To expect my mum to ask me before she comes round to do my garden?

[101handbags]

My DP and I have recently moved into a new home. Both of us work long hours, neither of us have any interest in, or time to do, gardening. Clearly the previous owners felt the same way as the garden could do with a bit of tidying up/weeding etc. We are planning to get someone in next Spring to plant the garden out with greenery/shrubs etc. that look nice but don't need that much care. In the meantime my DP has just been mowing and strimming at weekends to keep on top of it. My mum, on the other hand, absolutely LOVES gardening and has been itching to get her hands on our garden. We kept telling her we are getting someone in to to the flowerbeds, planting etc. but last week DP & I agreed she could come round and do the weeding and tidying. I sent her a text: 'it's fine if you want to tidy up the garden, it is a bit of a mess... we are not going away til mid Nov so plenty of weekends to choose from'. We got home last night to find that mum had been round without asking/telling us, she had tidied up and weeded the front garden AND she has planted out the two flower beds with her choice of spring plants and flowers. I was absolutely livid yet my sister thinks I should be grateful - as far as I am concerned she might as well have painted the front door or something. If she'd asked me yesterday I would have said that's fine & to just do the weeding/tidying, but she said nothing and then proceeded to plant out the garden too. I wanted to choose what went in the beds. It's the first property I've owned and I think she went too far. So this is really both an IABU and also WWYD?

I am going to swim against the general tide here and say you are totally not being U!! I understand absolutely where you are coming from because my mother is exactly the same. For her I think it is a form of control - she is utterly unable or unwilling to comprehend that I have my own house and family and that we might have ideas of our own that are different to hers. Following several fairly major bust ups she has now taken to "suggesting" things and when we don't immediately agree, she keeps hammering the suggestion home which does give a little flexibility to the situ. Still pretty tiresome though to have to constantly say "that's a nice idea, but we really want to do it like this".

Time to Have Words, I think, but be prepared for the hurt martyr routine -"but I was only trying to help" no, you were trying to impose your will on my life

I totally see you you are annoyed in that if someone planted something that was totally not my taste at the front of my house I'd feel that it looked liked I'd chosen it and would not like it. However, it does sound like she was trying to do you a kindness so I would thank her for tidying up and change the planting now she's kindly done all the hard work. (my mum has been trying to get me to "wear colour" for years and keeps popping round in "cheerful" red jumpers, pointing them out in shops etc. NO I do not want one. It is my choice. Go easy on her though!!)

Wow OP - please tell your mum she can come and do my garden anytime she likes. And she doesn't have to ask me first.

Livid?

Callani what happened then?

OP - I do think you need to take this as a lesson learned now you have your own home that things can be done too (compared to a rental where she'll know she cant just change stuff).

Say "no thank you" to all offers of help in the future, not limited to say weeding, or cleaning up, or helping you painting etc. No thank you for all offers. It's the only way with parents who overstep and prone to the belief that there's two ways to do anything; their way and the wrong way.

It's hard but it's easier to have a boundary that says "in my house you are a guest and dont do anything" rather than "you can do certain things and I expect you to understand I don't want you to do others."

It's a line I've had to hold with my parents, after seeing them massively overstep the mark with my DB - she does things like move where everything is in his kitchen, 'tidy up' his DP's paperwork for tax return because it was messy - no Mum, it was in separate piles and you just put it all mixed up in a drawer because you didn't think it should be on the dining table while they wre at work etc. Then if they complain, she cries saying she was helping, dad then calls DB back and tells him off for upsetting our Mum because she was cleaning and if they kept their house clean she wouldn't have to do it (arguments that she doesn't need to go into their house to see what state it is in and they have a weekly cleaner so it's not like it's a health hazzard - but they both work long hours so in the week do sometimes let it slip).

In my house, she is a guest, she doesn't do anything. And that is the safest way to be.

YABU and I just can't believe some of the responses on here. One day you won't have her and you will look back and feel very guilty. I just hope you have not hurt her with your ungrateful manner.

chandalier - I guess you don't have a parent who oversteps boundaries that normal people would have in place.

I have a much better relationship with my mum because I limit her ability to piss me off by heading off any attempts to 'help'. (Although still not great, she's very hard work, and sadly earlier this year I realised, she's not someone I'd chose to spend time with if she wasn't my mum).

Mine isn't too bad even, wasn't there a thread a year or so ago by someone who's parents had "looked after the house" while they were away and cut down all their trees and thrown out lots of their stuff they deemed to be 'junk' - including some really sentimental items that had belonged to a dead relative of the DP? Was a terrible thread, only a couple of people thought the OP was in the wrong for being upset by this 'help', most people thought it was a terrible invasion of their privicy and not to let them in again. It gave me cold sweats, that's exactly the sort of thing my parents would do given half a chance...

chandalier just because someone is your mother doesn't mean they can do no wrong. Wouldn't you be upset if someone had completely disregarded your views?

As I said above, this is not about gardening. This is about the OP's mother having very poor communication with her daughter and doing what SHE wants not what her daughter wants.

If you were 'bored' and enjoyed gardening, would you start planting stuff in a friend's garden without discussing it first? OP didn't ask her mum for a favour, her mother begged her to let her tidy it up a bit. No matter that the OP can plant something else next year or dig up the plants, that is completely not the issue. The OP is hurt because someone who is supposed to love and care for her didn't listen and disregarded her wishes.

communication -or the lack of it- is the key here.

A lot of posters here who don't understand controlling parents

I think if you let her do anything to the back garden and she does the same again you only have yourself to blame.
She has shown her controlling (and slightly martyrish) tendencies with the front garden. If you want to have control of the back garden just firmly tell her you don't want or need help with it thank you and will sort it out yourselves.
If you want her to really believe that sorting out your house and garden are not her jobs then you have to firmly say "thanks for offering mum but we'll do that" to all suggestions she makes. Sounds like she needs to get an allotment or join an adult learning class or something to stop her interfering in your life if you don't want her arranging your new home.

Marywest no my Mother would not have done this but to get "livid" over a few flowers being planted is just unbelievable.
Dancergirl No I would not be upset if this had happened to me.

I doubt very much it will happen again anyway if the Op again reminds her Mother about no more planting. At the time when she did it she probably thought just a few won't matter.

I can see both sides. I moved back to my home town and my parents are always round 'helping' (uninvited - they have a key).
I can see it's well-intentioned but it does make me feel like a child

As others have said, I would try and swallow my displeasure. Enjoy what's there for now - it's temporary Winter isn't the most inspiring season for gardening so whatever your mum's planted has got to be an improvement in the meantime. Even better if she's included spring flowering bulbs

In spring you can revisit your original plan. Nothing will have had the chance to become established. With care you ought to be able to redistribute plants between the front and back gardens. This in turn will open up gaps in the beds for you to fill with your choice of annuals/ perennials/ climbers etc. If you wanted to hire a garden designer/ landscaper you'll probably find that they can easily incorporate your mum's plants into your chosen design

If your mum's a keen gardener she probably fails to understand how a tidy, planted garden couldn't be anything other than well-received!

ps Mumsnet has an excellent gardening forum

Surely if the OP's mum is a keen gardener she should have more awareness of how important choosing the "right" plants for your garden is? It was my less gardening aware relatives who were keen to foist their unwanted plants on me, those who knew about gardening seemed more understanding of the enjoyment and desirability of choosing your own plants. Those less keen just thought if it's a free plant it must be a welcome plant.

I understand . Yanbu. Not the first time boundaries overstepped I expect.