It's All My Husband's Fault

  About two weeks ago, I had what I like to refer to as my best idea in the history of ever.  I don't even remember what brought it about but I was thinking about child support, how The Ex always blames her child support obligation for the reason she's broke, how Son is convinced we're just taking all of her money, blah blah blah.  I wondered if there was a way that we could get by without child support - after all, we had already gone a month and a half without a payment.   Then, all at once, every single gear in my brain started spinning.   I told Husband about my idea.  He said it seemed pretty good.  I called Our Attorney; she said it sounded good and if we got The Ex to agree to it, then even better.   I typed up a stipulation and Husband sent it to The Ex via 2houses.  To summarize, we'd change the order to say that beginning on July 1st:      •  The Ex will not have to pay any child support     ...

  Be forewarned, this is a rambling post because it's been really quiet lately.   The Ex was almost half an hour late dropping off the kids last Friday; Husband texted her about it so there's documentation.  I thought about being half an hour late to take the kids back on Monday, but we have a stipulation we want her to sign so we're kind of letting things slide.  If it happens again, then they're definitely getting taken back late.   That aside, The Ex hasn't said much of anything.  The kids said something about her "friend" bringing his jet ski to Tiny City.  I honestly almost asked, "You guys do know that [New Guy] is married, right?" just to see the look on their faces because a)they've never told us New Guy's name and b)I'm sure that while The Ex is acting lovey-dovey with this dude, her teen children have no idea that he's married to another woman.   A friend of mine says she wishes she could just understand what exact...

  I may have already mentioned them, but I'd like to take a moment to quote two specific phrases from the court order between Husband and The Ex:      •  The party receiving the children shall pick them up during the school year.  This shall be reversed during the summer.      •  The summer is defined as the Monday after school ends until one week before school starts in the fall.   That's easy enough to understand, isn't it?  After all, it's been the court order for nearly five years.  There has never before been an issue on our end over who was supposed to pick up or drop off Son and/or Daughter.  There was an issue in November 2013 when The Ex "didn't know" they had switched weekends, failed to pick up either of the kids, and then tried demanding that Husband give her a "make-up" weekend for her screw up.  There was another issue in December 2014 when The Ex left Husband a rambling voice mail and stated ...

  The Ex just shared a photo that read: "One day I am going to wake up, roll over on my side, and kiss the love of my life good morning."   Ummm.....considering that she's dating a married man while living with her parents because she has a restraining order on her second husband who she is still legally married to, I'm gonna take a shot in the dark here and say that maybe she has absolutely no idea what true love really is and couldn't possibly know even if it hit her square in the face.