Montreal Canada Interviews with children

[T&JL 5]

My husband will be immigrating with his 2 small children from Canada.  I am hoping I can get any advice or insight on what the process looks like with children (4) & (5).  Thank you in advance for your help.  

[SalishSea 17,839]

3 hours ago, Trish&Jeremy said:

My husband will be immigrating with his 2 small children from Canada.  I am hoping I can get any advice or insight on what the process looks like with children (4) & (5).  Thank you in advance for your help.  

You can petition for them as long as their mother has given permission for them to immigrate.

 

You are asking about interviews.  If you have not even submitted a petition yet, you are years away from an interview.

Edited December 12, 2021 by Jorgedig

[T&JL 5]

9 hours ago, Jorgedig said:

You can petition for them as long as their mother has given permission for them to immigrate.

 

You are asking about interviews.  If you have not even submitted a petition yet, you are years away from an interview.

I am at the NVC stage.  Just looking for any information on the interview process for children.  Should be around 6months left.  

Edited December 12, 2021 by Trish&Jeremy

[mam521 2,063]

On 12/12/2021 at 11:45 AM, Trish&Jeremy said:

I am at the NVC stage.  Just looking for any information on the interview process for children.  Should be around 6months left.  

Have you been documentarily qualified from NVC yet?  If not, it's probably going to be longer than 6mo.  Feel free to join our IR/CR-1 conversation.  Just make sure that you check out the FAQ's and read back some pages to see what's been going on (link to the FAQ's in my signature).  Since your profile is filled out, you can ask Hawkriders to add you to the tracking spreadsheet (also linked in my signature).  

 

Your husband will have to provide the custody agreement and permission from their mother that he has permission to permanently immigrate to the US with the children.  My ex and I do not have a formal, court filed custody agreement, but we do have a parenting agreement that we'd written and the CO looked at it.  We wrote a letter and had it notarized (gold seal stamp, embossed) by a lawyer stating he knew I was immigrating permanently with the children and the Consulate 100% asked for it and added copies to our case files.  

[T&JL 5]

On 12/12/2021 at 11:45 AM, Trish&Jeremy said:

I am at the NVC stage.  Just looking for any information on the interview process for children.  Should be around 6months left.  

I didn't ask anything about if I can petition them.  I am well aware of how the process works.  I am just looking on specific information on the interview process for small children.  

[T&JL 5]

5 minutes ago, mam521 said:

Have you been documentarily qualified from NVC yet?  If not, it's probably going to be longer than 6mo.  Feel free to join our IR/CR-1 conversation.  Just make sure that you check out the FAQ's and read back some pages to see what's been going on (link to the FAQ's in my signature).  Since your profile is filled out, you can ask Hawkriders to add you to the tracking spreadsheet (also linked in my signature).  

 

Your husband will have to provide the custody agreement and permission from their mother that he has permission to permanently immigrate to the US with the children.  My ex and I do not have a formal, court filed custody agreement, but we do have a parenting agreement that we'd written and the CO looked at it.  We wrote a letter and had it notarized (gold seal stamp, embossed) by a lawyer stating he knew I was immigrating permanently with the children and the Consulate 100% asked for it and added copies to our case files.  

Thank you.  This is helpful.  My husband has sole custody.   But no where in the process is custody or anything like this mentioned.   We haven't seen or heard from the mother in 2.5 years.  We had to write a letter to passport people to get passports without her already.  His lawyer already told him how to handle us moving.  Just don't want any surprises once we get to the interview stage.  

[mam521 2,063]

2 minutes ago, Trish&Jeremy said:

Thank you.  This is helpful.  My husband has sole custody.   But no where in the process is custody or anything like this mentioned.   We haven't seen or heard from the mother in 2.5 years.  We had to write a letter to passport people to get passports without her already.  His lawyer already told him how to handle us moving.  Just don't want any surprises once we get to the interview stage.  

As long as the lawyer can provide a letter or document stating he has sole custody and the mother is considered to have abandoned the children, it should be fine.  DoS doesn't take lightly to parental kidnapping so they definitely look in more detail at parents immigrating, especially with small children.  

 

I know this is a long way off still, but the kiddos will have to attend the interview and no one is allowed any electronics, so hopefully he can bring some books and other small toys to entertain them.  One poor mom was quite pregnant and had a VERY busy toddler with her.  She turned to her husband and said "there is NO WAY stickers are going to entertain her for 2 hours!".  At least your stepkids are kindy age, so that should help!  

[T&JL 5]

1 minute ago, mam521 said:

As long as the lawyer can provide a letter or document stating he has sole custody and the mother is considered to have abandoned the children, it should be fine.  DoS doesn't take lightly to parental kidnapping so they definitely look in more detail at parents immigrating, especially with small children.  

 

I know this is a long way off still, but the kiddos will have to attend the interview and no one is allowed any electronics, so hopefully he can bring some books and other small toys to entertain them.  One poor mom was quite pregnant and had a VERY busy toddler with her.  She turned to her husband and said "there is NO WAY stickers are going to entertain her for 2 hours!".  At least your stepkids are kindy age, so that should help!  

We definitely have custody papers.  The courts told us to write a letter 30 days before we are leaving and she has 30 days to fight it if she is going to.  If not we are free to go.  So this makes me hope the custody papers and protection order will be enough.   

 

And thank you!!! This is what I am looking for.  I will make them a bag of stuff to do.  They are on phones all the time so it will be interesting.   Do they all go into the same interview? 

[mam521 2,063]

2 hours ago, Trish&Jeremy said:

We definitely have custody papers.  The courts told us to write a letter 30 days before we are leaving and she has 30 days to fight it if she is going to.  If not we are free to go.  So this makes me hope the custody papers and protection order will be enough.   

 

And thank you!!! This is what I am looking for.  I will make them a bag of stuff to do.  They are on phones all the time so it will be interesting.   Do they all go into the same interview? 

Yes, same interview.  If you call USCIS now, they can link the cases together if they aren't already.  Then, when they get to NVC, they schedule them together.  Also, don't panic if one person's interview comes first and the other 2 don't - they'll probably come the next day.  Kid2 got the appointment first.  I was in a panic but the next day, Kid1 and I got our interview letters.  

 

Things do go fast once you do get the interviews.  Booking 3 medicals is fun times.  As soon as you get the letters, call and book.  We did all 3 at Medysis because I was in Alberta and there was no way we were paying airfare to fly to BC for the medicals then to QC for the interview.  It was cheaper to just stay in Montreal for the week, have the medical, stay the days and have the interview.  We also had less than 3 weeks to sort it all out.  Again, fun times!

 

Kid2 is a total electronics kid, too.  Did well though - I'd found an interesting book series, so crisis was averted.  Hopefully you guys can work on expectations and prepare the Littles!  

[T&JL 5]

12 minutes ago, mam521 said:

Yes, same interview.  If you call USCIS now, they can link the cases together if they aren't already.  Then, when they get to NVC, they schedule them together.  Also, don't panic if one person's interview comes first and the other 2 don't - they'll probably come the next day.  Kid2 got the appointment first.  I was in a panic but the next day, Kid1 and I got our interview letters.  

 

Things do go fast once you do get the interviews.  Booking 3 medicals is fun times.  As soon as you get the letters, call and book.  We did all 3 at Medysis because I was in Alberta and there was no way we were paying airfare to fly to BC for the medicals then to QC for the interview.  It was cheaper to just stay in Montreal for the week, have the medical, stay the days and have the interview.  We also had less than 3 weeks to sort it all out.  Again, fun times!

 

Kid2 is a total electronics kid, too.  Did well though - I'd found an interesting book series, so crisis was averted.  Hopefully you guys can work on expectations and prepare the Littles!  

All 3 of my petitions went to NVC at the same time so I am assuming they are all together.  I am going to finalize and submit them all together.  

My husband is in Manitoba,  so the plan is to spend a week there and schedule medical as close to the interviews as possible.   It's crazy to me that there isn't a dr in at least every province.    The hardest part is not being able to help and be there.  Thank you so much.  This is very helpful.   Unless you have kids you don't understand why this is vital information.