BM is trying to dicate how we get the kids back and forth to the exchange point.
BM and kids (14 and 11) live in Iowa. We get them for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Spring break and the summer. For the shorter breaks, she brings them to the meeting point and we fly them directly to our town simply to be able to spend the extra days with them at our home with my children instead of 2 days in a car...the meeting point is 7 hours away. This has worked perfectly in the past. However, over Thanksgiving, there was fog and the flight was postponed. She got them the same day she was supposed to, just 2 hours late. She is now telling my husband, their father, that we can no longer have them fly. The divorce papers do not specify that she controls how we decide on travel, just that she has to get them there and back home and the same for us. When we only get them for 4 days, traveling by car is not reasonable, especially on North Dakota roads in the winter. What do we do if she won't put them on the plane?
Try to work it out with her.
Try to work it out with her. However, if she refuses to budge, take her to court. She can not dictate the mode of travel if it is not one of the visitation agreements.
I would also have a conversation with the children so that they understand that the holidays might look a little different because of this. While turning their mother into a villain with the kids would be a huge mistake, they should know that if they are unable to see their entire family during the upcoming holiday (even for the full amount of time), that it isn't because you don't love them and don't want to see them. They should also be reassured that you are working your hardest to make sure that these hiccups don't happen again.
Good luck,
Well, you cant blame her if
Well, you cant blame her if she is driving 7 hours then hit with a 2 hour delay. A 14 hour day in a car is hellatious, now imagine it just got even longer.
Why don't you try negotiating with her and fly the kids out of her home town/ closest airport. If her drive time goes down she might be far more willing to work with you.
She could fly them out but,
She could fly them out but, she doesn't want to. We have tried telling her that we would spilt the cost with her but she likes to have control of every situation. I personally don't like the idea of the kids being in the car that long but, we don't tell her how to get the kids there and back
We really want to stay out of
We really want to stay out of court. But, if it has to come down to that, it is what we will have to do. Trying to find ways to take care of it civilly. Thanks!
You are right, we split
You are right, we split Christmas and Christmas Eve! I shouldn't have stated every Christmas.
From a BM perspective, that
From a BM perspective, that visitation schedule blows. So she parents them full time and then he gets the holidays? Perhaps that is why she is being difficult. Somebody needs to start thinking about the kids. Why do they have to be displaced just so both parents can have time with them? Why doesn't Dad fly in to see them, visit for a couple of days and then fly home? I can see doing summers, since most kids don't see their school friends during summer anyway. Is it possible that the kids are tired of going back and forth?
The history is that we all
The history is that we all lived in the same area, we had visitation every other weekend and spilt holidays. She decided to get married for a third time to someone who lived in Iowa. We were in court for almost 2 years. We won the case and the judge said with the fluidity of her relationships and how much time their father spends with them, it would not be in the kids' best interest. She appealed and in the meantime, her and her fiancé quickly got married. The judge then said he would not make them keep up two households being they are now married. She made up the visitation schedule and signed it before a judge. She was only thinking about how she could get down there to be with him. She now sees the mistake she made. Personally, I would've made the new husband move up here.
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What does it say in the CO
What does it say in the CO about travel? Who moved away? (NVM, saw your previous post)
The only thing it says in the
The only thing it says in the CO is we are to split travel costs. She pays to get them there and back and we do the same. the bad part is, they are supposed to be at the meeting point at 6 PM the day school lets out, which means she would have to take them out of school. We don't want that to happen so we have her bring them to the meeting point the next day, which means we lose a whole day every time. Not to mention, we always (except this last time because of weather) get them back to her the morning instead of the evening of the exchange so they can get home and ready for school the next day. She had them miss school anyway this last time so they could do Christmas shopping. Makes me mad since they have already missed 7 days of school and the oldest has two failing grades.
Tell her to kiss your ass.
Tell her to kiss your ass. We learned our lesson on this issue shortly after the CO that governerned our blneded family life for more than 16 years was issued. We took exception once to plans by SpermGrandMa to pick SS up for visitation and drive him from Texas to Oregon. We told her no. We did not care that they were going to road trip we took exception to that fact that SpermGrandMa did not have visitation rights. The SpermIdiot, her dipshit son was the one with visitation.
She filed for a clarification from the court (in her son the SpermIdiot's name). The judge was clear. How they chose to transport SS to them for visitation was not any of our business and was entirely up to them. He specifically added that transportation by grandparents was an acceptable transport method. Not once did any close relatives of SS come pick him up for visititation. Most of the time GreatSpermGrandPa would come get him. Either that or a random friend of SpermGrandMa would come get him.
Our CO stipulates that each party is responsible for getting the kid to their location and that both parties will be flexible in facilitating visitation travel including transporting the kid to and from the airport on the appropriate party's end of travel.. So when he was too young to fly unaccompanied we handed him over to them at the airport on our end on the first day of his visitation and they flew with him to SpermLand and we picked him up at the airport on their end and flew with him home. Once he was old enough to fly as an unaccompanied minor we would put him on the plane on our end and they would put him on the plane on their end.
Since they did not like to pick him up they would often offer to pay for us to bring him to them or for one of my DW's family to fly to visit us and bring SS back to them when they returned home on their first day of visitation.
Weather is not within your control and BMs bitching about weather delays should result in some very entertaining times as the judge shreds her in court if it goes that far.
IMHO of course.
Good luck.
Thank you, you very first
Thank you, you very first sentence makes me smile because that is exactly what we would love to do :). We decided the same thing, if we go back to court, the judge will shake his/her head at the pettiness of the things she does and says. It's just better to keep it out of court with the kids being older. We don't talk about these things to them but, we are not so blind as to think they don't know something is up. But, if we have to for their best interest, we have to.
AAGHHH, So she agreed to the
AAGHHH, So she agreed to the dates and "letting" them fly but she is upset about the times. We are supposed to get them at 9 AM and are getting them at 11:30. Supposed to have them back to her at 6PM and will have them back to her at 3 PM. We booked the tickets because we were within our court ordered time. She emailed back last night and said she hoped we got refundable plane tickets because she is not putting them on the plane at that time!!! Need some advice....where do we start to get an emergency court order?
This is exactly what we sent
This is exactly what we sent to her via our attorney. We decided that her childish he said/she said games are done and we will not participate in them. Although it is sad, we will have to do all correspondence regarding visitation through attorneys :(. Oh, and we are getting them back to her 3 hours early but she wants them even earlier.
SO they are arriving to YOU
SO they are arriving to YOU late (staying with her longer) and then going back EARLY (she gets them longer) and shes FIGHTING this....
Right! We cannot see where
Right! We cannot see where she is coming from. We give her an inch and she wants more. She is impossible to deal with at this point.