Judge in the court case outlined Christmas must be done alternately with New Year. Apparently some courts aren't in favour of sharing Christmas day and I can understand why because I don't much like tooing and froing either.
Does having Christmas generally mean Christmas day only and having New Year mean New Year's Day only?
I have to be so careful with how I play this, because my ex is the kind of person that abuses, twists and manipulates, and if you give an inch will not just take a mile but at least 10 miles! I find I have to cover my back and start how I mean to go on or else bad things happen.
Children have two weeks off at Christmas and we are slowly working towards shared holiday time, though oddly enough only half-terms and summer holidays were written in the court order specifically, to share on an alternate basis for half term and shared according to parental annual leave allowance (but both parents can't take off 3 weeks each to make it 50:50 during summer holidays so resident parent gets the lions share).
I should point out, it's not a 50-50 living arrangement but the more old fashioned 10:4 split every 14 days, though, not sure whether knowing this makes any difference or not. I thought it might be that these things are allocated one way if there is not an even split and another way if it's a 50-50 shared care arrangement.
I know that everything has to be in the best interest of the children rather than the interests of parents or extended family, but it's hard to know what children would prefer without putting them on the spot by asking. I invited the eldest to say what their preference might be, seeing as Christmas is all about the children, but they didn't like being involved in the decision making so I respected this and moved on.
The way I see it, we have several options:
#1. Both parents literally take one day each, and alternate that each year. So one parent has Christmas day and the other parent has New Year's day and then the next year it's swaps around. Normal weekly arrangements continue as though it were school time.
#2. Both parents take 2 consecutive days each, so one parent has either Christmas Eve and Christmas Day or Christmas Day and Boxing Day, and the other parent has NYE and New Years Day. Normal weekly arrangements continue as though it were school time.
#3. Both parents choose a whole week each like they do at half term or summer holidays, and have all of Christmas or all of New Year - however this is complicated when the calendar falls wrong so the first week is cut in half to avoid the wrong parent taking Christmas Day when it's not allocated to them, then give the middle week to the other parent to have their full week, followed by another half a week at the end to get the allocated New Year's Day.
#4. Both parents choose a week each and have all of Christmas or all of New Year and switch their weekends around to make it work so the parent who should have Christmas gets that whole week, come rain or shine! And the same with New Year. So the swapping of weekends would negate the need to split weeks for one parent.
Any helpful suggestions would be very welcome, but please don't say that it should be 50-50 and no haggling because much as I would prefer that, you can't choose who you co-parent with (or perhaps more accurately 'parallel' parent with) and you sadly have to work with what you've got, exercising as much wisdom and tolerance as possible whilst safeguarding the children through it all.