864)
Let's see what other people are saying as well, because maybe having a child changes a bit the doc's that you might need, but for the most part, i think this is it.
Good luck!!

good job!!
think positive, all the people you have helped out in this forum, i'm sure there is some great karma in that, that will bounce back to you!!!

I am not an expert but i will say yes you are correct. I did my homework, so i am preety sure that's acurate.
1 picture for I-130, 1 picture of you, and one of your petitioner.
2 pictures for I-485
2 pictures for I-131
2 pictures for I-765
If you are filling some other forms other than the ones above then i would ask around some more.
Good luck!