Ok, so I finally have time to sit down and write about our visa experience and thank everyone on this website who helped answer my questions and calm my nerves throughout the whole process!
We met on the internet in November 2004, I came to England for a 5 month, 26 day visit from March to September, we were engaged in April, and made plans to get married in September in Texas and go for the spousal settlement FLR visa.
We started putting all of our documents together about 3 months before the wedding, set a date, and my mother (bless her!) did all of the planning herself on the Texas end, calling and setting dates, ordering invitations, the cake, etc.
I flew home to Texas on September 1, leaving my fiance behind for 2 weeks. I was so nervous about going through Immigrations and having to explain where I'd been for the last almost 6 months (I only went on a visitor's visa). I went up to the counter and the man asked me how long I'd been away, I told him I was with my fiance for almost 6 months planning our wedding. He didn't ask me IF I worked, he asked me WHERE I worked in the UK to support myself...I guess this was an attempt to trick me into telling him I had worked illegally, which I hadn't, and I told him so. I told him I had a letter from my fiance stating he financially supported me and his wage slips. He didn't ask to see them, just stamped my passport and let me through.
Customs was actually a little more thorough and asked a lot more questions. I had bought my wedding dress at Monsoon in the UK so I had to declare it. The customs guy actually took it out of my suitcase and examined it and the receipt I had included in the bag. I told him the WHOLE story of how my fiance and I met, when we were getting married, and how I would be applying for the marriage visa so that I may join him in the UK. He then flipped through the folder I was using to keep all the visa evidence together, looked at all our pictures and everything. Finally he said, "I wish you and your future husband the best" and let me through!
Fiance came through on September 15th, had absolutely no problems telling them he was staying with me and getting married, they didn't even ask for any evidence that he would be leaving and going back to the UK after our wedding. Must've got someone in a really good mood that day!
We went the next day, September 16th, to the county court to apply for our marriage license. We sat there for all of 5 minutes, paid, and were told we had to wait 72 hours before we get married, and advised to take blood tests but told they're not required.
The night before the wedding, we filled out our visa application via E-Fasttrack and saved it. I think we needed an address for fiance's kids in the UK so we decided to come back after the wedding ceremony the next morning and finish the application, pay for it, and print it off. I finished up little odds and ends like typing up the cover letter and finishing my CV.
We were married on September 20th. The officiant/judge was really funny and made us feel a lot less nervous than we were. He signed our license, we were officially husband and wife!
We ran back home, took a few more wedding pics, changed, finished the application, paid on-line, printed it off, gathered all the visa info. which was put in order of importance in a folder, grabbed our overnight bag for the honeymoon, and high-tailed it to the downtown county court office to get a certified copy of the marriage certificate...stood in line for all of 10 minutes, got our copy, found the nearest Fed-Ex office, and paid I think $48 to have it priority overnighted. Oh yeah, we also included seperate photocopies of everything in the folder for the LA consulate's in-office use.
Finally we could relax, my parents drove us to our honeymoon hotel, which was HUGE and absolutely beautiful. They bought us the wedding package so we had champagne and strawberries, rose petals on the bed, luxury bathrobes, and a late check out time!
Came home the following day, checked the Fed-Ex website with our tracking number and saw that our package was received at 10:00 that morning at the LA consulate. We crossed our fingers and promised not to stress out about it; this was DH's first time in the US and we wanted to relax and enjoy the trip and not worry about this visa until we had to. We were only staying for 2 more weeks and were so afraid the visa wouldn't come back in time...we had included both original passports (I had to, obviously) so we were stressed!
On the following day, 1 day after our package had arrived, and to our surprise and shock, I checked our email (not even to check for a reponse from the consulate because everyone had already warned me that the LA office does NOT email) and had an email off them saying something like "Your application has been approved and your visa has been granted." I jumped up in the air and screamed for DH to come and look. We were SO happy, and thought because we had inlcuded the photocopies they must've been able to approve ours so fast!!!
That friday, September 23rd, we received the visa via Fed-Ex, with all of our documents and my shiny new visa placed in my passport. Funnily enough, all of those photocopies I spent an hour on were included as well!! So they didn't even use them, we must've just been lucky and they were having a slow day or something.
We flew home on October 4th, into Gatwick. I had NO problem whatsoever coming back in. I just told the Immigrations officer I have a spousal visa, she found it in my passport and said "Ah, so you do!" and wrote down something on paper, stamped my passport, and I was in! Took the 7 hour coach trip home to Torquay, threw our stuff on the floor and went to bed!
So thank you everyone so so so much from the bottom of our hearts. We couldn't have done it without you, and I credit all of you for helping me make my dreams come true and be here with the love of my life! I'm sure I'll have more questions when our ILR date comes up, but until then I hope to help anyone else who may be going through the same process. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!!!
