USCIS Fingerprints

Last Friday we got our fingerprint appointment from USCIS. The appointment day was for the day we are supposed to leave to take Ryan to school. So we decided to try to "walk in" without an appointment to Naperville and "wait" until they could fit us in.

Today was the big day! We made the boys get up and be ready to leave by 6am. (Matt and Ryan both have to be fingerprinted too since they are over 17) We arrived right at 8 am when they opened and we were told by the receptionist that we'd have to wait for the immigration officer to talk to us, but that he wasn't in yet. There were about 15-20 people ahead of us and more coming in behind us. It wasn't looking good. When the officer got in he came over to talk to us and told us it wouldn't be possible to be printed today because they had 100 people scheduled and only 3 workers. I politely asked if it was ok if we just sat and waited, even for several hours to see if there was time for us to be printed. He said we could wait but we had to understand that we might not get seen all day.

So we sat and read and watched "UP" on the tv. We continued to pray as the time ticked away, 9:00, 10:00, people going, new people coming. At 10:30 I looked around and for the first time there were only 5 people waiting instead of 15-20 like there had been all morning.

At about 10:40 the receptionist called our name and then stamped our papers! We were all going to be printed TODAY! The worker who printed Shawn said, "I thought it was supposed to be packed all day. I'm surprised to see it so slow right now." THANKS GOD!

We were out by 11am and on our way to treat our 2 oldest to Portillos for lunch!

Please pray that my prints were good enough quality. They were much better today since it isn't winter, but every other time I've had them done they have rejected and have to be re-done! I am so hoping that I don't have to go back there again!