Well, I’ve taken care of one piece of bureaucracy today. I drove up to San Mateo this morning to hand in my passport renewal application at the Dutch Consulate.
While I was there, I verified what I’ll need to do to obtain a Dutch passport for Franbert when he’s born. It turns out that we basically just need to get his birth certificate legalised with an apostille, which is what I’d already figured out from the on-line documentation.
What I didn’t know is that we’re obliged to also get him an American passport. The US has a rule about citizens with dual-nationality only travelling into and out of the country on their American passport and this rule applies equally to those just out of the womb, so that’s another bit of bureaucracy to take care of when the time comes.
In the next couple of days, I’ll send off my I-751 form and supporting documentation to the INS (or Department of Homeland Security, as they’re now known). That will set in motion my application to have the provisional status removed from my green card, thus allowing me to stay here past March.
It’s taken a fair bit of effort to collect the supporting documentation for this application: copies of bank account and credit card statements, an ultrasound photo of Franbert, a copy of our apartment lease, multiple notarised affidavits from people who know us… Bah! Still, now all I have to do is seal it in an envelope and send it off by registered post.