AIBU to really dislike Round Robin updates in Christmas Cards?

[ShinyRuby]

I mean the printed list of family achievements that some people insist on putting inside their cards. I had one today, a printed A4 sheet from someone who I haven't seen for a number of years. It had a paragraph for each member of the family detailing all their achievements over the year. I just found it all so very boastful & braggy. Obviously there's never anything negative &, reading between the lines, the achievements seemed to be no more than any average family. I know the letters go to literally everybody she knows. I can't see the need but maybe IABU. Anyway, it went straight into the recycling!

[Celebelly]

My mum and I used to get one every year from an old friend of hers, and every year we sat down and read it out to see what mind-numbingly normal things her children had done over the course of the year. We lived in hope of something outlandish happening like 'Luke has found Jesus and joined a commune' but alas.

I think they're dreadful as presumably people who actually care will already know about any real important things and people who don't care will have no interest in whether little Alfie has taken up the violin. But they're quite (unintentionally) amusing sometimes!

[ForalltheSaints]

There must be a comedy sketch/spoof that someone could share with us. Or Michael McIntyre could do one for us (he's probably on MN somewhere).

[MeVoila]

I love them, for very uncharitable reasons. I sent a few spoof ones last year.

[Finfintytint]

I receive one from one person only in my list of contacts. She is an old colleague and they provide us with much amusement. She is a lovely person but honestly thinks we are interested in her family’s food likes, holidays and illnesses. Let it go. It gives them pleasure in constructing it and I’m not a killjoy.

[FrostyMoanyWind]

They are awful. My parents send one every year, taking the piss out of my DC and detailing the achievements of go,den child's DC. I even got comments from people about it last year. Still, beats the year they wrote about my gynaecologist issues...to prove what wonderful grandparents they are. Dread to think what this year's will contain. They send it to IL's so my MIL will let me see it!

[BarbaraRoyale]

I love them ! Hours of cheap entertainment
Mean I know but .......😂🤣😂🤣😀😆

[AutumnCrow]

Some of them are beyond spoofing.

DP could do a good one, for real. 'We are blessed that DS1 avoided getting arrested in 2018, although obviously the year is not yet over so perhaps we shouldn't jump the gun on that'.

[Mrsdoubleskulls]

Bah Humbug to you all! I actually love these updates. I usually receive them from people I wished to stay in contact with, but for one reason or another, life has got in the way. I don't see them as humble brags, just catching up.

[itsgoodtobehome]

Every year Christmas cards arrive for the previous owners of our house. As we stopped forwarding their mail after 6 months (when we realised they hadn’t bothered to inform anyone of their change of address and were using us as a mail forwarding service), we still get Christmas cards for them 7 years later. So I open them, and there is always one every year from the same people with the most boring family update sheet I have ever come across. But the thing is, it’s soooo dull that it’s actually funny, and I get quite excited when it arrives to find out what tedious things they have been up to this year (think triathlons, church field trips, music tours). Anyway I find it quite amusing that they still send this shit to supposed friends who haven’t even bothered to tell them that they moved 7 years ago 😂😁

[ChocolateChipMuffin2016]

My mum saves them and does similar to @Celebelly, we call them the ‘we gots’.
We’ve thought about doing spoof ones and sending them back, but we’re too lazy!

[Sunnysidegold]

There is a thread on here somewhere where people write spoof round robin's and will send to someone for you!! I'd love to send one to confuse my parents

[PicaK]

I love them. I await the ones my parents get avidly each year.

[DanielRicciardosSmile]

I'm sure I read a satirical one online a couple of years ago. It was very funny.

Only ever received one, and it was full of stuff about people I'd never heard of (that presumably were mutual friends of someone else) so was really boring.

[TheCountessofFitzdotterel]

I love them, but to be fair we only get one which is actually annoying. The others are variously sweet, witty, interesting, heartwarming, dull.
Some of my friends write very good ones #brag

[ShinyRuby]

Glad I'm not the only one, I've retrieved it from the recycling & seeing the funny side a bit more now. Thanks for the replies, live the story about the people who moved 7 years ago! We still get a card EVERY year for the previous owners & we've been here 20 years! Sadly no Round Robin though...

[3out]

I loved these growing up! We’d all gather round the dining table and open that day’s Christmas card delivery, and we’d each hope to be the one to find that their little stack of cards would have a round robin hiding inside. We’d read them aloud and laugh and laugh! The older we got, the funnier they became, because the featured families were also getting older and were starting to rebel slightly. You’d get 2-300 words about Tim’s achievements and accolades from the year, and the same for Susan, and then you’d get to Matthew. Matthew has achieved nothing this year. No grade 8 oboe, no school skiing trip, no rugby wins. But his parents had to write something about him so that it didn’t reflect poorly on their parenting 😂
Then you get the RRs from the delightfully eccentric families. ‘Trevor and the lads have sat their Klingon exam this Easter, and all passed with flying colours. They were delighted to be presented with their certificates at this summer’s international Star Trek convention. I knitted jumpers for the occasion (see picture)’. Loved these updates!

[ShinyRuby]

Love not live!

[TheCountessofFitzdotterel]

Our favourites when I was growing up were from a family with a smallholding. They had lots of kids and they also used to tell us lots about the animals so we used to argue about which were which, eg 'oh look, you were wrong about Molly being the daughter, she's just had a calf'.

[RiverTam]

My parents used to mock the couple who sent us one. Frankly I think it was absolute jealously translated into sneeriness because this couple actually lived instead of sitting at home doing nothing much. I used to read their letters thinking ‘why doesn’t my family do some of this stuff, and why are they belittling it?’.

[ShinyRuby]

3out
I'll be looking forward to the messages when rebellion kicks in & it all goes off the rails!

[redcarbluecar]

I think they’re funny and wish I got more! Simon Hoggart compiled two very amusing collections of them a few years ago- worth checking out.

[BellMcEnd]

I think they’re hilarious! The more mundane the better. The fabulous and much missed mumsnetter CatThiefKeith was a complete genius at spoof round robins. A few years ago she sent one to my parents and I sent one to relatives of hers. The one she sent was brilliant. I must see if my parents still have it

[MrsDylanBlue]

My parents and my sister do this it’s so cringe.

[Cantusethatname]

I'm sure there was an Adrian Mole one, something like "In June I discovered Ivan was having an affair..."

[JustHereForThePooStories]

I only get one of these, from an American couple we’re friends with. I love it. When it arrives, DH and I have an agreement that neither of us can open it alone, we have to wait for the other to be there. I usually pour a glass of wine, and make DH read it aloud.

They’re very, very religious so there’s usually a few little gems along the lines of
“Jimmy has had a great first year in Kindergarten and is now able to count to 20, say the alphabet, and tell us the story of Our Lord Jesus Christ’s ascension into heaven using Playmobile figures”.

I’m looking forward to it now.