Custody & Kidnapping

I am not specifically familiar with STATE laws and so I can only give you some general information that I hope will be helpful. For more specific legal info, you may want to contact a lawyer in STATE who does family law. I will link you to referrals at the end of this email.

I am not sure if a state’s law would address this but in general, often times, parents alternate holidays. For example, in even years (2012, 2014, etc), Mom may get Xmas Eve, Dad gets Xmas day; and in odd years (2011, 2013), it is the reverse; or maybe holidays such as Thanksgiving and the child’s birthday may be split half day with each parent; etc. Often times, the holiday schedule supercedes a regular visitation day schedule. If this is not laid out in your custody/visitation plan, do you think it is something that you and the other parent can negotiate and work out outside of court. If not, you may decide to file in court to modify the order to include a holiday schedule perhaps. You may want to ask a lawyer for advice or help if you decide to go back to court. You can find free and paid legal referrals here, [ADD THIS IF IT’S NOT A DV SITUATION: although some may specifically be for domestic violence victims so you may have to find ones that may help all people]:LINK And here is some more information on custody law in STATE if that is helpful:LINK

CAN ADD THIS IF APPROPRIATE:
In some states, the court system may come up with guidelines for parents or some sort of standardized visitation schedule, which parents may be able to use in order to figure out questions such as this. I did some internet searching for you but I could not find anything specific to STATE. [GOOGLE STANDARDIZED VACATION SCHEDULE AND STATE TO SEE IF YOU FIND ANYTHING FROM A .ORG OR .GOV - IF SO, ERASE THE 2ND PART OF THE LAST SENTENCE AND LINK TO IT] I am not sure if you may be able to call the courthouse to see if they have any sort of information about this - perhaps some sort of “frequently asked questions” brochure regarding visitation or some sort of standardized visitation schedule – here is a link with courthouse contact information if you want to ask:LINK

Also, you may be able to get advice from an attorney who handles custody/visitation matters. We have links for free and paid legal services here:LINK

Lastly, in some situations, where parents cannot agree on details of an order, there may be papers in court that a parent can file to try to ask the court to modify (change) the order to clarify the details or there may be some sort of petition for clarification of an order, etc. Again, hopefully the court clerk or a lawyer may be able to advise you about whether or not anything like this is done in STATE.