AIBU to feel miffed that SIL refused Easter eggs?!

@Ponoka7 they weren't working class. They were mean. The children grew up recalling being hungry. The parents salted the money away. When FIL died, in 2007, there was a million in the bank. MIL never went short, she was a headmistress and salting away her own.

I fairness she is probably relieved. It is hard with small kids . We received so many clothes they won’t wear, duplicates of toys, toys they won’t play with. And then it is up to me to deal with the never ending amount of stuff and try and get rid of it.

I hate the waste: I understand where people are coming from on this although I personally just accepted the gifts with a smile and an inner 😮‍💨

It does feel rude her refusing them, but agree at this point they probably have had loads of chocolate. Just share them out amongst your family and enjoy.

Well done for stopping the gifts.

How did SIL react to that?

They are probably relieved that you have stopped buying. Everyone your DH's age, who was WC, grew up with restricted treats, there wasn't the money for them. We didn't grow into chocoholics because of it. Your shot of sugar was a jam sandwich, or pudding on a Sunday.
We over consume. The gracious manners around gifts came from the days of buying things being an effort, lack of disposable income and high prices. None of that applies to the eggs sold in supermarkets, Thornton unicorn eggs included. When my children were small, you'd go to the Thornton shop and they'd personalise them. Throwing them in your trolley isn't the same at all. Everyone didn't buy for all and sundry. People are starting to value going away and days out. As for 'put them in a cupboard ', were do you magic this cupboard space from? 'Drop them in the food bank' great if you shop in store. Luckily my DD works in a hospital, so everything gets taken there. I think that it's far more polite to tell someone to not waste their money. A £5 in a card is much better received.

That was very rude of SIL.

Is it your DH’s family? I wouldn’t bother with getting them Easter eggs or Christmas presents again. Let DH do it he wants to.

I don't think any of my aunts or uncles got us eggs.

When dd1 was 18 months, she was the only one in her generation and got given 18 eggs from various people, none were small. Maybe that accounts for her not really liking Easter eggs. She'll never eat more than half.

Dd2 ooh will wolf it all down in one go and feel sick.

Ds is the most sensible one and eats a bit over a few days.

That's been the case since they were tiny and now they are adults.

I’m exactly the same. I remember my aunt’s horror that my mum just gave me Easter chocolate and gave me complete freedom as to how and when it was consumed. As an adult I can have a box of chocolates in full view for three months.

At least you don't have to by Christmas presents, because they will have "too many"

Ewww who keeps chocolate in a fridge?!

But you said you were sad you wouldn’t get to see their faces when they got them, implying to wanted to give the eggs directly to the girls and therefore creating a situation where they want to eat more chocolate.

I can understand you feeling a bit put out by your SILs comment but she’s probably thinking ‘ffs Easter is well over and done with and I’m having to ration even more chocolate’.

Maybe next time buy a little Easter gift and make sure you drop it over before Easter not a week after. Or just don’t bother because kids don’t need endless gifts for Easter, Valentines etc

I think it depends on whether you were told in advance they don’t want chocolate eggs for health reasons.
It’s perfectly acceptable not to want your kids to end up with diabetes and obesity but she should have communicated this in advance if she knew you were going all out with buying fancy ones.

This is exactly how I feel! I’m very particular about what my kids have and I would rather people didn’t waste their money on things I’m just going to pass on. We also have the ‘no presents please, but if you must, we like books’. I find it really annoying having so much chocolate in the house and it’s not something I want my kids to have daily (all under 6).

I'd say because things were rationed in a stingy household. His sisters are similar. They all talk about the curmudgeonliness. They had to share one selection box between three with their names written on their allocated bars.

I (and our DC) always knew there were sweets in the cupboard and there was no need to be greedy.

Agree. Daft comment saying 'Cadburys is crap, so no-one would want it anyway! So just bin it!' 🙄

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Yabu perhaps the kids are getting fat from too much chocolate or the kids pester all day once they know its there.
All holidays in uk are about sweets and chocolate (incl birthdays).
But probably she should have said before so you didnt buy in first place

Why would you think that? After all, her kids have been eating the Easter eggs that other people have given them this year. She seems to have just decided that they've had enough now, so they don't need their auntie's.

I’m going against the grain I actually don’t think sil has been that rude.

The trouble is with all this chocolate it can become an absolute nightmare for parents. I’ve got one child where I can put the sweets/chocolate away for another day, but with my other child, I’d never hear the end of it if he knew there was chocolate in the house.

Sometimes at Christmas we’d end up with enough chocolate to last a year. In the end we said go
people, please no chocolate.

If your sil had accepted the eggs politely then no doubt you’d continue to buy each year. Perhaps you’d be better giving the children something else for Easter.

It's a cultural given.

I disagree, I think it's about individual family culture.

In our family it's normal to get an egg from your parents and another from your grandparents.

In my friend's family, every aunt and uncle and great aunts and uncles buy all the children eggs, ending up in oodles of the damned things.

A mutual friend's family buy one big fancy egg per child, but it's an expensive one, bought by grandparents only. (I very much wish I was a grandchild in that family, their eggs are incredible!)

@Roads - no, of course not. But if I was someone who felt strongly that cheap chocolate was filled with things that actively damage people's health and are addictive, I wouldn't pass some on to a food bank to inflict on some poor soul, I'd bin them.

(I don't believe that, but I have binned some dreadful UPF rather than donate them because I'm not contributing to fucking someone else's health up.)

YANBU. I think it's rude to refuse a gift, personally. Thank the person for their kindness and then regift if necessary. And she's being a bit precious about the chocolate, if she's that worried about recent chocolate consumption she could always save them and bring them out later in the year.

Perhaps she did gently do that last year? And this is the only way to put her foot down.

That's quite a privilege position though, do you genuinely think the children and families in this country who are struggling with the cost of living crisis and having to use food banks would care?

She didn't set a boundary. That's the whole problem. If she'd told OP that she didn't want the children to have Easter eggs in plenty of time that would have been a boundary. But she didn't. She just rebuffed a gift chosen with love, after she'd already allowed the kids some eggs. Just not OP 's.

Ok but does he secretly snaffle them because they were rationed when he was little, or were they rationed because he couldn't be trusted not to eat them all if they weren't hidden?
I realised early on that my son had no off switch when it came to chocolate.
My DH is the same.
ETA your sil was just rude though!