Christmas money for adult grandchildren

I think your sister is horrid and very selfish.
What an attitude towards her elderly mother.
You ve done what you can by speaking up in the first place.

Did you read the bit where mum isnt happy buying the gifts, where mum feels pressured to buy the gifts because when she mentioned she was stopping buying the gifts - the sister raised holy hell so mum said she would carry on buying the gifts she wanted to stop buying, just to keep the peace? where sister is taking the mick, telling her elderly mum to buy gifts for her children's partners? and in return gets mum a miserly box of chocolates as thanks from them all for her spending a thousand pounds each year?

Surely not... because if that was your mum being taken advantage of, you wouldnt keep out of it? Would you?

Keep out of it.
If your mum can afford it then it's not a problem.
I would treat all grandchildren equally.
Set a budget she's happy to give /spend and divide it equally.
I have DC at school ,at uni and at work.The one at work (24) is renting and living independently,he has no money left at the end of the month and would probably appreciate a cash gift now more then ever.

Cut off in my family was 21. This didn’t go down well with my SIL when we told her (so she cut off my DD at 12 in retaliation).
Your sister is behaving outrageously. The absolute cheek of insisting on expensive gifts for the boyfriends/girlfriends of her children. Your DM must immediately stop this nonsense. Pick an age & anyone over that gets nothing.

I think you need to have a conversation with your sister around her setting expectations for her kids. She can tell them they have had 10 years more money than your kids are getting, and she can tell the youngest who is concerned his siblings will hate him that as well

You can also tell her that it’s not acceptable to gift all this at Christmas and get a box of chocolates in return, nor is it acceptable to buy for partners

i think this year, if she must continue she doesn’t buy for partners, and your sister then has the conversation with her kids telling them they have dont better than cousins/ youngest siblings. She can also suggest they buy their grandma a present each!

21 is the cutoff.
GC get £50 each either in cash or present for Xmas and birthday till they are 21 then it will be a card.

Why don’t the working adult children buy their granny / aunty etc gifts ? I realise that you don’t give to receive but when the GC involved are working I don’t understand how they feel they are exempt from the giving part .

I would be having a frank conversation with your sister how upset your mum was last christmas that she got a box of chocs. All of my mums DGCs have gifted my mum thoughtful presents since they started work.

Even the ones that were students and had part time jobs. Same for me, all my adult nieces and nephews buy me and DD9 a thoughtful present - I don't care about the cost but it means a lot that they think about it and it's not something led by their parents.

I have s sister like this. Her kids are all in their very late 20s and she has never once opened her mouth and said no need for Xmas cash anymore even thou she knows some of us are struggling. Shes obsessed with card giving ( the moon pig cards ] fancy dinners and cash gifts but hasnt got money to pay her gas bill and she wants you to be in the same spot as her... I mean you cant make this stuff up. 🤦🏻‍♀️🤣

My mil has 12 grandchildren - ranging in age from 31 to 7. She lives in Ireland and gives each of her grandchildren €3,000 every Christmas. She makes no distinction at all - even though all of the over 21's have asked her to stop! It's very tax efficient for her and she wants to do it.

My grandad died last year at over 90 and he always gave me and my brother our “Christmas box” which was cash. I’m 40. My mum used to take him to the post office to withdraw the cash specially.

He would always buy my DH a bottle of whiskey. In later years he’d include cash for my kids too and I’d put it in their accounts. When they were little he’d get them a toy (which my mum probably arranged for him)

We were his only 2 grandkids though and he loved my DH and they got on really well.

If your mum doesn’t want to do it then she can stop. I’d just get a token gift for the partners (if anything). Your sister needs to get over it!

The thing that I don’t understand is why the adult children don’t buy their grandma a gift? Amongst all of those adults (inc partners) receiving from grandma / mum, doesn’t anyone feel sad for grandma sitting there with nothing to open. Maybe you could remind your sister how it felt last year for your mum, and ask her why she feels entitled to receiving for everyone, but nothing comes back the other way? It’s bizarre.
If I was your mum, I would tell your sister that she has sorted it this year and just move to token gifts, if she’s asked, just say that after last year, she had assumed that everyone had moved to token gifts for adults as that was all she received, one single token gift from what sounds like a lot of adults. Your sister being hysterical suggests that this gets discussed (why?) when it doesn’t need to be. Just cut them off. Gifts for children only.

Why does she need to give to the partners @Loveapineapplepizzame? My gran writes a card with the present (cash) to both me and my dh same for my sister. My brother and cousins who are single get the same to them. Maybe i’m wrong but this whole “when my dc is 18 the will get a satsuma and that’s it” mentality is just really horrible when they dps or in this case dgp can afford it.

I don’t think grandma needs to discuss it with her grandchildren, they aren’t buying her gifts so a £20 limit to them wouldn’t help.

That's actually quite horrible. Your sister is happy to take from her but only gifts her a token gift, while she watches everyone else get better gifts! In that case tell her to gift a bottle of wine and tub of heroes! They don't deserve more than that!

I have to be honest, I would speak to your nieces and nephews because I suspect that they are unaware of the position that their mother has taken. I think that they would agree that the time has come to set a limit of £20 and call it a day and that would be for family only and not partners.

Many years ago, I got scolded on here when I mentioned that I was feeling used because I had a friend with three children and it was expected that I would be five gifts (inc her DH) but get just one in return. It was not tenable as a single person, so I quietly faded the friendship, now I might just give a generic family gift as I know better, but back then I worried about keeping up appearances.

And finally a big thank you to your mum, who helped her family when they were younger and needed it... tell her to make 2026, the year of granny being spoiled!

I am more on the fence. Clearly your sister is being unreasonable although why she was fine about it and then hysterical is very strange- is she struggling more than you think?
Hard agree about not buying partners of grandchildren gifts- especially if giving cash no need.
However- unless they are actually all rolling in it (unlikely given the current climate) if she can give away some money at a v expensive time with no detrimental effect to myself then, if I was the grandma, I probably would? And if I did decide to go for token gifts I would expect the same myself and receive 10 pairs of slippers of fluffy socks....

Its absolutely despicable that your sister views your mum as a cash cow for her kids (and their damn partners).

Id be absolutely livid with her and wouldnt hold back. Tell your mum she can rest assured she doesnt have to give the cash and you'll sort it

Cheeky cow.