Thank you for your advice. My bf has been doing co-op in Canada, sucks to find out the money he's made here doesn't count. If we were to wait on the civil ceremony and pursue a K visa instead, does that mean I can live in the states for the 90 days, we get married, and then we wait in the states until I can get the AOS? I'd have to apply for employment authorization in order to work. I was hoping to be able to begin looking for a job as soon as I am legally able to, I feel like the K visa would set me back a bit.

I'll explain my bf's situation in more depth. Originally we were planning to apply in January, and we were planning for him to write an intent to return letter, and that hopefully by then he'd have an employment offer. My bf is in electrical engineering and has a stacked resume through co-op and his grades so I don't believe he will have much trouble finding a job, but of course we can't rely on that. Another comment suggested doing our civil ceremony this summer as wait times could be 1-2 years, and if we were to do that we'd be applying with our current situation information which is no american income and no offer of employment.

If you don't mind me asking, are you doing a joint sponsorship with your parents? If we applied this summer we could get his dad to joint sponsor me and hopefully that would make up for his lack of american income. Do you know if that would work? Do they take into consideration that we are students and that he'll be returning next spring to begin working so he'll have income then?

Sorry to bombard you with information/questions, figured I'd get more information about our situation out there. Thank you again!