u/GallowayNelson

A couple years ago I had learned that I might be eligible for citizenship via descent, and told that I may also be able to go direct to passport (or try anyway). Life has been life-ing but I’ve been trying to work on getting documents when I can and wanted to double check with you lovely people because some of the posts here have had me second guessing everything and whether or not I am able to or not. I’m wondering firstly, if I am correct in thinking I am eligible, and secondly, whether or not I’m correct on all the documents I need for it.

The deets:

Great grandfather (born in 1899 in Germany) - arrived in the US in 1923 and naturalized in 1935. Married in Germany.

Grandfather born (in wedlock) in 1927 in the US. Married in the US.

Father born (in wedlock) in 1953 in US. Married in the US.

I have: great grandfather’s birth certificate, marriage certificate and proof of naturalization. Also have great grandmother’s birth certificate.

I still need to get: grandfather’s birth certificate, father’s birth certificate, grandparents marriage certificate, and father’s marriage certificate.

I had written all this down ages ago via a discussion I had here on reddit with someone but I can’t for the life of me find any of those posts. I have seen some discussion on here that in order to go direct to passport, you need your ancestor’s German passport (which I do not have), but that wasn’t my initial impression so now I’m just more confused!

I have had an Etsy shop for years now and have been using letter mail as my shipping. I sell stickers and use regular card envelopes (usually about 5 x 7, never bigger than that but I've learned not all brands are created equal!) and have had my dimensions for letter mail as 5 x 7 and .20 for thickness since I started using it.

Suddenly today, I went to ship and I noticed my shipping was a lot more expensive because it was adding a non-machinable letter fee to each order for $0.49. I have read that if an envelope is ridgid, it can be considered non-machinable. But mine aren't and they've been the same the whole time. I'm just wondering if anyone has any experience with this? If this is going to be the status quo going forward, I'll have to increase my shipping, but I don't understand what has changed. I tried tweaking settings and nothing made any difference.