Illinois Child Custody & Parenting Plan Guide — Build Your 602.10 Plan

You have 120 days. The blank court form is 14 pages. Where do you start?

The State of Illinois gives you free parenting plan forms. They are perfectly good for filing. But a blank form asks what you want to decide — it does not show you how to decide it.

Do you allocate education decisions jointly or give one parent sole authority? What happens when a two-week summer vacation conflicts with the other parent's holiday weekend? If you write "reasonable right of first refusal" instead of specifying a triggering absence period and response window, you have just written the clause that generates the most post-decree litigation in Illinois family courts.

A family law attorney will walk you through every one of these choices — at $260 to $330 an hour. For a custody case that goes to trial, Illinois parents pay $10,000 to $50,000 in legal fees.

This guide is not a replacement for an attorney. It is the preparation system you use before you sit across from one — or before you sit across from your co-parent at mediation, or before you open the blank court form and try to fill it in from memory.

The Parenting Plan Decision System

The Illinois Child Custody & Parenting Plan Guide is a structured decision-support workbook. It translates every statutory requirement into a choice you can make with a pen in your hand, so you walk into court, mediation, or your attorney's office with a fully articulated parenting plan — not a stack of unanswered questions.

Illinois replaced "custody" and "visitation" in 2016. The guide uses the current statutory terms — allocation of significant decision-making responsibilities and parenting time — because your judge will, too.

What's Inside

• The 15-Provision Drafting Framework — every mandatory element of 750 ILCS 5/602.10(f) broken into clear decision points: decision-making splits, residential schedules, holiday rotations, transportation, electronic communication, relocation notice, right of first refusal, and dispute resolution
• Decision-Making Split Matrix — walks you through allocating the four named core domains (education, health, religion, extracurricular activities) as sole, joint, or split by category, with scenarios for each configuration
• Parenting-Time Schedule Builder — side-by-side comparison of 2-2-5-5, 2-2-3, alternating weeks, and 3-4-4-3 rotation models, with age-appropriate adjustments for infants through teenagers
• 146-Overnight Child Support Calculator — two worked examples showing exactly how the Income Shares Model math changes when you cross the shared care threshold, including the January 2027 SB3524 changes that drop it to 110 overnights
• Right of First Refusal Builder — a clause-by-clause template specifying triggering absence periods, exempt caregivers, notification methods, and response windows — built to prevent the vague language that leads to post-decree motions
• Holiday and Vacation Rotation Planner — fill-in-the-blank schedules for every major holiday, school break, and summer block with exact transition times
• Caretaking Documentation Log — a 24-month tracking tool aligned with the best-interest factors under 750 ILCS 5/602.7(b), so your evidence is organized by the criteria judges actually use
• Relocation Quick-Reference — county-by-county rules for the collar county 25-mile threshold versus the downstate 50-mile threshold, plus the 11 relocation best-interest factors
• Mediation Preparation Worksheet — organizes your proposals before your first mediation session so you direct the conversation instead of reacting to it
• Key Resources Directory — county-specific contacts, mandatory parenting class registration links, free court self-help centers, and child support estimator tools

Who This Guide Is For

• Divorcing parents who need to build a complete parenting plan within the 120-day filing window
• Unmarried parents establishing a parenting arrangement through the Illinois Parentage Act of 2015 — parentage does not automatically grant parenting time
• Parents preparing for mediation who want to walk in with concrete proposals instead of negotiating from a blank slate
• Parents working with an attorney who want to minimize billable hours by handling the organizational work before the first consultation

Why the Free Court Forms Are Not Enough

The standardized parenting plan form from illinoiscourts.gov is what you file with the Circuit Court Clerk. It is a required document. But it is a blank table with instructions like "Describe your proposed parenting time schedule" — it does not explain that a 2-2-5-5 rotation keeps both parents involved during the school week while alternating weekends works better for long-distance co-parents, or that choosing a parenting-time schedule with fewer than 146 overnights can cost you hundreds of dollars a month in child support calculations.

Illinois Legal Aid Online's Easy Forms tool is an excellent guided interview that generates completed court documents. It handles the what — the procedural filing. This guide handles the how — the strategic negotiation work you need to do before you type anything into those forms.

Co-parenting apps like OurFamilyWizard ($110–$300/year per parent) and TalkingParents ($77–$353/year per parent) are built for ongoing post-decree communication. They are valuable after your parenting plan is finalized. They do not help you write the plan in the first place.

What You Get

Your download includes 12 PDFs:

• The Full Guide — 13 chapters, 49 pages of step-by-step guidance covering every stage from filing through post-judgment modifications
• The Starter Checklist — a quick-reference summary of the essential action items, deadlines, and statutory requirements
• 10 Printable Worksheets — the Decision-Making Allocation Worksheet, Parenting Plan Provision Checklist, Overnight Counter, Child Support Estimator, Right of First Refusal Builder, Holiday Rotation Planner, Caretaking Documentation Log, Mediation Preparation Worksheet, Relocation Decision Checklist, and Agency Communication Log — each a standalone fillable PDF you can print, mark up, and bring to mediation or your attorney's office

All are yours to keep permanently. Download them, print them, mark them up. No subscription, no recurring charge.

Satisfaction Guarantee

If the guide does not help you build a clearer, more complete parenting plan, email us and we will refund your purchase. No hoops.

Get the Illinois Child Custody & Parenting Plan Guide →

The free checklist gives you the overview. The full guide gives you the system — every worksheet, every schedule template, every child support calculation walkthrough, plus 10 standalone printable tools you can bring to court, mediation, or your attorney's office. Everything starts on the same page.