How many times a year a green card holder can travel abroad?

[Nata2010]

I've traveled to Ukraine at the end of September 2009 and stayed there till the end of March 2010, so total came to a few days over 6 month limit. But I had no problems in US boarders coming back. Plus my last trip to Ukraine was in 2005, so I had a huge gap in before travels. I'm planning on traveling back to Ukraine this August again for 2 month and wondering if I'd have any problems with USCIS about that. I'm applying for citizenship this month and want to know if traveling so frequently would be a problem on the way of getting citizenship.
If you look at my traveling time, with added 2 months this August + September it will be 7 months of traveling total in between 2009 and 2010. It is less than a year, so I'm hoping that may be it will be ok? I have prove that I'm constantly living in US as I've started a new business with my fiancé last year, I have bank accounts. I don't have prove of rent pay as we self employed and a lot of times we paid cash and we moved a lot in the area looking for a better place. I hope that won't be a problem.
Any help? Thanks in advance.

 

[madh4]

You must be having a valid reason for overstaying 6 months abroad. Any document in support will be helpful, if the question arise, during interview. You can have any number of trips as long you meet physical residency requirement.

If you apply in June, you may or may not get your FP in July. Your interview will most likely be in October or later. I feel it would be better to complete your FP before proceeding abroad.

 

[baikal3]

I've traveled to Ukraine at the end of September 2009 and stayed there till the end of March 2010, so total came to a few days over 6 month limit. But I had no problems in US boarders coming back. Plus my last trip to Ukraine was in 2005, so I had a huge gap in before travels. I'm planning on traveling back to Ukraine this August again for 2 month and wondering if I'd have any problems with USCIS about that. I'm applying for citizenship this month and want to know if traveling so frequently would be a problem on the way of getting citizenship.
If you look at my traveling time, with added 2 months this August + September it will be 7 months of traveling total in between 2009 and 2010. It is less than a year, so I'm hoping that may be it will be ok? I have prove that I'm constantly living in US as I've started a new business with my fiancé last year, I have bank accounts. I don't have prove of rent pay as we self employed and a lot of times we paid cash and we moved a lot in the area looking for a better place. I hope that won't be a problem.
Any help? Thanks in advance.

There is no specific limit on the number of foreign trips you can take per year, either for naturalization purposes or for maintaining green card status.
However, your Sept 2009-March 2010 trip to Ukraine lasted over 6 months and therefore it will represent a problem for satisfying the continuous presence requirement for naturalization purposes. By law, any foreign trip over 6 month but less than one year long is presumed to have broken continuous residence for naturalization purposes. This presumption can be overcome if you manage to convince the IO at the interview accordingly, but it is not easy and the burden of proof will be on you.
There is no fixed set of rules/documents required in such cases, and a lot will depend on your luck and on the discretion of the IO. Generally, they'll want to see proof that your trip was strictly temporary in nature, and that you maintained residential and job ties with the U.S. during that trip.
P. 47 of "A guide to naturalization", http://www.uscis.gov/files/article/M-476.pdf, does provides examples of evidence they'll want to see in such cases, including: IRS tax transcripts for the last 5 years; proof of rent or mortgage payments; pay stubs. Se also page 22 of the guide where the issue of trips over 6 months long is mentioned.