As the holiday season approaches, newly separated parents may face the challenge of coordinating schedules for Halloween, Thanksgiving and winter break. These occasions are special times for children, and working to ensure that thoughtful plans and expectations are in place can make the holidays more enjoyable for kids and parents alike.
No one-size-fits-all approach to scheduling – and generally navigating – the holidays works for every family. Yet, by thoughtfully approaching common scheduling and logistics challenges, those who co-parent or parallel parent can potentially reach solutions that work well for everyone.
Halloween
For many children, Halloween is a truly exciting day. If you and your ex share parenting time with your child, you’ll want to do what you can to avoid last-minute conflicts in order to keep Halloween exciting and rewarding for your child. As such, it’s important to agree on plans well in advance. As Halloween festivities only tend to last one night, you’ll need to decide whether you can manage to share the holiday with your ex, or (if possible and appropriate) whether you need to alternate years celebrating with your child in-person.
Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving is a major holiday for many families, and you and your child’s other parent should begin planning how to divide the day or weekend as soon as possible accordingly. If logistics allow, you may opt to split Thanksgiving Day so that the children spend time with both families. For example, they could have lunch with one parent and dinner with the other. Since Thanksgiving usually includes a long weekend, some families may prefer to split the four-day break, giving each parent extended quality time.
Alternatively, one parent can have the children for Thanksgiving Day in odd years, and the other parent takes the even years. This way, each parent gets to celebrate the full holiday break with their children every other year.
Winter break
Winter break spans multiple days, making it more complex to coordinate. Many co-parents choose to divide winter break into two halves, with each parent taking a portion of the time. Some families alternate the holidays at the beginning and end of break each year, allowing both parents to share in these key celebrations over time. Others “simply” trade off the entire break every other year.
Only you can know what kind of approach to each holiday – and holidays throughout the year as a combined whole – will work best for your child and your family. Just remember that planning as far ahead as possible is likely wise, as doing so will allow you to work through disagreements and set expectations for everyone so that they can start planning accordingly.