As the winter holidays approach, many families begin preparing for time off school, travel, and festive traditions. For parents who share custody, the holiday season can also bring stress and uncertainty if plans aren’t clearly established in advance. At Johnson Law Group, we’ve seen how last-minute decisions can create conflict and how proactive planning can prevent it.
Whether you’re newly divorced or have been co-parenting for years, now is the time to make sure your holiday custody arrangements are clear, fair, and enforceable.
Why Holiday Custody Planning Matters
Winter break is one of the most emotionally charged times of year. Children may have expectations about family traditions, while parents may feel strongly about having their fair share of time during Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, or other holidays they celebrate.
Poor planning can lead to:
- Conflicts over pick-up and drop-off times
- Disputes about travel plans or out-of-state visits
- Uncertainty for children about where they’ll spend key holidays
- Last-minute court filings and emergency hearings
When both parents are unsure or disagree about the schedule, the children often suffer the most. Because holiday time sits inside your broader child custody in Colorado arrangement, planning should be a priority every fall, before the decorations come out and travel begins.
Review Your Parenting Plan or Custody Order
The first step in holiday custody planning is reviewing your existing court order. Most Colorado parenting plans include a holiday schedule, but not all are specific enough to avoid confusion.
Check your agreement for the following:
- Defined dates and times for custody exchanges during holidays
- Details about alternating holidays (e.g., mom has Christmas in even years, dad in odd years)
- Provisions for school breaks, snow days, or extended family visits
- Travel restrictions, including how far a parent can take the child without consent
A holiday that moves on the calendar shows why the wording matters. Easter falls on a different date each year, and it often lands across a weekend your regular schedule already covers. A plan that says only that parents alternate holidays leaves open which schedule wins.
Passover, Eid, and Thanksgiving break raise the same question. Some families alternate the holiday year by year. Others split the day itself, with one parent taking the morning and the other the afternoon.
Write the choice into the plan rather than settling it each year. Travel deserves the same treatment, because a trip over a holiday weekend can absorb time the plan assigned to the other parent. Say whether that time gets made up and how.
Naming specific traditions, such as who handles the egg hunt or who hosts the first night, removes one more thing to argue about in the week before.
If your plan is vague or if you’ve noticed recurring disagreements each year — it may be time to revise your custody order or seek a temporary holiday modification.
Tips for Peaceful Holiday Co-Parenting
Even with a court order in place, communication and flexibility can go a long way. Here are some best practices we recommend to our clients:
1. Plan Early
Start discussing the holiday schedule in early fall. The sooner you talk, the more likely you are to avoid disputes.
2. Put Everything in Writing
Even if you agree verbally, confirm your plans in writing (email or co-parenting apps like OurFamilyWizard). This can help prevent misunderstandings later.
3. Keep the Kids in Mind
Focus on what’s best for your children, not just what’s convenient for you. If they have strong preferences or traditions they love, try to honor those when possible.
4. Be Flexible When Needed
Life happens — flights get delayed, kids get sick. If your co-parent needs to make a change, try to accommodate them when you can. Goodwill often goes both ways.
What If an Agreement Can’t Be Reached?
If you and your co-parent can’t agree on the holiday schedule, don’t wait until December to act. Courts get overwhelmed with emergency motions during the holidays, and last-minute filings may not be heard in time.
Instead, consider:
- Mediation: A neutral third-party mediator can help both parents come to an agreement without litigation.
- Temporary Modifications: If something unusual comes up (such as extended travel), your attorney can help you request a one-time change through the court.
- Enforcement: Colorado has a motion built for this. A verified motion about parenting time disputes puts the question in front of the court within 35 days, and the court either denies it, sets a hearing as soon as it can, or sends you to mediation. The remedies include make-up time of the same type and duration as what was denied, so a missed holiday is made up with a holiday rather than an ordinary weekend. The parent who lost the time chooses when and how it happens, if that serves the child’s best interests. The make-up time is scheduled within six months, or within a year where it cannot be matched sooner. Fees run both ways. A parent found in violation can be ordered to pay the other side’s costs and fees, and so can a parent who files and is found wrong.
At If your plan does not say enough about holidays, the time to fix it is well before the one you are worried about. We can review the order you have, work out a schedule that holds up next year as well as this one, and file for enforcement where the other parent is not following it.
Whether your order came out of a Colorado divorce or a parenting case between parents who were never married, it is only as useful as the detail written into it. Schedule a free, no-pressure consultation and we will look at what yours actually says.