Corey&Xu

We filed on September 5,2018 and she had her Oath Ceremony on January 9,2019..........We are in Raleigh NC. Pretty fast considering the Holidays. I enjoy reading your posts, they also get me thinking of all of the blessings that I share with my beautiful bride. I hope it goes quicker then you think. The Oath Ceremony was a very enjoyable experience, nice to see people happy to be part of the USA.

Randy, I came to the same conclusion, mailed it out late yesterday..........................

I have put everything together to send in for my wife but wanted to see if anyone had an opinion on which way to file the N-400. Is it a better/faster path to citizenship or is it essentially the same? Looking at the processing times it is 5.5 - 14 months, pretty large swing. Any advise would be helpful.

Yes...........................Canada.

Yes, we fly through China both on the way there and on the way back. Thanks for the link and information I will check it out.

Thanks for the reply.

My wife and I are flying to China for a few weeks in October on Air Canada, she has a 10 year green card. My question is in regards to flying back from Hong Kong, will she need anything as far as a visa to leave mainland China or will her green card and flight ticket be enough? Looking online I did not find anything that was required except the green card and ticket but want to be sure we are correct. Thanks.

Great, Thank you for sending me these. I will check them out.

Great link, thanks Randy. Looks like with all the great restaurants we may need to hit more then one of them on the trip. I also wanted to say seeing the picture you posted just brought me back to when my wife and I first started the visa process. Here we are nine years later and I just can't imagine life without her. I also try to follow all of your posts of living in China as we may spend more time there in the future.

That would be great, thanks Dan.

Randy and Doug, Thanks for the info, I will do a little more searching online and see what I can come up with. We are looking forward to having a few days to relax. If I recall correctly when you first posted the picture with Doug it created quite a stir about his black socks.................

Hi All, We are flying into Houston Texas next month to visit some family in Brenham northwest of Houston. I am hoping to get some guidance from you all as far as a really good Chinese restaurant to go to in Houston. I looked online and there are lots of Chinese restaurants but I am unsure of which ones would be truly authentic. My lovely wife is originally from Jilin in the northeast part of China. I think different provinces have different foods...... Any help would be greatly appreciated.

The real difference in using Oasischinavisa instead of Visaexpress may just in the end be that they are more lenient in the consulate in Houston versus LA....................not sure if that is true but looking back on the last three visas I got I had gone through Oasis but none of them where for a ten year visa either. Just thinking out loud.

I possibly would have been better off using Oasis instead of visa express but who knows. I ended up using expedia to actually book a ticket and then cancel it as they have a 24 cancellation window. This has worked I guess as they charged me for the visa yesterday. I should be seeing it in the mail first of the week. In the end it all worked out just had an extra hoop to jump through. It will be great to have a ten year visa so we can make trips over this time period without having to go through the visa process so often.

Thank you for the replies. I appreciate it.

We did that in the invitation letter indicating arrival date, dates we would Travel in China and where and return date. I will email them I guess because in the phone call what I got from it is they wanted a flight itinerary. I was hoping someone else had encountered this recently and had a simple way around it.

Hi All, I have applied for a 10 year visa and included an invitation letter also. The visa service (visaexpress) called and they are asking for a Itinerary....... We indicated we would travel there in October but in reality we will wait until next year so I am not sure what to send them. The airlines/travel agencies do not provide an Itinerary until the flight is booked. Can anyone who has gone through this tell me how to get an itinerary that they will accept without actually buying tickets. Thanks in advance for the help.

Thanks for the replies. I will get the forms done today. Tsap- we are still in Apex. We moved about 3 miles from our old house. The community here is great and continues to grow. Cary and Apex are growing more to the west now as more roads are put in and updated. We bought a building lot a few years ago and we just finished building a new house. We were very fortunate to sell the old house at a fair value so we don't need to carry that house or rent it out. The new place is much larger and really way to big for us but we intend to sell it in a few years and build another one. If you make it to NC anytime in the future drop us a line and we can meet up. Thanks again.

Looking for some help. We just moved and I need to update our address with USCIS. I just want to be sure I get it correct. Below is what i saw on USCIS website. I guess one AR-11 for my wife and one for my stepson. Do I also need to submit an I-865? They already both have their 10 year green cards. We may be over the 10 day mark by a few days also..............................I guess put the moving date within 10 days of submitted date...... "Certain customers are legally obligated to inform USCIS when they move regardless of whether they have a case pending, approved, or denied. If you are not a U.S. citizen and you have moved, you must complete a Form AR-11 and submit it within ten days of the completion of the move for legal purposes. U.S. Citizens are not required to complete a Form AR-11. Regardless of whether you are or are not a citizen, if you have previously submitted a Form I-864 on behalf of someone who has become a permanent resident, you must also complete a Form I-865 within ten days of the completion of the move for legal purposes. For case processing purposes, a customer should inform USCIS of any address change as soon after the completion of the move as possible. This way, the customer will receive any notices or documents related to their case in a timely fashion" Thanks in advance for the help.

Thanks newacct. That helps alot.

Thanks Randy. I will check it out. I know it is his to file, I also know it will be me that needs to guide him.

Hi, I am preparing to do my taxes and this past year my stepson (20 years old) worked an internship. He made about $ 2,500.00 and we received a w-2 on this. My questions are do I need to file for him on that income individually. If so what form do I use. I also have been claiming him as a dependent and I am assuming I can still do that.......... The same goes for my son also. He is 16 years old and made around the same amount.................. I just want to know that i am doing everything correctly and lawfully. Thanks for the help.

I hope they get it settled soon to. We are living a very good life together. My stepson and son get along great and my wife and I are doing great........just need to get to a point where the government is in the rear view mirror. Michael (stepson) is a great kid and is in college now looking to graduate in three years. We are starting to build a new house this fall and my son is driving now and is a junior in high school. It is always busy but it is a good busy. I guess I need to be more patient with waiting on this but I just want to be sure I am doing everything I can for him. Thanks for the responses and as we get closer to the one year mark for the I797 I will do the info pas as you advised Dan.

Thanks Dan, I will follow up with customer service and see if I can get any response from them. I am nervous as his drivers license will expire on 11/10/2012.....had the date wrong in original post. In NC they won't issue a license past the date shown on his green card or I797 in this case.

I need some help. We filed on 9/9/2011 for the 10 year green card for my stepson. We did the biometrics and are waiting...and waiting and then finally on July 30th 2012 we recieve an RFE that required a signature. We signed it and overnighted it back to them. They said in the RFE that it would be a minimum of 16 days before we would here anything else. It is now the middle of September and we still have heard nothing. The case status is the same online. The proccessing times at VSC are into October already. Is there a way to contact someone by phone or get an appointment to find out what is going on? His one year extention letter runs out on 10/11/12..................... Thanks,