visas, and more visas.

I'm sure that for any of you who have ever needed to get a visa before travelling and entering another country, you can relate to the red, paper trail, jungle that you need to traipse through before arriving to your final destination.

Well, Miguel and I are currently trying to wade through that paper jungle. There are basically two things that we are working on right now. One, is getting U.S. residency papers for Miguel so that he can travel back and forth with me to the States, and the other is getting Dominican residency for me so that I can legally live here in the Dominican Repubic. Because Miguel is Dominican and I am American, we can both petition for each other and know that eventually we will get both residencies. The unfortunate unknown is being able to calculate the time it will take to get either one.

Please be praying for us as we try to gather the remaining few papers for my Dominican residency. It is our goal to travel down to the capital, Santo Domingo, within this next week to get my medical exam taken care of as well as deposit all the paperwork. We've already made one attempt to get stuff done in the capital and it ended up being a completely wasted day due to office directors not showing up for work.

As we currently stand for Miguel's residency paperwork, he has a case number and is on an appointment waiting list at the American embassy in Santo Domingo. His number in line is in the high 15,000's at this point. I had petitioned for a fiance visa for Miguel more than a year ago. We were told that because we chose to get married within the Dominican Republic instead of waiting to get married in the States, that the fiance visa case would be terminated and we would need to start from scratch as a married couple. Up until this point, his case is still open. We won't know if we have to start from scratch until his case is closed, and that is all the information we can get from the government offices dealing with cases pending in the Dominican Republic. Because the embassy has requested our marriage certificate and birth certificates, it is our hope and prayer that they will keep the case open and allow us to continue to send in the necessary additional paperwork.

Thank you so much for your prayers in this matter. We know that ultimately it is all in God's hands, and we continue to lean on Him and how he might direct the paperwork from this point. As the Dominicans say, "Dios sabe." (God knows).