...to ask for your funny in law stories to make me feel better?

[Oobis]

Hi, I'm new to using this, so I apologise if this topic has been done to death! My FIL is a nightmare. There isn't space on here to go into detail, but I was hoping for some comical stories to make me feel better about my narcissistic, arrogant, misogynistic nitwit.

Jumping in on this forum rather late, but I have a few cracking stories about my MIL. No risk of being outed as she's computer illiterate.

Firstly, she's a huge show-off. Two instances come to mind. I'm a classical singer and have an okay career, but one time we were invited to a dinner party at her house and just as DH and I arrived at the door, she took me aside and said "by the way, can you pretend that you've sung at La Scala (arguably the top opera house in the world) this evening?" She'd told her guests before we arrived that I had worked there. Not true, and I certainly did not lie when one of her guests asked me about my experiences there. And then there was the time that just the two of us went for a dinner in a hotel whilst the men were at a men-only function, and she said to the maitre d' "My husband Sir *** made the reservation." He most certainly is not knighted!

Then, and this is a stinker, there was the time that DH and I were returning from honeymoon only to find she had redecorated one of our rooms. Painted the walls a different colour and moved the furniture around to how she preferred it. Needless to say she has had the spare key taken off her never to be returned.

She painted your house, truly?!

I'm also still giggling over "to Derek, a pig." :o It's just so funny!

My MIL is okay actually. She used to terrify me before DH and I got married because she is very quiet and reserved and...dry, I guess you'd say. DH is younger than his siblings by quite a bit and I'm a few years younger than that, so by far the youngest at any gathering before anyone had GC. I think she thought I was a frivolous bubbly silly girl I was, back then and that we were too young and unsettled to get married. We were 24 and 27, so not unheard of. But DH's siblings made a lot of money and were settled in their own houses before getting married, and we didn't do that. Soon after the wedding, though, I found out I was expecting DS1 and she's been kind ever since. We just had to get used to each other, I think. :) And she's always thought I was a good mother, which is kind of her, and she is thrilled I'm having a third DC.

FIL is all right but very much of the generation where he will say something as though it is fact and expect not to be challenged on it. He's very conservative and will say things like "Obama is just not intelligent" and glance around imperiously. I find it hard to keep a mocking look out of my eye, so I usually don't. We know where we stand. But he's harmless. And also in his late seventies and not in good health (he seems twenty years older sometimes) so I'm willing to keep the peace while he's here. He loves the DC and tells them tall tales, watches John Wayne films with them, and takes them out to feed his chickens. Those are nice memories for them to have someday.

My mother, on the other hand, was hell on DH for awhile. She didn't like him, called me two months before our wedding and sobbed that he wasn't right for me, etc. She told him that his parent's names shouldn't be on the invitation because "they don't care." She also held the fact that they were paying for it over our heads to get the guest list she wanted.

When I called her to tell her I was pregnant with DS soon after the wedding, she said "I'll have to call you back" and hung up on me. She was basically in mourning for a few months, then decided she was excited about it and ever since has doted on DS to an obsessive degree.

When, five years later, I was pregnant with DC2 she said "oh I hope it's a girl, a boy would be in DS's shadow his whole life. I don't even know why you bother, you already have the perfect child."

When I told her I was expecting DC3 I prefaced it by saying "don't you dare have an insane reaction!" She did oblige, I have to say. :)

My PIL live close by and we see them often (I've just been ill in the hospital with this pregnancy actually and they has taken the DC every day so I can rest) and it's fine. My mother lives a five hour drive away and we see her once a month and that is also fine. :o

weathergames my mil is a health monologuer too.

She loves talking about her many ailments and all the tests she has had for various things (nothing ever wrong with her) she has ibs and high blood pressure and she loves talking about it. She will also challenge anyone who thinks they have it worse and tell her so!

We hear the same stories over and over again!

FIL - Man In Beige - has outdone himself.

Ds3 (my youngest) is 18 today. Years, not months. FIL has sent us a cheque, and we bought ds3 a shirt - FIL is Not To Be Trusted, buying things for, frankly, anyone. Over the years we have had some cracking presents - dh got a book on Toilets of Cornwall, for his birthday one year, and when he was about 12 or 13, ds3 got three books - Cats of Cornwall (a book of cartoons of cats in Cornish locations), A History of The Cornish Pasty, and Cornish Cheeses. Another year, we suggested he get ds3 a nice tie (ds3 is a bit of a dandy, and likes a smart shirt and tie, on occasion). He went to M&S and bought the most unattractive, black and paisley pattern tie, you have ever seen!! If he had looked round every tie shop in Penzance, I don't think he could have found a tie less likely to appeal to a fashion-conscious teenager!

But this birthday, he has played a blinder. As I said, we bought the present for him - all he had to do was buy a card - so he bought a Thomas the Tank Engine card. A card that is for a child so young that it cannot be trusted with a pin, on the Thomas the Tank Engine badge that came with the card.

We think he is trying to be witty. >

Wow, this is swesome! I confess that I couldn't want for a lovelier, kinder, more thoughtful or considerate MIL. Although I do blame much of FIL's poor behaviour on the fact he has been allowed to for the last 40 years.

I love the amorous sheep wedding cake idea. In fact I love the funny stories and feel sad for the sad ones. I think I'll be sticking around on Mumsnet, it's certainly cheered me up! Thanks all :-)

OP! You're back to reap the laughs from this glorious thread that had kept me going for three working days now! :D

SDT your fil really does sound amazing, wearing that beige I bet he looks like a giant artificial limb

Over the years we have had some cracking presents - dh got a book on Toilets of Cornwall,

My DS is only just 4 and I'm pregnant. It is now my ambition to appear on a similar thread in years to come!

I like the Thomas the Tank card. Brilliant!

For dd's 18th I got her a lovely card with David Cameron on the front. I think she threw darts at it or something. Ds got a Pingu one for his.

Mils annoying ways:
It doesn't matter how clean it is she will mop the floor when she comes over
I had several bunches of flowers in a bucket by the back door that I told her were for friends I was meeting the following day for a joint birthday meal. When my back was turned she took them all out of the wrappers & arranged them in vases
She comes over to do garden jobs when we're out which 1. Really winds the dog up as he can see her through the glass door and 2. I want to do my own f-ing gardening
When the dcs go over she changes them into clothes she's bought and then changes them back again before they come home as she doesn't want them to get dirty
She brushes ds's very curly hair so vigorously that he ends up with a blonde frizzball
Whenever I cook a meal she always says its -something heavy like oh goodness this is very aubergine heavy, it doesn't matter how much/little of it is in the dish because I actually find this funny now & have little bets with the dc on what is gonna be -heavy
Phew...could go on all day!

All of those things would drive me totally mad namechange!

Something I find insanely annoying - my MIL has no waste bins or baskets anywhere in her house except the kitchen, so when we stay there I always have to carry little bundles of tissues, cotton wool, things the kids have dropped, panty liners you name it into the kitchen. Everything goes into the kitchen bin - to be separated later by FIL into waste and recycling - yuck!

My dd is a surrogate baby and my in laws had never heard of such a thing. But once they understood and dd was here, it was never mentioned again. They never asked after my friend, her birth mum, they looked blank when we mentioned it. Dd has always known and we'd talk about it quite a lot so it was of no import to dd if you know what I mean. But it was like my friend had done nothing. I can't explain. It's so weird. My own mum sends df a birthday and Xmas pressie each year. She gets what she did for us. Just was like in laws didn't have the emotional intelligence to understand the enormity

I did get on great with them but mil had muncahusens and faked (obviously as that's the condition ) every symptom in the world.
I remember I used to do their cleaning and she'd leave me really funny notes round the house and cartoons. I'd write back and hide them. One I did one on an oval of cardboard and was a stick figure and "my mum in law is a looney" . She took it with her to the EMI home and it was the only thing she'd have on display. I still have it now on my fridge. Ah I miss her

She was a great mil and nanny but by 'eck a dreadful neglectful mother. The children were all abused in 1 way or another. She didn't have muncahusens by proxy but part of her illness I swear meant that THEY had to suffer so that she could suffer because X had happened to her child ... make sense?

I got lucky. Met her at 17 and as I'm irreverent and a bit rude, something she'd never experienced, we hit it off.like a house on fire until she died.

But she was barking!

My own MIL was horrified I didnt jump up the moment DH got in from work to make hes cuppa - hed been on a bus for an hour reading the paper I was at home with 3 under 2y - hed make me a cuppa - she would shove him out the way to make it. She fussed over him constantly and rub his head he banged on a cupboard - I had laughed (whoops) fav was when DD was a day old she phoned to say she wanted to be called grandma - no! Why this is an issue I had no idea. 18 months later DSIL announce she was pregnant and I was too so Dh shared the news - only to Up stage her by having twins - yes we planned that :-p

I've got so many that I don't know where to start! First time dh took me to meet them they ignored me through the entire meal. I might as well have not been there. They took us to the airport when we had our first holiday but they didn't just drop us off, they had to come into the terminal. Then mil got the huff and stormed off when we started to head off to passport control. I still don't know why! When we were house hunting she made an appointment to view one that we were looking at without telling us. Fil measured the living and dining room and made a scale drawing with cardboard furniture so that we could 'plan' where we were going to put things! She picked furniture for us (which I've finally got rid of after 20 years). I was young and naive at the time

When my Husband announced to MIL we were having our first son she replied "are you keeping it? Does Royal know where to go for an abortion?"

When I announced pregnancy with DC2 I had had some bleeds and bad scans and it wasn't looking good for the baby, she asked me infront of evertone at a family meal and again a week later in a busy shopping centre "has anything come out yet? Have you had any more bleeding?" I said no and she said both times "it should start happening soon"
After not buying anything or showing any interest in our fast progressing second pregnancy she asked me if I had got our second baby anything yet? I showed her I was very prepared as I had been buying bits and pieces here and there and she said "well I'm not getting anything yet, it's early days and anything could happen to it, best to leave it for a bit"

I was 32 weeks pregnant
This woman was a health visitor for about 15 years. Hilarious.

Oh god.

Mine has just text my OH saying "you should make idontknow do some relaxation exercises, its not calm enough in her life for you and the baby she is carrying. I suggest whale noises etc...."

Kindly fuck off and do not tell me that I am not calm enough in MY pregnancy just because if I say Boo to your precious son who at the age of 40 is totally over sensitive because you've wrapped him up in cotton wool and still feel the need to text him 'hugs' 3x a day I'm being angry!

bensam Oh my MIL did the same when we started renting this place out, she booked to go see it without telling us, she also drove round to see it when it was still locked up and just peered through all the windows!
Shes obsessed with us buying a house, she has moved house 4 times in the last 5 years and buys new furniture every time she moves. She is always looking online and around show homes and texting DH telling him about them, she is even more desperate now we have our first DC on the way. We love our rented house! The land lady is lovely an the area is a perfect location for us and for DH's work! argh!