Norma K. Litton - Page 9

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          respective Sunday night at her home, petitioner counted Sunday as           
          a full day that the children were in her physical custody.                  
          Therefore, according to petitioner, the children spent 195 days             
          in her physical custody.                                                    
               There is no statutory yardstick to quantify physical custody           
          “for a greater portion” of the year, but such a yardstick is                
          determined by the facts of each individual case.  In the present            
          case, the Standard Possession Order awarded petitioner physical             
          custody during the regular school term every Tuesday and Thursday           
          beginning at 6 p.m. and ending at 8 a.m. the following morning.             
          With respect to the weekends, the Standard Possession Order                 
          awarded petitioner custody beginning at 6 p.m. on the first,                
          third, and fifth Friday of each month and ending at 6 p.m. on the           
          following Sunday.  If Monday was a school holiday, petitioner’s             
          custody would end at 6 p.m. on that Monday.  In light of the fact           
          that the Standard Possession Order awarded physical custody to              
          each parent on the basis of an overnight stay, we find it                   
          appropriate in this case to quantify physical custody on the                
          number of nights that the children spent with each parent.                  
               We found petitioner’s testimony at trial to be straight-               
          forward and credible, and she impressed us as a sincere and                 
          conscientious taxpayer.  Moreover, we found that petitioner                 
          diligently documented the time that she had physical custody of             
          the children in her day-planner, which she maintained on an                 






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