Sister-in-Law didn’t invite my mother in

To put it another way, if mil and family had been the ones visiting (and perhaps dh was also home), how would PPs respond to their own mum ringing the bell as she was dropping something off? Would it really ge along the lines of "what part of unavailable don't you understand?". It just strikes me as so cold.

I think this is where we are going to have to agree to disagree. I don't see making a wrong assumption about the acceptability of knocking on your own dil's door as anything approaching "incredibly rude" and so the sil's reaction and the subsequent lauding of it on this thread comes across as incredibly harsh. Do the same people accept generous hospitality, forgiveness and childcare favours etc from their ILs? Because imo that makes it even worse if so.

But why did MIL need to knock on the door at all? She'd been told DIL was unavailable so it was incredibly rude of her to knock on the door at all, let alone more than once.

@Lostcat MIL had all the information she required. She knew the day before that DIL would not be available - at that point she could have chosen not to come, which would have been perfectly reasonable imo. What is not reasonable is to choose to come anyway and then get all upset that the person she had been told was unavailable was, in fact, unavailable.

MIL has agency too. "OK, if you aren't free then I'll bring it another day"

why would MIL do that though? Makes no sense at all. She had no idea DIL was intending to be at home entertaining others. Only DIL knew that.

The point really is how sil reacted to the unexpected knock at the door. Mil clearly thought there had been a change of plan. Understandable imo as most people can manage to answer the door if they are at home. Obviously she was mistaken and if sil had been polite while making it clear she couldn't invite mil in I would say that's weirdly unfriendly but OK. As it is I think she was unnecessarily rude and hurtful.

Irregardless, this isn’t different friendship groups. This is her MIL. She is beyond entitled to spend quality time with her own family, focused on them, discussing whatever private matters she wants with them, without having her MIL present or in need of hosting.

People keep saying the DIL should have arranged another day. Why?? In the past MIL has demonstrated zero issue with dropping the items on the doorstep and buggering off. DIL had no reason to believe today would be any different. If she didn’t have previous for this, sure, there could be confusion. But on every occasion DIL has requested items be dropped and left and she not be disturbed as she was unavailable, this has been met with ZERO PROTEST.

the problem is MIL seeing that she was unavailable for a different reason than she assumed. The further problem being the lack of invite inside after her knocking. If she had knocked and was told SIL is still busy, and went home fine, this wouldn’t be the issue it is. MIL cried offended that she didn’t get an immediate invite in for tea.

I said a few pages back that MIL had agency, she can choose a different day to go. That's what most people would do, surely, if they were told the person they were hoping to see was unavailable on that day?

She goes on a Tuesday because that's what suits her. Most of the time that's fine, the DIL pauses her work, invites MIL in for a chat and gives her food and drink; on this occasion it wasn't convenient.

How in any sense does that translate to the DIL being at fault?

I like your of use punctuation.

and I agree with you

Absolutely the point

DIL didn't insist she came round then

MIL has agency too. "OK, if you aren't free then I'll bring it another day"

No. Issues. Created.

Not. The. Point.

DIL has agency. “Thanks MIL, but another day will work better.”

No. Issues. Created.

It is MIL who chooses the day of delivery!

"Can you really not imagine any scenario in which someone is hosting people you don't know, and is thus unavailable to see you? Really, not even if you put your mind to it?"

But in that case, why not tell MiL to come round another time rather than treat her like a delivery woman you've never met, being happy to take the presents but not to talk to her!

" if Friend D, who doesn't know A and B, and is a very different person to them and probably wouldn't get along immediately, turns up, I wouldn't invite them in. Does that make sense?"

Why would you be friends with anybody who wouldn't be nice to your other friends?
Are you one of those people who changes personality depending on who they're with?

I understand why your mum feels upset. Of course it would have been lovely to be invited in.
Just because SIL was with her family, she was busy and asked for the stuff (freebies?) to be left in the porch.

I clearly haven't rtft so I hope sil has mentioned something about it and your DM is feeling better about it now

Can you really not imagine any scenario in which someone is hosting people you don't know, and is thus unavailable to see you? Really, not even if you put your mind to it?

"More the merrier" is a lovely approach in the right circumstances. If I'm hosting Friends A and B, and Mutual Friend C drops by, of course I'd invite C in. But if Friend D, who doesn't know A and B, and is a very different person to them and probably wouldn't get along immediately, turns up, I wouldn't invite them in. Does that make sense?

In this case the MIL hasn't met the SIL's family in four years. I assume there's a reason for that, and it's not the kind of reason that can be overriden by a spontaneous drop-in.

Some people on this thread seem to think that because the DIL was physically present she was somehow obliged to interact. She really wasn't, you know.

Unavailable just means unavailable. It doesn't mean unavailable unless someone else deems that your reason is not good enough. If MIL behaves like that she might find her DIL is much less available in the future, and who would benefit from that? Certainly not MIL, who is usually invited in for a cuppa and a chat.

No inventing needed when OP had told us everything we need:

MIL's schedule so not SIL insisting she sneak around like some ninja

MIL knocked more than once "in case she hadn't been heard" which means she was being quite insistent rather than "Oh she's busy and probably doesn't want disturbing"

MIL knew who was in the house and doing what before the door opened so must have been looking through a window

MIL wanted to ring DS and thus was making a drama about nothing

No imaginary scenario needed, from the OP:

on this occasion it seemed different and she knocked initially and then again as she thought she hadn’t been heard.

Mum sends a text and Sister-in-Law will stop work

here were people in the house and a couple of kids running in the hall so my mum knocked on the door a couple of times when finally SiL opens it and seems surprised

SiL answered but didn’t invite her in

My mum is so upset but we have stopped her ringing Bro.

If she just wanted to hand out the stuff and leave, there was no need for the drama, was it.

It' s all in the OP...

Talk about not understanding nuance.

That DIL was physically present does NOT mean she was available. She had tactfully tried to alert MIL to that. But of course thinking only of herself, MIL beat on the door, until "finally" DIL was forced to respond.

It's allllll about MIL.

Normal people would say to themselves "oops, she's busy with guests; I won't disturb them."

You're wasting your breath I'm afraid.

People on here seem to like making up imaginary scenarios and pretending that is what actually happened. 'Repeatedly banging on the door,' 'hammering on the door', 'peering through the windows', 'barging in', 'taking round tat that SIL doesn't even want' 'rude, pushy and inconsiderate MIL' etc etc, none of which is in the OPs posts or even hinted at by OP.. it doesn't seem to occur to them that if they need to lie about or massively exaggerate what happened to fit their narrative then chances are that narrative is probably incorrect.

But it suits the fantasists to pretend MIL is some rude, intrusive monster rather than give her the benefit of the doubt and consider that once she realised SIL was actually in it might have been okay to knock the door to handover the gifts rather than just leave them in the porch.

It seems a complete misunderstanding to me and SIL's reaction was OTT when a quick 'thanks MIL, I'm a bit busy at the moment, I'll see you next week' would have sufficed. Even if she though MIL was trying to encroach on her family gathering/get herself invited in, that response would have nipped it in the bud, so what was the point in being rude at all?

If SIL didn't want to be disturbed, and would be pissed off at anyone disturbing her she should have communicated that more effectively than saying she was 'unavailable', when she was quite obviously available to answer the door to receive a package.

exactly this

Exactly.

Either way, MIL making it all about her, and threatening to create a stir with her son, is beyond obnoxious.

But in this instance the DIL and MIL have a good relationship, so why would the MIL assume the plans have changed? Surely if they had, the DIL would have messaged to that effect - 'I'm around after all today so do please knock on the door', that sort of thing.

But she didn't, so the MIL shouldn't be making any assumptions, she should take her DIL at her word and respect the fact that she is unavailable. To assume.otherwise is really rude.

I am also annoyed if I tell the delivery driver to take the parcel elsewhere and they ignore it...