Hi. I am not sure where you are living, but, do you not have to pay a portion of extra curricular there? This would be classified as extra curricular here and we would have to pay our portion.

As far as enrolling her. We came up with a similar situation in our house. We enrolled ss along with my daughter into cadets. We only have ss every 2nd wkend and cadets was on Monday nites and they would often have camps/activities on weekends. We made arrangements with BM to pick up ss on Mon. and drop him off with my BD to cadets on Monday's and then return him home again. This entailed me driving almost 2 hours return trip to get him there each week and back, not including what would take place on the wkends he was supposed to be with BM, as she would not allow us to change wkends so he had to be returned after it was done. She lives about 25 min from us in the wrong direction, then when you get back to our town we have another 15 min to the town it was in.

Well this seemed to work ok for about 2 mths., then because I had to travel in my work, I had to change times a bit to fit everything in. Normally I would pick him up, take him home to eat supper, dress and then we would go. When my work schedule changed,he would have to keep his uniform at her house and have it on by the time I got there and be fed. He would bring his uniform every 2nd wkend and we would wash it and have it ironed ready to go back for the next week. The only thing that was req'd of her, was to make sure ss hung it up when he got home and make sure he had it on when he was supposed to be picked up. (By the way, we pd for all the gas travelling too. One night I hurt my neck and hubby was away working. I managed to make it to the town to pick them up afterwards, but could not do the other 80 min drive to get him home and me home as I was in agony). I called BM and told her apologizing. I asked if she would pick him up, well, she agreed as long as I gave her gas $ to do so. I didnt' have any other options at this point so I agreed.

After that we started having problems. She sent the uniform here with the skids on our wkend and gave a note that she would no longer be responsible for it there....WTF...hanging it up once a week is too hard?? That I wold have to readjust my work schedule to accommodate this problem. Then it got to the point that I would drive all the way there to pick up SS on the regular times and she would say, sorry, he isn't going tonight...no reason, just he wasn't going. No consideration that I am doing this out of the kindness of my heart, spending my time and money to do it. Sometimes it would happen every week, other times she would let him go once out of every 3 wks. We never knew when he was allowed and when he wasn't. She refused to give us any notice, said that she would let us (meaning me because I was the one driving him) know when we got there. So after months of this bullshit, we finally pulled our ss out of the program. Something he needed and still needs so badly because he has severe social issues and anger management issues and we could see an improvement in him.

Our younger ss made mention that he would like to join cadets next year. My oldest daughter has already completed 2 yrs and my younger daughter is about to join in Sept as well. I came right out and told the other ss that his mom made it impossible for the older ss to go and after months of everyone's time and expense we were not willing to do it anymore. If his mom was willing to sign an agreement stating her equal involvement in it, then we would renegoitate. If she won't and he still wants to go, he should speak to his mother about it because she will have to take him. He was disappointed but I am sick of sugar coating things around her behavior anymore. I (we) are always made out to be the bad guys with the kids and enough is enough. Its time the boys see what their mother is doing to hurt not only us, but them too.

So before you make any decisions, think about what this family went through. Personally I would make her enroll the child and you pay a portion of the expense. That way she is well aware of the committment and she too is responsible for her part of taking her on her wkends with her. I would tell your sd that you think it would be very, very good for her to get involved with this, but that her mom has to work with them or it won't work. By all means if BM has an issue once in a while taking her, then work around it...just don't make a habit of doing it all the time or you will be obligated and will look like the mean one to the sd if you don't follow thru each time.

good luck...I am thinking about your headache right now!
Corie

is not part of child support here either. That is an "extra" and BOTH parties HAVE to agree to it, then the cost is split between the two parents.

In my case, I pay for BD to play softball and I provide all the gear, clothing etc that is not included in the cost of signing up. My ex pays for cheerleading and all the clothing that is needed. And we work together on making sure she gets there etc. If it is my week with her I drive her, if it's his week he drives her.

It is what it is...

But I strongly agree with getting her to do the enrolling to make sure she keeps up with her end.

My Dh enrolled SS is soccer and she shared the travel for 2 months after that she said bugger this I am too busy to take him on my weekend, so he will just have to go once a fortnight or not at all...DUH!! This shattered SS as he loved it...did she care?...nope!!

So she enrolled him in rugby as thats what the yuppie kids do and all her "social" circle had their kids in so that was fine, but training was on a Friday night, so DH's visitation started Saturdays because he had to go to Rugby. Nothing will work unless they arrange it and then you just have to abide...sucks doesn't it?

Catch xx
*Mean People Suck*