Irish Consulate of Chicago

Fairly nice people at the Chicago Irish Consulate. While there is a culture barrier there, and I am sure that 100 people call the office with the same questions, they still don't tell you to feck off!

The Consulate is "open" to the general public for 2 hours (10a-12p) M-F. Don't let that fool you though. They have people available in the office to speak to until 5pm. A FBR-1 (or FBR-A) is the form you will need to fill out close to it's entirety, depending on how far back you are looking to do the fact/lineage finding. My grandparents came across, and for the most part, that is the last of it. Once you get to the grandparents, they usually cut it off. So I consider myself lucky.

Right, the FBR...The Consulate gives you a form attached to the application which gives you the ability to see exactly where you are in your findings so you have a check system.

I will get into that in another blog, because I would like to be very detailed about it, and I feel the better the detail, the more helpful to others I can be.

Once everything is in possession, signed, notarized etc...make a copy for yourself. Then send it in however the Consulate wants it sent. The Chicago Consulate wants it sent via Fed-EX overnight (well they did when I sent mine).

It's a waiting game after that. I had to wait six months, which is short. I also had a mishap with some of the forms that i "THOUGHT" were correct, and was wrong hahaha!

Be prepared to spend some money. Also, if any of your family is going to "get in" on your citizenship later - meaning they are going to use the exact same docs, minus their own birth certs...have them help you and save some cash :)

The total costs for acquiring a FBR in Ireland is not cheap, so be prepared to spend close to $400US. The cost for the FBR application to be turned in is $213US alone...FYI.

Next is going to be my trial and error with the Illinois State Government System, costs and fees for different documents you will need, things you don't, things that you may not, but look great and may help, notaries, bank checks, etc...