I've got a bunch of questions from Misguided Mommy, so I'll answer some of them heehee!

Whats up with you and FB lately you haven't updated us in ages. Gosh! Nosey people need answers! How is he? Did he end up finding a job? Have you heard about your visa? Do you know where you are going after the wedding? How is work? Gosh girl your leaving us all hanging over here!

1. F.B. is fine. We were going back & forth on each other's facebook pages today. We have been meeting for "dates" every other day online to chat. I think we spent almost 4 hours talking today.

2. We did discuss some wedding dates for December. Right now we are waiting to see when his parents will book the hotel we will have our wedding "reception" at. I believe it's just going to be a small dinner with family & friends. I do know it's going to be at a hotel in Manila. But we aren't sure which one yet. I've already invited my friend Gayle to our wedding dinner, which I'm excited about! Gayle & I met on myspace a few years ago. She is also a mutual friend with my old coworker & friend Christie. We got to meet in Makati City in January 2008.

His parents have also said they will pay for 2 nights at a hotel for our wedding night. I don't think we are really having a honeymoon, since my whole trip in the Philippines is like a vacation. I do think F.B. & I will take a day trip to the beach sometime (Maybe Cavite?) and we talked about staying a few nights up in Tagaytay again, since they've built more shopping places, restaurants since our last stay there and we could go to Enchanted Kingdom too. Plus I always love seeing Taal Volcano. We won't be staying at the same hotel we did last time though!

3. Next year I'm not going back to the Philippines. F.B. & I have already discussed this. We agreed to take a year off from traveling due to the expenses. He's going to focus on the job thing next year and take anything he can get so he can save up some money for when he moves over here. He also won't have to worry about taking time off work to be with me if I come to stay 2 months.

I'll be working here in the USA with our immigration lawyer and be able to save more money while I'm not worrying about $1,500 plane tickets and other travel expenses. Immigration may take up to 2 years. I will be going back to the Philippines for another visit in 2011. The long distance sucks... but at least we'll be working on our immigration process and closer to being with each other for good!

4. Visa question can be answered here!

5. And work question can be answered here!

I'm 27 today... another year older, lol. Went to the park in the morning and took Saffy with me. Got alot of nice pictures and it wasn't too warm out in the early morning, I could actually wear a hoodie. Ran into 4 angry mean geese though blocking the path. Two bikers couldn't get through, I couldn't get through, whenever someone would try to walk to the side of the path out of their way they would flap their wings and chase after you! Finally a lady with a dog came through and the geese scattered. I guess they had a nest somewhere close to the path. I think I'm going to start going to the park twice a week for extra exercise... those hills kick my butt! Sad to say alot of my jeans have gotten tighter on me... and I have 2 months and 3 weeks to make them fit again! blah!





































































My boy sent me a letter & two birthday cards and a Watson's Drugstore Lemon Lip balm! He said he had to search 8 stores for it, maybe they are about to discontinue that flavor? I lost the last one he sent me in the creek at the park accidentally a few months ago, it fell out of my pocket accidentally. I promised him I wouldn't take this one to the park! Heehee!

After a quick stop at Starbucks, I was heading to the supermarket when my Service Engine light came on in my brand new Nissan Versa. I've only got 2,100 miles on and I'm not even due for an oil change until I hit 4,040 miles. I checked the manual and it said to check the gas cap, nothing was loose. I even stopped and put $5 worth of gas in even though the tank was already over the halfway point. The light was still on. I called Nissan and I have to take the car up there tomorrow at 9:30am because it could be something with the engine or emissions? Fun....

Turned around and headed to the library to pick up the 6 books I checked out. I love my library. They have an online catalog and I can just pick the books out and they email me when their ready to be picked up. I got there at 11:50am and there were a bunch of people waiting outside... they didn't open until 12pm on the dot.

My birthday got better in the evening. Steak pizza with the family & a chocolate chip cookie cake. Also got alot of great presents. A Sentry Safe from my parents. I've been wanting a fire proof box for awhile, now I'll be able to put my birth certificate, marriage certificate (In December!) and our immigration papers in my lock box. 5 for $25 Victoria's Secret Hip Huggers, Marshall Carry Sack for my ratties and my brothers got me a flashback from my childhood the 1st 3 seasons of the Animaniacs on DVD. Haha.

My passport came back on Friday with my 59 day visa. The expiration is still weird, it's 2 days after I arrive. Maybe I need to send it 1 month before I leave instead of 2. At least I know, once I enter before that date, I can still stay 59 days.

UPDATE 9-5-09: So as I'm approaching the exit I get off to go to the Nissan Dealership the stupid Service Engine Light goes off! WTF?! I still pulled into Nissan and the mechanic said if the light went off it's fine & he doesn't need to check it out. He said sometimes when you get gas if the cap isn't tight enough, etc, when you start the car the computer won't recognize something and it will take driving a certain amount of miles to make the computer reset. Gee, I wish the guy that I talked to on the phone yesterday had told me all I needed to do was drive it! What a waste of time! Glad the car is okay though!

I mailed off my passport to the Philippine Consulate in New York almost 2 weeks ago for my 59 day tourism visa! And if my application and paperwork is filled out properly, etc. I should be getting my passport back with my visa in a few more weeks.

I still have to go shopping for another medium roll away suitcase. Last time I went away I just took one big HUGE roll away suitcase. It ended up being overweight on the way home and the airline made me repack it. It's a pain to take more than 1 suitcase (for me.) because when I get back to the USA, I always have to claim my luggage and then recheck it after I've been through customs.

But... this time I'm going to take two suitcases. I have a large but not over large purple roll away I've taken with my before, and I'm going to get a medium one as well so that way the weight my luggage will be more even and I hopefully won't have any issues with overweight luggage. So far according to my airlines rules, I shouldn't have to pay any extra for 2 bags since I'm traveling to Asia. But if I run into baggage fees, I'll just have to deal with it.

F.B. & I have been in discussions about a possible date for our wedding. His parents want to give us a reception and will have to make arrangements to set that up and they will also have to give the judge that will be marrying us a specific date. We've narrowed it down to a few different dates in December that will give us enough time to get our paper work done but nothing is definite yet, and... since I still want to do a wedding date blog giveaway, I won't be sharing it on here even when we do know. *wink*

I haven't posted in a few weeks. July 3rd, I was finally able to visit the Mütter Museum after wanting to go for years. I went with my cousins. We took the train down to 30th Street and walked about 3 blocks or so down to 22nd Street where the Museum is located. Definitely better than driving in downtown Philadelphia traffic or looking for parking! I wish I had pictures, but photography is not allowed inside the museum. It is a medical oddities museum. They had Siamese twin skeletons, babies with birth defects in jars from the 1800 & 1900's. A full wall of skulls from people that passed from different diseases. They had animal brains in jars, rats, ferrets, cats, dogs, etc. Any organ you can imagine. The world's tallest man skeleton, a dwarf skeleton. Human leather... some of the stuff makes you go "Ew!" or "Wow!" but it's a really interesting museum. My mom & brother want to go some time so I will definitely be going back!

About 4 more months until I am off to the Philippines. I can't believe it's already July! In September I have to apply for my visitor's visa from the Philippine Consulate in New York. I am still making copies of everything for our immigration process next year. It's slow but I'm getting there!

Sugar's two tumors are growing very large. She has one under her right armpit and another near her right back leg on her tummy. She is still able to get around but I've had to learn to pick her up differently now by supporting her bottom in my hand when holding her instead of picking her up around her waist. A few years ago I bought a carrot shaped calcium chew for the rats but no one would touch it. Then Spice developed a mammary tumor and she would chew and chew on the calcium chew. After Spice passed no one touched it again. Until Sugar developed her tumors... I am thinking with the tumors sucking nutrients from her body she needs the extra calcium and vitamins. I've been buying her calcium chews at the pet store. (Never salt chews! Salt is bad for rats as it can dehydrate them quickly.) She really loves these ice cream shaped ones.

I discovered Pet Discounters through a Yahoo Search. Their prices are unbelievable! I pay $5.99 at Petco for Sugar's calcium chews. For some of my girls other treats I pay $3.99-$4.99 each. I bought 9 items at Pet Discounters and only paid $30 including shipping! I would have spent $50+ for the those same items at the regular pet store. Fast shipping too! Everything arrived this morning and I ordered on Monday!

What else have I been up too? I finally caved and purchased The Sims 3 during my mini vacation from work. (Love The Sims!) Thought it might be a bit much for my 3 year old PC. But it runs really well actually on my 2.0GHz Duel Core Duo processor, 2GB of RAM, 256MB video card PC. (Even with the graphics set to medium & high on some options!) The biggest issue I have with my laptop is space. I only have a 87GB or so hard drive. (Originally 100GB but system hardware & Windows XP take up some of that space.) I have about 23GB left. I uninstalled some other programs, but I do still have The Sims 2 and all it's expansions, plus 2 stuff packs installed. I want to get an external hard drive at some point.

Actually, at some point down the road I want a whole new laptop from Dell. I asked F.B. when we're married if we get a new laptop can I have it and I'll give him this one, haha! He said since he likes older games my laptop would run his games perfectly with my specs so he would love mine. I really want a higher 2.0GHz processor. Probably Core Duo 2. (It's the fastest processor for a laptop.) Windows 7, 4GB of RAM would be nice and a 512MB video card! A bigger hard drive too. Anything from 200 to 500GB. Sigh.... Haha!

Since F.B. & I are getting married December 2009 in the Philippines, I've decided I need to start looking up Immigration Lawyers in my area. I've already contacted about 5. I emailed 3 more tonight and am waiting for replies. 2 lawyers got back to me and I need to call the one back tomorrow. I want to compare fee's to see who is easiest to work with and who will really help me through the confusing process of filing all of the paperwork. Several have gotten back to me, but a few were too expensive, didn't explain the process, and one told me I needed to come in for a paid consultation before he would discuss anything!

The one lawyer I emailed in Center City Philadelphia, called my cell phone the last night but I missed his call. I called his office today but he was in a meeting. Then I ended up missing his call this evening by 15 minutes or so. But he left his cell phone number for me instead so I would be sure of getting ahold of him. He was so incredibly nice! We spoke for about 30 minutes and he went through all the processes/scenarios.

Here is the email I sent F.B. tonight about the immigration lawyer:

Hi Baby, I just got off the phone with the nicest immigration lawyer ever! All week I've been looking lawyers up online and in the phone book. I've emailed a few but they were either too expensive, or not helpful or wanted me to come in for a paid consultation before they would explain anything, even fees. A few were nice but were way too expensive. This lawyer in Center City Philadelphia called me last night after I emailed him but I missed his call. I called him at work today but he was in a meeting. Then I missed his call again when I took a shower, lol. Buttt.... he said he was leaving the office and would give me his cell phone number instead so I would be sure to get a hold of him.

So I called him around 6pm and he was sooo nice! He was actually driving home from the office but talked with me for 30 minutes. He went through each scenario with each visa, told me the processes, the costs, etc. He said his father has an office up around where I live and if I didn't want to travel all the way to center city- he would even come up to where I lived for consulatations, etc. He said they can do monthly payments with the fees and he usually requests half, but he could do a smaller percentage of that and then monthly fees over the course of the entire application process.

He actually told me a better way to go about the entire process! What I was thinking of doing. Was filing for a K-3 visa. That would get you into the USA. But then we would also have to apply for employment authorization. And then within 90 days we would need to file to change your status to a permanent immigrant resident. But those are 3 different forms, each with their own costs.

He says, we don't even have to file for a K-3 visa. If you just file the I-130 Petition for Alien Relative, once you file that paperwork you can at the same time apply for permanent immigrant status. Which means instead of going through 3 different processes we can go through 1 process. Which means when you finally step into the USA, you would already be a permanent immigrant resident. You could apply for a job as soon as you stepped off the plane, because you would be a USA resident. He says filing the I-130 starts off with mailing our marriage certificate, copies of our birth certificates, application, etc in. Then they mail you back a packet for the next step, where I mail in income tax copies, bank statements, etc. Which would cost around $355.

He says that first process takes around 3-7 months. Once that is finished Immigration will mail all of our paperwork to the US consulate in Manila Philippines. From there they would call you in for an interview for permanent resident status. You would have paperwork prepared with medical clearance, affidavits from our family and friends proving our relationship, etc. There would be a fee for the interview of a couple hundred dollars. This is the longest step because it can take 12-16 months for a decision. The lawyer would help us through each step and help us to prepare our applications, the packet you would need to take for your interview at the USA consulate, etc. All together it is an estimate of about $4,000. Really he said just $3,000 for the lawyer fees- the rest is the immigration fees.

If we went the other way that I was thinking we could actually be spending around $6,000 because it is 3 different processes. This way we work through one process you enter the USA a permanent resident, you can get a job and we are together. $4,000 is not a bad price at all, compared to the other lawyers I've been contacting. And none of them helped me through each scenario/situation like this lawyer. He is so nice F.B. we are definitely using him for our immigration lawyer. Even besides chatting about the legal stuff, he talked about how he grew up in Jenkintown, his father has a lawyer office in Feasterville near me. He asked me where I went to school, where I grew up, even said he looked at my myspace page and blog so he knew even more about our situation when I called.

He also said it's great I've kept copies of my plane tickets, itineraries from the past trips. That I have lot's of letters from you, etc. Because we can use that to document and prove our relationship. He advised me to start making copies of those things and getting them in order. I'll have to start doing that!

This is great! And the fact he does monthly payment plans is even better, that he will work with us with the payments and help us through the entire process is just wonderful. Aaah! So much stress is gone! With the time-frames for processing everything, you wouldn't be able to come to the USA until around 2011 at some point. So that's good for us too, since you said you still wanted to find a job over there and save money. This buys us at least another year and a half. What do you think of everything? I think we will definitely work with this lawyer and go the process he says. It will great that you would already be a permanent resident and be able to work as soon as you stepped off the plane! Yay!

I'm so excited that I finally found a great lawyer who will work with us and who takes the time to explain the processes, costs, etc. What he thinks is best and more cost effective. We are definitely going to choose him for our immigration lawyer!

NOTE: Our lawyers Peter J. Gonzales & Shanna Stanton have changed firms. They are no longer with Kahiga Tiagha. They are now with Green and Spiegel LLC, but still located in Philadelphia.

Some Links:

I-130 (Initial Form Filed)

IR1 (This explains what he was talking about.)

Extra Info ( On what the lawyer is suggesting.)

Okay so I got in touch with the Philippine Consulate this morning and this is what they said....

They said even though the expiration date on my visa is October 24th, because I'm arriving before that date on October 6th the visa will still be valid when I enter the Philippines. My 59 days for the visa start counting on the day I enter the country. If I was to arrive after the 24th the visa would not be valid anymore. It sounds sooo confusing. But she explained it like 6 times to me because I didn't get it. And my visa does say the 59 days thing on it... so I hope I will be okay. I'm still going to contact the USA Embassy in Manila Philippines to ask them about it... but I guess the Philippine Consulate knows what they are talking about since they issues visas all the time...

I'm sure most of you have read about my visa issue: Here.

Back in March I mailed my visa application in prematurely. But a lady from the Philippine New York Consulate called me and said they would hold my passport for me and issue the visa in September- so it would expire around the end of December. I was going to call the Philippine Consulate in New York on Friday to check in with them and make sure it was being mailed in September.

Well today when I arrived home I found my passport/visa waiting for me... and they issued my visa wrong!!!

The issue date is: July 25th, 2008.

Expiration date: October 24th, 2008.

My trip dates on my visa application are:
October 6th-December 4th, 2008!!!

Ohhhh they issued my visa wrong and I only have 2 months to get this straightened out! I called their office and no one was there so I had to leave a detailed message and I also just emailed them. I'm going to call them again in the morning. This needs to be fixed.

I had to send them my passport, notarized visa application, passport photo, bank statement, income tax copy, flight itinerary, copy of my plane ticket & a money order for the visa. So they had all of my information to issue the visa. I really hope they can get this straightened out. I'm hoping they let me express mail my passport back to them and they can fix my visa. I have the receipt they sent me. Someone really messed up and I want to cry!

Do you see this silly baby?






















And this cute little boy?

















And this dorky guy?

He's ALLLL mine!!! Aren't I lucky?

Don't we make such a cute couple?

Now check out these email subject lines:

From Sarah Lynn: AHHHH! CAN WE REALLY?!

From F.B.: Yes...hehe.

WE'RE FINALLY GETTING MARRIED!!!

F.B. and I have been talking about things and working out alot of issues since last weekend. We've also been discussing the future. We've decided we'll be getting married next year! We never really had a set plan on when we were going to marry. But we've finally decided on getting married fall/winter of 2009. I will probably stay in the Philippines 4-5 months next year. No set date on the day we'll be getting married though because it depends on how long it takes to file our paperwork, marriage license, etc.

We will be getting married in the Philippines by a judge. We both have never wanted a big wedding. Just a small ceremony with family/friends and dinner out afterwards. (Here are the requirements for me to marry in the Philippines.)

We've also always talked about having a short honeymoon in Boracay! F.B. has always said he wanted to take me there and we agreed a long time ago we would do that when we got married!

Here are a few paragraphs from some of our emails from the past few days:

From Sarah Lynn: So are we getting married next year? Are we really?! Am I allowed to blog about it yet? Haha! I just want you to say we can do this, that we'll make the commitment and plan on getting married next year. I want that so much! I want to be with you for good... I want to start our lives together. And you know we probably won't get to really be "together" until some time in 2010. But at least we'll be married and working towards filing paperwork so we can actually live together in the same place!

And if you think about that, that's still awhile to find a job since it's only mid 2008, if we get married in late 2009 and don't live in the same place until 2010.... you see what I mean? Isn't that enough time for you? Aaaaaah! I want to get married to you! I do! I want to get married next year! I could stay for 4 months or so and we could get married and maybe even take a little honeymoon to Boracay for a few days... and we could get to spend so much time together. And I could come home and file paperwork for you to come here- unless you've found a great job, then I can file paperwork to move there...

From F.B.: Btw, the answer is yes baby. haha. We could get married late next year. I wanna be with you. I know that the job issue can get frustrating. But I do hope that I could find a job before that like you said, to get some experience and save up too. That would be nice. Late 2009 sounds nice baby. It's not that I changed my mind about it. I just thought it was a little too soon to get married this coming October like you said since I'm still looking for a job and you're saving money too. I wanna be able to save up some money too for us whenever I get a job.

We've always agreed that the person who was more financially stable wouldn't move. Since I've been at my Government job 6 years now, make a nice salary, have good health & retirement benefits, have my credit cards, good credit and our savings. The best option financially for us, would be for F.B. to move to the US. Now if F.B. does find an amazing job over there before or right after we marry I would definitely move to the Philippines to be with him. The person that moves will be unemployed for several months while the paperwork is filed and before they can find employment. We did talk about this option when I was in the Philippines in January and he agreed it made sense.

Also even though I love the Philippines so much & love visiting there, I wonder if it would be difficult for me to obtain employment there. The visa procedures also seem more complex than the USA procedures. I worry about the language barrier. Tagalog is the main language, even though English is also spoken. I don't think I will ever be able to speak Tagalog fluently. I know words & phrases and a little taglish, but I am not fluent. And I don't think I would ever be able to drive in the Philippines! The traffic scares me too much!

So that is my big news! We'll be getting married next year!!! I'm excited. We'll have to look at wedding bands when we are together in October. We can price them over there, though they may be cheaper to get here in the USA, we'll have to see. Hehe!

F.B & I have been having relationship issues lately. The long distance thing becomes a struggle sometimes. And we go through these periods after we've been together in person, where it becomes harder to communicate. Lately we've haven't been meeting as often for our "dates" online on the weekends. Partly my fault. Sometimes I'm so exhausted after a full work week and I want to sleep in on the weekend. Or I'm feeling depressed and don't feel like I can communicate through instant messenger. It's been harder to communicate lately, through email & instant messenger. Sometimes I feel like I have nothing to say to him. It's hard when you can't be a part of each other's daily lives... can't experience all the little things together... it's hard when you have to relate your entire day through email... in order to maintain a relationship, instead of just cuddling up at the end of the day... together.

Our relationship feels a bit stagnant right now... and there's still 4 1/2 more months until my trip back to the Philippines, until we get to be together again. There's also issues we are dealing with; the fact F.B. is still struggling to find employment a year after he graduated college. Stress on me with saving up money for our future and just feeling like we are never going to be together for good... where are we going? I've just been having these feelings lately and that always seems to happen after we've been together and then have to go through the long distance "separation" phase again. It's just been tough the past 2 months and we are struggling somewhat to get back on track... because in long distance relationships it's all about staying in touch and having good communication... it's something you have to work at every day.

In other news, this will be the first time I'll be staying in the Philippines 2 months. My past trips, I've only stayed 3 weeks, which was the limit I could stay on my passport. I'm still worried about my passport... I have to contact the Philippine Consulate in August to make sure they are still mailing it out in September and haven't forgotten about it. (Visa Issues)

Whenever I'm in the Philippines for awhile I'll go through a moment of culture shock and homesickness. The first year this happened first when I got my period and discovered there were no tampons! I was also homesick on Christmas Day, when we went to the mall to have lunch. There were just hundreds of people & familes at the mall on Christmas Day & it was just a bit of a culture shock to me because at home the malls are closed on Christmas Day & everyone stays home with their families.

In January I had a homesickness moment too. It was the first time I was away from my new pet ratties and the previous year I had went to the Philippines my Ferret Nippy had been sick with cancer and when I returned home I had been too tired to see her. When I woke up the next morning I went to say hello to her and she had passed away in the night. So it was kind of hard being away from my new pets because I was afraid of the same thing happening...

I also had another culture shock when I hurt my knee and we were looking for an 'Ace' bandage, I had to explain to F.B. what it was; "Those tan stretchy bandages with the metal clips." before he knew what I meant. (I know Ace is a brand in the USA. But pretty much everyone calls those tan bandages an 'Ace' bandage in the USA.) We finally found one in Mercury Drug, but they are called 'Elastic' bandages in the Philippines, haha. I was feeling so homesick that night we went to eat at Friday's because it was somewhere familiar to me except the price of Friday's in the Philippines is just crazy! We experienced this the first time we went to Friday's in the Philippines, haha. Normally F.B. & I can go and eat at a sit down place for around $10 or less between us. But Friday's is so expensive! My salmon plate alone cost $17! We ended up splitting the bill.

So... I wonder what it will be like staying in a foreign country for 2 months. I'm sure I'll have some homesickness & culture shock moments. But at least they'll make interesting blogs!

I got a call from the Philippine Consulate in New York today. It turns out I mailed my visa application in prematurely. I did not know this because I've never applied for a visa. The tourism visa I applied for is only good for 3 months so if they issued my visa now it would be expired before my trip! The lady I spoke with (with her Philippine accent, hehe!) said If I didn't need my passport right away they could keep it until September, then issue my visa and send back my passport for my trip in October. I asked her if I filled everything else out on the application correctly since it was my first time applying for a visa and she said yes. The only problem was that they couldn't issue the visa until September... so the Philippine Consulate will have my passport until September! Eeek! Oh well, at least I'll be aware whenever I need to apply for a visa again!

In other news: I mailed F.B.'s anniversary cards to him the other day. Our 4th anniversary will be on April 1st!