Official Canucks!

Something else that has been taking up a fair bit of my time lately has been getting all our paperwork in order to apply for proof of citizenship in Canada for the kids. They've all been citizens since birth...I've simply never registered their births with the government...if that makes sense. So they are Canadian by right...but had no evidence of it.

It was not unlike the process we had to go through to get Miriam her American citizenship of birth abroad record. She was never not American, but she doesn't have an American birth certificate. She has a record of birth abroad. Her birth certificate is Egyptian. But she doesn't have Egyptian citizenship.

I submitted her birth abroad certificate when I applied for Canadian citizenship, but that didn't count. I had to send in her Egyptian birth certificate (along with a translation...and an affidavit from the translator...who was Andrew). It worked out fine.

Other than that we had to provide:

• my birth certificate
• our marriage license
• birth records (ideally certificates of live birth) for each of the kids
• (digital) passport pictures from the last six months
• an affidavit or receipt from the photographer proving the photos weren't manipulated
• copies of our passport ID pages
• along with copies of any stamps/visas inside
• a second form of government ID
• driver's licenses for the girls
• a valid immunization record on Georgia letterhead for Benjamin

And then I had to fill out a million forms online. It was quite a bit of work, but it all came together!

I was only able to do the three oldest kids (because you can only have three applications open online at a time), so I'll do the younger kids in a bit (after the older kids are all official and before their passport pictures "expire"). 

Benjamin's application was the first to be approved. He was rather proud of that!

All the important information is on the back of the certificate (sorry, scammers)

Miriam's application was approved soon after, however, which surprised me because I had had to resubmit her birth certificate (and only found out about that—and did it!—on Monday). 

Her picture is less glamorous because this happened between coming home from the pool and leaving for church activities and she was busy helping to fix up some grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner:

Rachel's application is still pending. I don't know what's taking so long for her. They just have to really consider whether or not they want her, I guess...

It can't be her birth certificate is wrong (it was issued in the same state as Benjamin). It can't be that her passport has questionable visas (she has the exact same stamps as Miriam). It can't be that her secondary ID isn't acceptable (it's her driver's license, just as Miriam's was). All the other documentation is the same...and they haven't said anything about missing anything...

I'm a little worried about her passport photo because I had that taken at UGA and...I don't think they did as good of a job as the CVS Andrew went to with the Benjamin and Miriam. Like, I just feel like the saturation is way off...and it was supposed to be "untouched"...so I don't know.

We'll see what they say in the next couple of days, I guess.