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Background:  Ex's husband is in military, my DH used to be in military.  SD was born in 1993.  IL kept jurisdiction regardless of who moved because BOTH parties were in the military.

Ex moved to west TX in 2002.  In August 2002, My husband got out and we moved to IA.

We went to court in IL in 2003 to adjust child support and to create the current visitation order.  We went to court in IL, to fix arrears and get the credit we needed (military had paid ex instead of court-ex had papers to prove it).

Now:  We went to court in July and August 2006 to get the visitation clarified.  Ex moved from West TX to East TX.  Ex's lawyer has the jurisdiction thrown out of IL on the visitation as my husband was no longer in the military.  SD is now 14 and will be starting high school in the fall.

Visitation order:  every spring break-we pay, 8 weeks uninteruppted in summer-she pays (not allowing the week after school lets out or the week before school starts) and alternating Thanksgiving (even years) and Christmas (odd years.)-we pay

Ex has recently filed papers in TX to vacate the entire IL visitation order.  SHE wants to be the one to determine what if any visitation my husband was to get and if that doesn't work to get the Standard Order for Tx put in place with the variation that she gets every other spring break.  (there are only 3 years plus a spring break that we can be court ordered visits).

Will a judge do this????  We have in turned stated ex doesn't have grounds for a modification of a foreign order(she registered the 2003 order with TX) and that the current order works, but needs some clarification.  We ask that layover flights be allowed and each party picks the airport on their end.  It also asks for pick-up times and drop-off times when the SD is driven to be established (ex fights us on times and we usually lose a full day of visit when she does this).

We are willing to compromise on the Christmas, with odd years starting in 2009, that we get SD when vacation starts until Dec. 30th and we would continue to pay as ordered, but for even years, because we are paying at Thanksgiving, ex would pay as she is the one who has wanted this change and we would get Dec. 28 to end of Christmas visit.

Anyone from TX who can give us an idea of what the likelihood is for her to get the order overturned and the TX one in place.  Without ex's variation, we would lose 2 weeks every summer and a week the year we have Christmas visitation (2007 and 2009).

Ex is stating there is a substantial change in circumstance.  Any idea what that might be?

Thanks,
Lynn

We are court ordered to pay for transportation for spring break and thanksgiving/christmas.

Ex is stating that the flight must originate in the airport of her choice and it must be non-stop.  

She argues that the connecting airport is too complicated for the SD and the flight attendant to manuver thru safely(Dallas/Ft. Worth) and she just doesn't trust the airport or the attendant.  

Ex recently moved and the airport she choose is an hour away from her.  If we got the non-stop flight, it means we have to drive an extra 3.5 hours each way, twice a visit with an additional cost of $400 for the entire visit.

We agreed to keep SD on non-stop flights until she was 13, which she did a year ago.  SD has now been flying for 3 and a half years.

We cannot do the extra driving anymore.  We are just not financially able to.  (Ex makes 3X's what we do). My husband has to take a day off of work (and still pay child support), we can't come up with and extra $400 and our car is older and we are afraid that it just won't make it.
(One flight with the ticket, unaccompanied minor fee and extra driving makes up about 3-4 months of child support)

We have a perfectly good airport in our community.  We would like SD to fly into it.

Ex states that she is not denying the visit, that we are because we refuse to put SD on the flights that meet her conditions.  There is nothing in the court order that states she gets to determine the flights, that we are responsible for the costs.

Are we the ones denying the visit, or is she?
Do we fly the SD with the non-stop (ex would have to drive the 3.5 hours each way) or do we go with the stop-over and have SD fly out of the city ex wants?

Any thoughts or advice?

Thanks,
Lynn

We went to court today and lost the case.  We need some help please!

1) does anyone know any GOOD attorneys in Bell County TX
2) where can I research the laws and statutes
3) where can I find out more about how the child support works
4) are there any fathers rights groups in the Austin/Waco area

These questions will help us get the ball rolling.  We need to immediately take ex to court.  She is going to majorly try to modify the visitation to TX only instead of the air transportation to and from TX and IA.  She is also going to try to raise child support.

Since we see this as a major change of circumstance and would like to try for joint legal custody also.  Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Lynn

I know in IL, a court overturned a case involving grandparents rights.  Does this automatically make all the grandparents right cases void, or is it still an individual basis?

My husband's parents got grandparents visitation when his daughter was an infant.  He was in the Navy and overseas.  Ex was making it impossible for them to see their granddaughter.
He has since then gotten his own visitation, but the grandparents case was never mentioned in any of his hearings.  I know in regards to our own court case, if the issue isn;t addressed in the newest hearing, that part of the court order is still in effect.  ( I don't know if I explained that well)

We found out that ex dropped off their daughter to the maternal grandparents without notification to the paternal grandparents, as they are required to do, under that court order.  Should we push the issue that the paternal grandparents would like their required overnight visit as per the court order and see where it gets us?  I know in general, the grandparents don't want to go to court again, but we are going back ourselves to get some issues resolved, can we add it that ex is required to again notify us and grandparents (via email) and daughter is to continue with the overnight visits when ex has her in the area. (Patenal grandparents are very close to granddaughter even though they are denied seeing her except through our court ordered time).

Any thoughts?
Thanks,
Lynn

Ok, I will go in order, or everything will get confusing.

1) On Feb 2-We e-mailed ex dates for spring break 3/11-19.  She said ok.  I read the school calendar and like last year it said early dismissal.
 
2) On the 3rd, she said those dates were fine.

3) On the 14th, we told her we purchased the tickets.  We had looked at the school calendar again and still say the early dismissal note.  I read it and thought it said K-8(the picture quality for the online calendar is autrocious).  So using last year as the precedent, I bought the ticket for the Friday because of the early dismissal.

4)  She never got back to us til yesterday(27th) that there is no early dismissal and therefore she will not put the SD on the flight.  Because school let out at 2:50 and the flight is at 2:05, then she won't put her on the flight.  

It doesnt' matter she didn't mail us the calendar as court ordered, nor does it matter that she didn't tell us school times changed either.  How are we supposed to read her mind.

I am not saying the blame shouldn't fall on me, but why can;t the SD get out of school one hour early to make sure she catches the flight?

Ex says she knows she is being "childish", but she is still "stewing" over the SD first 7 years when my DH was overseas and she disappeared.  So she brings up everything she is still ticked about.  She said the issue isn't SD missing an hour(?) of school, but that we try to get more time than court ordered.  She doens't like it that she counts a whole day, when we pick SD up at 5 or 6 at night.  That is not a whole day to us and we don't count it as such.
We still are supposed to get reasonable visitation, but we don't get anything that isn't specifically written out.  

I am so upset, I made a mistake and because of it, DH may not get to see his daughter.

I called out attorney, but lo and behold.  We have to re-retain him because the money ran out.  He never told us, never sent us a bill or anything.  We called the attorney again today and spoke to his assistant about mailing us a new retainer contract.  She said he isn't taking new clients right now and we need to talk to him directly.  I don't want to lose him as an attorney.  Ex really hates him.  Not sure what to do now.

Not sure what to do.  SD is 12 and she is not a talker, at least by phone or e-mail.  This is normal for her.  She is the same way when she is here and her mom tries to get ahold of her.

I am getting the feeling though that ex is intercepting e-mails.  I don't have proof, but now SD is even more distant.  I think ex is getting on under SD name and reading her mail and going thru it all.  Ex doesn't let her get on as often as she used to.  Ex is mad because she didn't get her way again and if she is going thru the mail, she is doing this to hinder the relationship.

We are going to talk to SD again about staying in better communication with us, but she is a teen.  Not sure what we can do or say to stay in better touch.

Thanks.

We have transportation responsibility over Christmas break.  We get the entire break.  We contact ex in mid October to let her know dates and if she was going to be driving into town-so we could plan accordingly.  She said yes, we could switch with her summer transportation and we said not, because if she drove she would drive SD here 3 days late and want her picked up 3 days early.  We said, no, looking at her drive schedule, we would just purchase the ticket.  We did and sent her the information at the end of October.
THEN, we hear from friends in her state last week, that they are going out of town this friday(today/yesterday-looking at time).  Pick-up is now only 5 days away.
She tells us in an e-mail going out the door, by the way, there is a family emergency and we left, SD won;t be on the flight.
We say since she choose to change plans so last minute, she should be responsible for the plane ticket we purchased in good faith.  We checked with airlines and we can't use the second half of the ticket since ex didn't use first portion.  Now we are out almost $350 for a ticket,  We can cancel, but to reissue later will charge us a big fee.  We can't afford to purchase a new ticket, even using the cancelled ticket money.  She will refuse and blame us for buying the ticket even though she had months notice.
She will also claim family emergency--I need a somewhat tactful way to tell her to prove it.  We are going to call the SD school and see what they have.  They pulled SD out 3-4 days early and are going to want us to return SD 3 days early so she doesn' miss any more school.
We e-mailed a very stern letter stating she is responsible for the ticket, she will reimburse us, she will be picking daughter up on the last day of vacation as per the orders.  She can choose to fly home with SD from the airport here or she can pick SD up at airport and drive home.  If she misses school, so be it, I will get assignments from school and have SD do them here.  We told her we are not arguing with her, everything we stated is nonnegotiable and if she sends any negative e-mail it will be forwarded to the appropriate people(our attorney and court records).  And the negative e-mail will not be responded to.  Any negative response will have us consider she accepted the driving option and told her where we would be at what time.

Any suggestions?

We just returned SD(12) to her mother.  So far we have agreed to fly SD on a non-stop flight, but it meant that we drove 3 hours out of our way to and from the airport(6 hour drive time).  Ex refuses to put SD on anyother flight.  There is another non-stop flight, BUT it means she would need to drive 9 hours or fly SD to the airport.  We checked prices.  It costs us about an extra $300 a visit to drive to the airport and back.  It would cost her $180 to fly daughter from her airport to the non-stop one.  Ex also refuses to put SD on a one-stop flight.  It is more expensive for us, but those are our only options.  We are writing a letter to our attorney who is retained for transportation purposes.(we have to pay more for him to cover other issues--income tax returns next year??)

School in TX started on Monday.  We have not heard back from SD to let us know she is registered.  We haven;t heard from the ex or the school.  We think they have pulled a disappearing act--they do this every once in awhile.  We don't have as much money as ex, so they go on "vacation" because our visits are so bad(no money, means we stay at home and that is not good enough for ex)

We have been trying to call SD since Monday.  Court order is for Wed nights, but both sides have been pretty lax, because my husband works nights and ex doesn't mind(usually).  We document each phone call and keep our phone records.  I think from now on, every week, we will be sending a letter(e-mail) to the ex every time we cannot reach the SD for conversation.  We will also forward the letter to the circuit clerk.  I know SD is 12 and can call when she wants, but she doesn't, ex controls the phone and screens the calls.  SD is not comfortable calling because ex's husband likes to listen in or grills SD about the phone calls.  Ex and her husband talk really bad about my husband, but we can't get proof.

We need to go to court and require ex to let us know when they are out of town, and contempt if the phone calls are not allowed through.

We are in Bell County TX, trying to find out about Texas law, attorneys and Father's Rights groups that might be in the area.

Is there anyone who can tell us more about the laws in Texas concerning joint custody, visitations and child support?  We have court orders in effect in IL, now jurisdiction has moved and we know nothing about the state.  We need to find an attorney ASAP before ex files papers with us caught with no where to turn?

Thanks,
Lynn

My DH and I would LOVE to have custody of SD. She is 12 now.  Right now if asked she would stay with mommy because that is all she knows. Her mom does not work and never has had to.  She has 2 siblings in TX where they are currently living.  They just built a house. Ex'shusband is in the military and is currently away(but not for long enough).  We tend to have more of problem with him than with her.  He has avery bad temper.  He used to hit ex, but have no proof as to whether it is still going on.  He tries to cause any problem possible, such as calling Public Aid in IL because we weren't paying child support.  He forgot to tell them it is abated in the summer when we have SD(he called in July).  That got them and the State's Attorney involved.  State's Attorney tried to up child support and we had to go pro se and prove the income wasn't there.
We have 3 children here, we live in an old part of town(not the best area,but it could be worse).  Our house is falling down around our ears, we struggle to pay bills every month.  I work parttime(because that is what I could get--still looking for better), but I still need to be full-time mom(cannot pay for daycare).

We get approximately 10 weeks visit a year, but we have to struggle with ex(and her husband) to get the right dates and then we fight on times.  We have to save to pay the transportation costs from Texas to IL and pay for our 3 hr drive to pick SD up at airport.  Ex has enough money she can buy a ticket and travel at the drop of a hat.  When she does we lose communication with SD(which we are court ordered to have weekly)

SDU keeps "finding" arrears and sending us new withholdings.  We are paying about $100/week now.  We have written, called and faxed to get updated receipts and find out where the new "mistakes" are at.  We have been paying our support and arrears religously.  There is no reason for errors.

It's getting depressing dealing with ex.  Ex isn't the worst parent, but she could be better.  Ex's husband is just plain bad, but no proof, just what we hear inphone calls and from SD.  We think we could definately provide a more stable, loving environment for SD.  We would love for her to really know her other siblings.

We have nothing to go to court with.  Just wish for equal time and ex to behave.  Since no reason to fight her with in court, we are praying.

We will have to go to court this fall maybe, we need to get parts of the visitation order more thoroughly defined so ex will stop some of her snits.

Anyone know Texas law, or attorneys or Fathers Rights groups in the Bell county area?

Ex is keeping from my daughter.  Now she is being blatent about it.  I am getting extremely frustrated.  I don't know what to do know.  I call at least 3 times aweek, which isn't very easy since I work nights.  I send at least one e-mail a day.  She doesn't call back, she doesn;t respond.  
I am keeping what records I can.  I leave messages so that it will all record on the phone bills.  I would have to supena her's though since I can;t get them from work.  I save copies all all my e-mails and e-cards I send.  I am going to start sending the letter of denial, changed over to fit the phone calls.
I plan to go to court soon, but not sure how we can get the ex to follow through the court order.