How are 50/50 holidays split, who decides the dates?

[ThisMustBeMyDream]

Massive issue in our family. If you have 50/50 division of all school holidays, how are they split? Who decides? What if the parents don't agree? How far in advance should these things be agreed?

Feel like we are wading through mud here. It is going back to court (for other reasons - namely 3 months of contact denial) but it would be good to see how this can be resolved as the court will want solutions to the problem.

Split when ds were 2 & 5.
I (RP) emailed in advance about holiday dates and we just agreed between us.
I got fed up of emailing in advance and if I don't have any plans I just left it, then he'd email as holidays were approaching with a suggestion.
All agreed amicably and no court arrangements though, so it's a different kettle of fish.

Examples:

• half terms: we will just split in half with changeover on Wednesday.
• 2 week Easter: again split in half with a week each.
• Chrismas: have always done handover on Boxing Day morning, actual split of the holidays depends on how it falls, a week each or 2 shorter periods each etc.
• Summer just depends on various arrangements, each usually have a 7-10 day period and the rest split into weeks or shorter.

What's the disagreement? For shorter holidays it's split in the middle of the week and in the big holidays it's a week at a time at each but has moved to 2 weeks at a time as the SC have got older. All agreed months in advance and if one party has booked a holiday then the other is flexible.

Christmas is one year with one parent, change over on boxing day. Alternating between parents each year

Similiar to other posters DP and his ex are pretty reasonable about it.
Half terms is a Wednesday hand over usually to coincide with normal EOW. Christmas is alternated for Christmas day and a bit of a mix depending on who has what on.
Summer holidays is usually 2 weeks and 1 week in each house (we had 1 year of a 3 week in each house but his mum wasnt keen so have reverted to 2 +1).
It usually DP says I would like x week and then his ex will either say yes or could we swap to...
This is always done before we book any holidays or anything so no one is disappointed

School holidays just continue with the normal schedule for us. We don't vary it.

The only change is at Christmas, we alternate who has Christmas Day and who has Boxing Day each year.

And we have an agreement that we can each pick two weeks in the summer holidays to take the kids away. It's generally first come first served in that respect.

Other than that, the routine stays the same as any other week ie if we normally have them on a Tuesday on a school day, we'd still have them on a Tuesday in school holidays. When it comes to childcare over the holidays, it's the responsibility of the parent who's contact time it is, to sort.

Summer hols - alternates every two weeks. Other hols - split down the middle.
Alternating each year which parent has the first half.
Christmas - no special arrangement - covered like other hols by splitting down the middle.
Everything is cast in stone in the custody agreement and there is sometimes negotiation on the odd bank holiday if falls badly.

Is it usually 50/50 or just over holidays?

Ah yes, like Notcrackersyet there are negotiations for the bank holidays if the fall weirdly.

The court documented the rhythm that my partner proposed word for word in the judgement so it’s definitely worth putting time into making it as defined as possible. Weirdly now it’s locked really tight my DSD’s mum seems to find it easier to communicate / act pragmatically on changes (whether she or DP proposes them). Unexpected additional benefit!

My ex and I split the holidays 50/50 and it's never difficult to negotiate really.

Generally we split the half terms so we do half each in october, he gets February, I get May/June. We just agree which week of Easter we're each getting, and the same in the summer. Christmas I always get the first week, he asks for the second so he can take DS to visit his parents.

I think we are both able to be perfectly reasonable and flexible about it though.

I'd be here all day explaining the issues. I did start to type out a post but it was so lengthy, it would just take too long.
We are really just looking for solutions as to what others do. Particularly surrounding the holidays that are longer than 1 week. Eg. This half term is 2 days plus 1 week, Easter was 2 weeks plus 2 days.

I've not been in this position myself - my Ex only wanted EOW - but have a couple of close friends who have 50/50 care. I know they both arrange calendars at the beginning of the year, so everyone knows where they stand. One friend has it easier as her ex is quite flexible, the other not so much.

DPs and his ex are generally flexible with each other. If one of them wants to go away so will be unavailable for some of the holidays they check in with each before booking. They also let each other know about any plans to take children away to avoid clashes.

Otherwise they see what the kids want to do and they can stay where they want (they are teens now).

We had 50/50 arrangement which continued throughout the holidays apart from summer hols when we each had 2 weeks. At Christmas we alternated Christmas Day, from Christmas Eve to mid day Boxing Day. Same for New Year’s Day, and her birthday. Mother’s and Father’s Day spent with the relevant parent.

Okay, to be more specific, this is for those who don't have 50/50 the rest of the time.

It gets stuck on to DH's weekend (he has every other weekend) for the short holidays. For the longer ones it used to be a bit of tooing and froing depending on when easter falls etc bur now they are older they prefer to stay in one place for longer and minimise travel.

We don't do 50-50 all the time. Just the holidays.

So you have 3 half terms. A two week break at Christmas and Easter. And 6-7 weeks in the summer.

You could have one half term each, and split the other one in half.

Christmas and Easter you could do as one week each. And maybe alternate who gets the week with Christmas Day/Easter Sunday.

Summer holidays we do it as 2 weeks, 1 week, 1 week, 2 weeks usually. But can vary based on other commitments etc.

Where there's an extra day, just see what works best at the time.

Where holidays are longer than a week we'd split the time in half, just as we would with a week.
(Not 50/50 the rest of the time - half of every weekend and 1 weekday overnight).
Exactly how it is split would depend on the holiday, so Friday-Monday inclusive (11 days) might be fri-wed with me and wed-mon with dad (although Mon night is his night so it would turn into wed-tue).
It wouldn't matter that is was 1 week & 2 days, it would just be the total time we looked at.

Not a great set up here, and I'd like to change it do following this with interest.

We split the holidays 8 weeks with me, 6 weeks with ex. I usually email 6-12 months in advance to try to book in dates. I have family abroad that DC adore, and we generally spend 4 weeks in the summer with them. Half terms are negotiable on an as hoc basis. Sometimes split the week, sometimes we do a whole week each.

I try extremely hard to preserve the EOW pattern all through the holidays when I can. If not, I make sure my ex gets extra days if he "missed" a weekend. I'm more laid back if he has on of "my" weekends.

My DC don't like to do more than 1 week away from me because ex is chaotic and two DC have autism and can't cope there.

Interesting that a court order can help. I'd been trying to avoid going to court because I'm terrified that ex will try to get 50/50 all the time instead of EOW.

We make no change in half term as it works out roughly the same for us each.

One week each at easter, we're not too fussy about Easter weekend itself so just choose whichever week works best for us.

Summer Holidays we generally split into 2-1-1-2 or something similar, we each get a two week block and a one week block, we'd be flexible about the dates if either were planning to go away but we each know how much is 'ours' to play with so to speak.

Christmas we alternate, handover is on Boxing Day and we count up the days between and split them so it's the same, generally DSC will be with us on NYE as we have longstanding NYE plans with friends and their children that they'd be very upset to miss out on so we don't alternate it.