When coming up with visitation schedules, often holidays are the most fought for item of them all. After all, parents want to be able to spend time with their children, especially during holidays, in which there is a certain sentimental value in spending time with family. However, Illinois parents shouldn't feel restricted to merely religious holidays when designing their visitation schedules and should feel free to ask for days which are personally important to them in some way as a type of holiday.

One Illinois father did exactly this. When he was looking through his former wife's holiday requests and his own, he discovered that there was an imbalance. Though they believed in different faiths, so they were not arguing over the same religious days, he found that he only thought of Christmas and Easter, whereas his former wife had asked for four different Jewish holidays. In order to even it up, he requested for two more days which had significance to him -- St. Patrick's Day and Super Bowl Sunday.

However, in addition to these requests, he also asked for a particularly unusual request. An avid fan of Syracuse University, which is located several states away, he asked that, if their basketball team was playing for the NCAA men's basketball title game, he would have custody of his children so they could watch the game with him. At first, the wife and her attorney were confused by this request. However, as he explained his reasoning behind the request and his love for the university, they finally granted him the day.

It is important that parents spend a lot of time in determining visitation schedules, as these schedules determine the contact that the parents get with their children. Because of this, it's very important that parents introduce any requests that they might have, even though the requests may seem odd at first. This way, parents will be able to spend more quality time with their children and be able to share something special, even if it's just the love for basketball.

Source: The Dagger, "Syracuse fan makes unusual custody request in divorce settlement," Jeff Eisenberg, July 27, 2012