How to share special dates on a child arrangements order

[BlahBlahBlah2023]

Hello
Been to court for a first hearing and we're struggling to decide how to fairly split Christmas and New Year and our child's birthday, which will fall within school time unless on a weekend.
How have you arranged yours?
Just some suggestions would be great please so I can put some different ideas forward.
Also, if one parent can't accommodate all the school holidays due to work so the other parent has to take the hit and take all those weeks off work to look after the child, do you still treat it as term time contact or is it treated as your holiday time with your child and the other parent doesn't see them.
Thanks in advance.

Special days , mother's Day, father's day and birthdays are normally spent with the respective parent,
This could mean the retrospective parent gets two weekends in a row ( in my case )
Christmas is normally split Christmas eve to midday one parent
Christmas day midday and boxing day with the other parent ( swapped over the following year )
Child's birthday would be evening before and school drop off then other parent has evening - night swapped over , non school day this is afternoon swap over ,
I know some parents who do joint birthday parties ( I don't )
Long distance means weekend after is spent with the other parent( in my case) though it could be the case it could be the weekend before

Long distance ( where it is not practical or other parent doesn't drive precludes this and means it is for ( my case ) Christmas and New year
End of term to 27th December, other parent picks up child and has them to day before the start of term ,
50:50 holidays should be that
If the other parent cannot do this then the Costs of alternative provision should be paid for by that parent otherwise the other parent has to pick up the costs for full holiday
I have done this and it's blatantly unfair and when our youngest meant even with HMRC child support was expensive,
As my children are older now I have the children at home as I work from home , we do evening activities or day trips around my meetings as I will not always have enough holiday
For summer I do 2 plus 1 arrangements so each parent gets a break long enough to go on foreign holiday plus one week , I pick up the slack over the few days either side.

Holidays and time the other parent spends with the two youngest,

Are mutually agreed every year in January for Feb to end of January the following year so each parent has the opportunity of making plans for their year for their family time ,
This is swapped over the next year
Parent a getting Christmas this year parent b getting Christmas the following year
Calender is shared via Google ( I prefer a parenting app or timetree as it stops the other parent just adjusting things without notice)
Our daughter is in year 11 so each parent has agreed to be flexible In regards to weekends ( the other parent due to distance in my case has a 50:50 weekend term time with our children) due to this ,
Next week I have two intervention days in my holiday so have a break away but only a short distance away
From school,

This works for both parents
There is always disagreement
Weekends but January is a full month to resolve and find compromise

We just moved a lot of dates so Mother's Day / Father's Day etc became a week earlier or later. Birthdays were celebrated twice.
I had the children every Christmas Day (which was how they wanted it) and the went to their dad for Boxing Day and New Years day for a week. There was no court order though so that made things easier.

We do alternate Christmasses and then do nothing about the other days. My view is they are fairly arbitrary anyway and if my son is not with me on his birthday/other special day we just pick another day to celebrate it on. Not worth arguing about in my opinion.

Don't commit to being the default school holiday parent. Split them, and if the other parent doesn't have enough annual leave they have to use holiday childcare, the same as other working parents do.

The more you can arrange between yourselves the better. Try (hard I know) to put the children first, so if it's a special occasion split them or even better try to have your ex included eg their birthdays, mothers/fathers days self explanatory, try not to be too prescriptive about making up "lost" days within reason. If one parent is a teacher for instance then school holidays are obvious, otherwise state from the start that even if one parent has them overnight mostly throughout you will share childcare costs 50/50 until they are old enough to not need it

Half of all school holidays

Year 1 xmas eve 7pm till xmas day 7pm
Year 2 xmas day 7pm till boxing day 7pm.

Birthdays. 'child shall spend no less than 3 hours with the parent whom they have no spent any time with with that day .
So if with their dm before school. We collect for 3 hours after school then return home.

But for example this year they woke with their dm. It was a Friday they come here so theysaw mum in the morning then here for the rest of the duration /weekend. Which dm wasn't happy about but then again this is what happens when she is awkward and when it was previously on a weekend day told dh you can have 6 30am till 9. 30am. Dsc was 4 and made to get up and out for dh to collect for early early hours middle of winter.

New year depends really.
So the half school holidays as long as includes the xmas plans above normal works out
If we have the xmas eve till xmas niight we have the week before leading up to it from school ending
If its xmas night to boxing we have dsc the 2nd week and return to school in the NY

The EOW also stops during school holidays
If its a 1 week, so feb, may, oct we have fr to wed.
Easter 1st week.
Summer first here, 2nd dms. 3 and 4 here. 5 and 6 mums