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Just be thankful you were awarded child support. My husband got cusotdy of his 2 kids 2 years ago. Ex gets the kids for the summer, but we still have one full day a week, EOW and odd/even holiday. She was not ordered to pay any child support!! We pay for all activities, school clothes, supplies, medical and dental insurance- oh, I'm sorry- she pays 1/2 of the $20 do-pay.  That is her one and only financial obligation!! Her justification of this is that we got what we wanted- with custody comes expenses.  I guess she doesn't remember the $900 a month she received in child support or the $1000 a month house payment he was required to pay for the first year following the divorce.

We are currently in that situation. 2 stepkids, girl 10, boy 8. They live with me and dad during school year and live with their mom during the summer. Not by choice- mom lost full custody as of Jan 04 because of her inability to control her anger and parental alienation.
Our baby is due in September. The kids have been so excited, even asking to buy toys, clothes and anything they could find to get for the baby. Not asking for anything for themselves. Then they went to live with mom- the name we had all picked out and liked- they no longer like. The mom is writing us letters talking about how upset the kids are and how afraid they are because of how I (step mom) will treat them when the baby is born. But they have no worries about dad. But according to her previous letters, they didn't like me anyway, so why would they worry about that?? I have a great relationship with both kids.  They are wonderful.  The mom is insecure and is pushing her insecurities onto the kids.  The mom has even gone as far as writing to tell me once I get fat he will divorce me too. She has written me letters telling me about what happened when they had sex and so on...... She is a jealous, insecure and scared to death- of life and responsibility. She is 34 years old and her mom and dad still support her because she can't make ends meet with her part time job.
Monday night at the ball field we saw the kids.  My step daughter gave me a hug, looked to find her mom. As she kept an eye on mom(making sure she wasn't watching), she rubbed my belly to tell the baby goodbye, then jerked her hand away quickly.  
The flip side- at our house she always rubs my belly to tell the baby goodnight, good morning or even I love you. Sad that she can't be herself in front of her own mother.
Sorry, hard to find a stopping point....

My DH is a firefighter. Works 24 hours, off for 48 hours- 7am to 7am. When he was NCP(now he is CP) his visitation catered to his work schedule. He had the kids 2 days Monday - Thursday - one day from 8-8 and another day from 4-8 and every 3rd weekend. The court order only required him to give 7 days notice as to which days he picked.

I am a step mom of 2, girl 10 and boy 8.  We had a court order for co-parenting counseling.  Mom lost primary legal and physical due to PAS, she was awarded summer(2 months) physical and legal custody. At our first couple of visits we felt like the dr understood us, was on our side then we met with the dr and BM.  Complete turn of events. All of a sudden we were getting beat up every visit from dr.  She stayed on our case, told my husband that he "barely won custody" and that it "wasn't by very much". We were furious, we called our attorney and asked to change dr's. We felt like she was siding with mom and mom was eatting it up. We kept going and eventually figured out the dr was just pushing our buttons. She wanted to see how we handled situations and how far we would go to do what was best for the kids. She wanted to see how much we would compromise for the kids sake. After several visits, she turned the tables again. Pushing BM's buttons, asking her to make changes, compromise- BM refused, she would not budge and the dr let her know real quick that she didn't have to do anything. Dr would just mark it in her notes and if we ever went back to court she would have to testify that BM was not willing to work together and not compromising for anything.  Well here we are- we have depositions next week and a court date the following week. Our motion is to stop the summer visitation, as mom cannot and will not communicate with us about the kids and witholds information from us.  She is still trying to alienate them from us.  She hasn't learned anything from this.
Stick to the truth, keep your cool and NEVER say anything bad about the other parent. You can only control your actions not other peoples. Do what is right for your kids and everything else will come in time.

Quick history:
Jan 2004 kids( currently girl 10, boy 8) came to live with DH and myself, stepmom. We won custody during the school year and BM gets custody for 2 months during the summer. BM lost custody due to her anger management issues and mainly PAS.  There was no child support awarded, me and dad pay for everything during the school year and most activities during the summer. BM refuses to help contribute financially.  Because BM's behavior has not changed since the custody change and at the recommendation of our co-parenting counselor- we have filed a motion for change of custody- asking for full custody.  At this point we've been through depositions and that's about it. BM has asked for a GAL and we have already spent $15k on a pysch evaluation back in 2003 in which the pysch recommend DH to get full legal and physical custody.
Problem:
Tonight we have learned that the BM has sat down with the kids and explained to them that we are taking her back to court. She told them she is having to show the court she wants them to live with her and that she wants to be with them. She wants them to know that their mommy loves them. She also told them that we were taking her back to court because of their homework. One of our many issues is that she is not capable of helping them do simple elementary homework- it's usually incomplete or just flat out wrong.

We found out because she was discussing this at ball practice with another parent and they felt that we should know what was going on.
The kids have been acting aggressive and very aggrivated towards DH and me since they've been back. They are very argumentative and emotionally very fragile.
Any suggestions on how to handle this? What to say to them? We have never discussed court, attorneys or any other adult issues with them and certainly don't want to start now.  But, now we know they are in serious emotional distress and other than loving them and being there- how can we assure them we only want to help them?