MIL has forbidden DS to call for his friend when we visit

What struck me was the fact that your son had dinner with the neighbours. Was this in place of something that MIL had made? I would be pretty annoyed if that is the case.

I think that your MIL is very unreasonable. If she is only bothering with the younger children, why on earth would she care if he plays with the little girl next door, especially if they only play in the garden and not the house.

Do you enjoy the whole day visits every other weekend?

Op, can you get the grandparents to come to you on alternate weekends. Or perhaps you could cut your all day visit down to a half day instead of a full day.

Why on earth would they want some random kid at their house?

When I’m a granny I will not want the neighbours kids in and out of my house. I would like for my DIL / DS to arrange their own play dates with my neighbours’ kids in their own house.

That said, I would probably not say anything as I know anything ‘small’ can ruin a MIL / DIL relationship, so would suck-it up and quietly pray the kids fall-out soon 😂

How often do you see PIL & how long are the visits?

If for example you’ve had lunch together, it doesn’t seem unreasonable for DS to go & play while the adults chat. Better than playing on a screen.

We have this too - my DS’s friend lives next door to the GPs. I would allow him to pop over there sometimes, but only after he’d sat with the GPs for a while and had a nice chat and a snack or something with them. I’d also expect him to be with us for a meal if that was the plan.

though the kids go back and forwards between the two houses the in laws seem a bit annoyed when they are at the in laws house

To be fair, why should your in-laws have to host a play date with a random kid from their street with zero connection to them?

I don’t see the problem with your child going over to the other child’s house for an hour or so once he’s had some time with his grandparents, but YABU to expect grandparents to want an extra child who is nothing to do with them in their house when they’re already hosting family.

Well perhaps she’s trying to and this situation is part of a bigger picture involving the family.

In what way is the MIL being annoying?

I can see that the IL don’t want neighbours child running around their home.
so you can organise two visits, one to see the friends and one to see ILs. Or ask next door neighbour if she’s happy for your son to knock but to stay at hers as your MIL is being annoying.

Yes but the in-laws don’t interact with him, they just want him to “present” @Hellotodays I would take a game of snakes and ladders or dominoes and say to GPs, “grandad DS has been looking forward to playing this with you!” If they still don’t want to actually engage with him meaningfully, but want adult conversation whilst he has to be there for their vanity but not involved, then that is selfish and I would let him call for his friend

I also think the OP has deliberately buried the lead.

There are neighbours' kids wandering in and out of her mother in law's house when this happens. And she hasn't said how often they visit.

OP has not posted with details in good faith.

Well she is the one who should be playing with and entertaining her grandson if she wants a good relationship with him as we do when our children and grandchildren visit.

I agree. I think it's really rude, unless you are staying for a few days in which case it would be ok to pop out somewhere else for a couple of hours.

I don’t think she sounds sour. I think she doesn’t feel as relevant in her grandchildren’s lives as she’d like to you and is struggling with her emotions.

You're replying to the wrong comment, since nothing you said is relevant to mine.

That is unfair. Of course her son wants to see his friend. The MIL sounds sour and not a nice grandmother. It is quite hard to entertain your child at someone else’s home especially when their mind is where they would rather be.

Can’t you entertain you own child?

Arrange separate play dates with neighbour’s child. Assume the neighbours children don’t come round to in-laws

Why what?

Why?

Sounds like they just don’t want to have the neighbours children in their house which I think you should respect. I don’t see an issue with your son spending some time with family and then going to the neighbours though.

Bonkers. I had friends who I only saw when I visited my grandparents. Beyond asking my DGPs for permission to go out and play, they weren't involved at all. Although I would occasionally go over to the friends' houses, they never came over to my DGPs' house other than to play in the garden with me. DGM would occasionally pop out with fruit or cookies for us, and DGF would make sweets and chocolate suddenly appear as he stomped past. They were delighted to see me having fun.

Occasionally my DGPs would say I couldn't go out to play that day because they were having guests and wanted me around, too. But because the default position was that I could ususally play with my friends, it felt like a reasonable compromise (even though I would often be bored, and knew that I had to be on best behaviour becaus my DGPs were showing me off and were massively proud of me).

I don't understand parents or grandparents whose default is to selfishly keep the children for themselvves, rather than feel joy at the children's happiness.