MIL wants to do my kids Christmas stockings…again

Would your kids not rather enjoy Christmas in their own house? Obligation visits to relatives can be on any other day of the year.

Could you give the kids their stockings from you on another day, eg the beginning of Advent? And make it a genuine surprise to find them on their beds along with an Advent calendar? Then MIL's stockings would be an extra.

Just say your going to the do the stocking. I think setting firm ground rules is important for Grand parents. You only get a few years of doing proper santa with the kids so don't miss out if it is important to you. We have one set of grandparents who insist - just we tell the kids that ones we do is from Santa and the other is from the grandparents - everyone seems brought into this.

I wouldn't word it like this because it accepts the premise that stocking are MIL own thing to grant

It sounds like your m-I-l goes to a huge amount of trouble and expense and I think the correct attitude is to be grateful and let the cousins all have fun together creating happy family memories and lifelong relationships.
I also think it’s good that they mostly get similar stocking as then there is no disparity. I remember one of the nephews, an only child being somewhat green eyed at the stockings his cousins got. That particular sister just has never been a great present giver, she just doesn’t choose well or appropriately, it doesn’t interest her.
If I felt so strongly about the stocking I would create a new tradition of finding Santa still came to our home while we were away and having at home stockings too.

As an aside I’m amazed you have a nine year old who still believes in Santa. Also as children get older stockings become much more expensive so you might be grateful to have them done for you in the future. My daughters are young adults and I have suggested it’s time to give up stockings but they don’t want to! I try to put in nice things that will be appreciated and not discarded but it ends up costing a fortune. For instance I might buy a gift set of lipsticks or small perfume samples and split them between the two but such sets might cost £20-30, I usually put some food treat items in, this year I have already bought a small can of espresso martini for each £5x2,
I always buy a pack of M&S pants for each which are about £10 x 2. There’s always a book each, last year’s were well appreciated with one happening to be the January choice for that daughter’s book club. But it was a new issue hardback, about £12-15 I expect.

When I add it all up I am probably spending at least £100 or nearer £150 each. Gone are the days of £2 jokes. 🥲

So enjoy it while you can and let your mil have her traditional Christmas of excess. You can save the money for Christmases to come.

I never understand these issues.

What do you think divorced parents do?

Santa has to visit and leave presents at different houses and in different stockings, to be opened over different days at Christmas.

I’d just be grateful that my child/children had so many people that loved them.

I this this is good. Also, as they get older, it can become hard work filling stockings, so someone else doing some of it is a bonus. You can ensure they get the key things you want them to have.

I really don't understand this, the kids don't know granny has bought the stuff.

It is not about monetary value, it us about Father Christmas knowing them and what they like.

There is no harm in being ungrateful for things that people do for themselves, rather than for others. Those people need to ponder why their actions are not met with gushing gratitude and adjust their behaviour.

It is pure entitlement to have no involvement with your grandchildren, other than to take the most magical moment of the year for yourself.

I think you are being ridiculous making a fuss about this. Just do a stocking for your DC and keep in your room. That way they get presents before 9am and you get to keep your own traditions. Alternatively, just decide to have Christmas at yours one year and do what you want.

One new year's Eve I stopped at a great aunt's and she made up a small stocking and that will be my all time fave NYE!
It was a kind gesture which I will always remember that is what granny is trying to do. You either go with it or stay at home.
But the big meet up is memory building for your children.

You're fine with this very detached and hand-off relationship. However, I do think it does make it quite cheeky and entitled of your MIL to then insist that her Christmas traditions for your children, that she doesn't bother with through the year, take precendence over your's. If she had a warm and loving relationship with them, I'd probably let it go. As she doesn't, I would refuse to follow her stocking rules.

What a load of nonsense! Just buy your kids what you want, wrap them up and put them under the tree.

forgot their Santa age!! Give at home after you are back, and say as away Santa dropped some there anyway!

Just add a couple of the bits you've got into the top of the stocking before you go to bed. Then your kids get the extras they want and MIL has got to use the bits she's bought. Doesn't seem like any kind of big deal.

That’s not the case in all households, we don’t do stockings at all. Santa gives one big gift here and the rest are from us and family. Santa uses different wrapping paper.

Yanbu. She’s had her chance to do stockings for her own kids and it’s your turn now. Doing a stocking - putting the thought into little things that you know will excite them is one of the privileges of being a mum for me.

Tell MIL that you’re happy to use the lovely stockings she’s made but you’re going to choose and buy the things to go inside them yourself.

Stockings from Santa are the ones MIL does.

nothing to stop you doing a hamper of gifts for the dc from you that they have upstairs to open before going down to Santa gifts and tree presents from family.

That way it’s all kept separate, it explains why they got that extra stuff and all grandkids get the same.

but I also don’t think it harms kids to get basic stockings they aren’t expecting every other year tbh

A classic example of how ungrateful kids have become.

“I would prefer most of the stuff they receive at Christmas to be stuff they want or need.”

OP, can’t you say it MIL, “I know you love doing the stockings, but DC1 wants a …. And DC2 has asked for …., so I will get them to put in their stockings. Then it’s up to her to say either that she will get whatever is wanted, or that yes, you can add that to their stockings. As a DGM, I normally get a few bits for my DGC’s stockings, which are primarily put together by the parents. My DIL said please would I not as she likes to do her DC’s stockings herself - that is absolutely fine and her prerogative, so I just put such bits as would otherwise be in their stockings under the tree with a name on. In our house, the stockings are left by the fireplace, but the DGC can get them whenever their parents get up. I think it’s mean to make children wait until everyone has come down - adult DC who don’t have children don’t tend to want to get up at dawn!

Op doesn't think think it's lovely and neither would I. The eldest won't be grateful, she thinks it's from FC and is wondering why he hasn't got her anything personal to herself this year.

It's completely different and more enjoyable if the children are teenagers and know it's from Granny.

I wouldn't drop out my own family for a woman that does what your mil is doing. She's had Christmas with her own kids. Move the big meetup to Easter instead. I bet the others will thank you for it.

Offer to help her with all of the stockings.
Sounds like a massive job for someone hosting too. That way, everyone is more likely to get gifts they'll want, and you can put what ever you want in your kids'.

I would never have thought of doing a stocking for grandchildren until I read this. This is what the parents do.

Agree with this. Don’t make problems for the sake of once, every other year! Do your own stockings too, either give before u leave, or when get home. Or do upstairs again. If cousins ask your kids, they can say my mum n dad got them for me, no big deal. And if MIL ever gets wind of this, just say you have a tradition of doing your own stockings each year, but that you are ever so grateful for the one she always gets them. It shouldn’t b an issue, its just Xmas presents from their own parents like the other cousins will b getting, but just presented in a stocking!

I'm all for telling parents no and not wanting them to take your traditions (because they had their turn and now it's ours). In this case, I wouldn't stop it. There's a group of grandkids and it's going to be strange if your children don't get one the same way they did. You can still do a stocking. Maybe a 'before we go to granny' one? I think both traditions are able to exist alongside each other. It might be lovely for the children to get both stockings and will make granny happy, as well as giving them the chance to experience the stocking opening with their cousins. This doesn't have to rain on your parade.