To find these gifts awkward and embarrassing?

[HardLightHologram]

Every year we make a point of saying we don't want much for Christmas for us or the kids. We firmly say we are sticking to a £20pp budget and would appreciate if they did too. We make lots of noise about decluttering and what a lot of stuff we've got, how the kids have gadgets and toys coming out of their ears.

And then every year without fail we hand over a single bag of gifts to SiL and BIL and they fill our car up in return. This year it is FIVE bin bag size bags of presents. A bag full each.

It is equal to the amount we've bought the kids. Totally over budget and completely unnecessary.

I struggle with this every year because what can you do? We've tried everything we can think of. We've even said firmly that we don't want this much stuff and that they arent sticking to the budget. BiL is adamant that SiL is just an amazing shopper and finds bargains. This just isn't true. It's all brand new branded stuff. Lego sets etc, which I know are rarely reduced by much. Current clothes from shops I shop in, not sale stuff.

I find it awkward, embarrassing and tbf a bit controlling.

I refuse to compete, so our gifts look pathetic in comparison.

Please, if anyone has any fresh ideas how to stop this I'd be so so grateful. Short of dumping it all back on her doorstep I am stuck.

And I know how weird and ungrateful this sounds but its suffocating me.

(Also you have probably read this thread before as I think I post a version of it every year).

Please help me.

In October, I would give the SIL a list for each child of 2 to 3 items with a note saying words to the effect of "Please can you only buy items from this list for Christmas this year. The children will be really grateful for them and it will save you from buying items that they either have already or do not like. Many thanks!"

If she persists in bagfuls, smile and say "You really should not buy this much - I did give you a list" and then, as suggested by other posters, place majority in storage for charity or for re-gifting at birthday parties. You could even make a routine of allowing your children to select 3 presents to keep and then arranging to visit a hospital or children's home to donate the rest to disadvantaged children. That would be a win win: your SIL would have fulfilled her gifting compulsion and you children will learn the value of charity. If SIL enquires about her gifts, you could plainly (but nicely) tell her: many thanks but she gave far too many so you, in turn, gave the excess away to needy causes.

If she continues to give you an excess even after that, she either doesn't mind what you do with the gifts or may need some therapy.

My MIL was very similar to your SIL and although she still "over gifts" my DD (and majority of items are happily given away), she limits herself with me after the year that I accidentally re-gifted one of her presents back to her!

I don't think some folk on here are getting the message (almost to the extent that this SIL isn't getting the message!).

You can set any limit you want:

£££s
Number of items
Total value
Only pick from this list
Draw straws
Only pick from this catalogue.

The daft woman will ignore ALLLL of these and just buy multiple bin bags full every. single. year. Until she is stopped.

You cannot effect change in the deluded, you may as well talk to a brick wall.

OP reports her house is stuffed full of belongings and purchases. The woman clearly has a severe shopping addiction - I personally wouldn't want to be party to receiving the products of that addiction and for the sake of my SIL I'd be returning them so she could take them back to the shops and get her bloody money back!

I wonder OP how much those several bin bags full of gifts add up to? It must be a small fortune. The SIL is completely reckless and the more I think of it, I think this is more of the problem than the controlling behaviour and 'you're going to have all this whether you like it or not'. She clearly has a severe problem which she expresses through massively excessive spending and present buying and therefore if she's addicted and also can't see that she's addicted, no amount of controlling it or trying to, will ever work.

She has to be stopped.

Get in the car, with the bags, today, go in, explain it all, leave the bags with them all except for two pressies of their choice, come back home, open wine [optional, but highly recommended].

Go Pollyanna9!!!

Just say thank you, and donate half on the gifts to a local charity. It's not something to get worked up over, life is too precious for that.

" MumsTheWordYouKnow

If they won't listen let them buy the gifts. Let your children choose one or two they want then keep the rest untouched in a cupboard ready to be regifted."
We do not have a cupboard that could hold five bin bags full of crap. I'd be really angry if I were the op hat the storage and disposal of all this stuff always became my problem. I don't have the room, time or patience. I didn't ask or volunteer to store and art out stuff regularly for charity. I don't want to.

Sorry; I haven't read the entire thread but after the first two pages this feels humiliatingly familiar. Years ago, before being diagnosed with a mental health condition, I did just this. To me it was my way of connecting with people, because I knew that somehow I loved them but I couldn't feel any emotional connection, so attempted to show my love by extravagant spending. Never on myself, on my children, my partner, other 'friends'. It was constant and no matter what anyone said to me it never went in, this was the way I formed my bonds, this was my way of trying to be a good person and showing how much I cared. It took eventually being sectioned and medication and therapies before I started seeing things from other people's perspective.

I don't know if this has been covered already in the thread, your SIL needs serious help, possibly intervention from her partner and or medical personelle, if only to rule out the suspected mental health illnesses. I wish you the very best of luck, and I really hope she gets the help she needs to see how uncomfortable this makes you.

People who think this is 'kind' or 'nothing to get worked up over' are really misunderstanding what is happening here. 'stuff' carries emotional weight and can have a damaging impact on children and adults alike.

I had a work friend who would randomly give presents like a new top/ dress to colleagues she hardly knew - it was cringeworthy and made people feel really uncomfortable. SHe was just trying to show love /affection/ be generous because she felt well-off compared to others - but it was inappropriate.

'Gifts' are a symbolic transfer of power/ energy between people - they are about more than the 'stuff' involved.

I absolutely agree with waterrat - presents are about more than stuff. my mum always over buys especially at Christmas. she is a very anxious person and I think this is her way of trying to control things. We end up with a massive present mountain at her place. So big that in past years we have not been able to get it all in the car. She has calmed down a bit but still buys an inappropriately large amount of presents for the children (more than we buy for them) and I feel like she is competing with me to be the best 'mum' at Xmas. She also does other things like, if a relative gives her a present to pass on to me for the kids, she doesn't tell me (I think that their presents should go under the tree here). but adds it to her present mountain at her place. It upsets me that she won't listen to me when I ask her to scale it back and over the years the resentments have grown so that I hate Xmas. No question of not going over there though - the kids always want to go because, well, they get a huge pile of presents. I thought I was the only person with this problem and that I was over reacting so thank you OP for this thread - I am not alone. And I feel more confident that I should do something about it...

I think if I was on your position, I would take the excess ones to a hospital Christmas toy collection for the toys and homeless shelter for the clothes (now).

Then, in the new year, I'd send a letter thanking them for the gifts, reminding them that I don't have space or need for so many and saying that I had therefore donated them to the toy and clothes collection for people who need them more than my family does.

Maybe knowing they have been handed straight on might reduce next year's amount? And, if not, at least you can give them to a needy cause and be straight with your SIL about what's happening to them.

I think myself it's the thought that counts not amount spent, At Xmas there's only myself & my fiance, my mum n kids visit for a hour..... we only get presents for each other mum n kids n my nanna and only get from these too..... It's same every year my family never gets invited to family events, or dinner so point I'm trying to make is enjoy what you have no matter if it's a little or a lot as it's the thought n the love that counts xx

I agree it's the thought that counts.

There is no admirable thought in buying bin bags full of tat when you have repeatedly been asked not to.

Doesn't matter if it's tat or not!

OP clearly states it's not tat, it's full price branded items.

It matters if the person gifting is a. a shopping addict and ultimately it's going to screw up their finances or b. it's tat but it's done to either control or justify their needs, not the person they are giving to.

If neither of those applied it wouldn't matter, but in all the cases described, one or both apply.

Ergo, it's not gifting with 'the thought that counts' - Christ. It's gifting with 'only what I want to spend counts' only 'what I want and think is important that counts'.

Assuming 'the thoughts' are genuine and not distorted is the issue sadly. There isn't the right thought and that's just the problem. You wouldn't do any of this if you hadn't thought about it from the other person's point of view - the thought has to be aligned to the recipient, not the giver.

Maybe she's a compulsive shoplifter and just looking for a way to launder her ill-gotten gains

Sounds like she may have been sticking to the limit of £20pp. The kids only have a few gifts each but the op has a bag full of candles and ornamental tat. Unless we're talking Diptyque candles (in which case send any unwanted ones my way!) she may well have just got 20 things from the Poundshop. In which case a limit of 1 or 2 gifts each could work. My other theory is that it's a load of stuff she has bought for herself but physically can't fit in her cluttered house - the dh is probably glad to see the back of it.

I doubt VERY much that you could get five bin bags worth of toys for £20. Unless this SIL has bargain hunting skills in line with the mythical Mumsnet chicken that can feed a family of four for a week?

The ops more recent post doesn't sound like 5 bin bags tbf though. She said theids had 2-3 presents each and she had a bag????

The kids had 2-3 presents each that should say.

Five bin bags. One is all for me, the rest are for the kids and DH. I've rummaged a bit more and the boys actually have seven and nine, but biggish parcels. Dh has a couple and there are two more wrapped ones for me. Dd has a bag of her own, slightly smaller than mine. I missed a bag out when I looked before.

This sounds incredibly complicated and I'm not surprised you're finding it stressful.

We have a conversation each year with mil, who is not well off but a compulsive spender and hoarder. She insists on buying us "the sack" each year and I absolutely dread it. About 15 wrapped gifts per person. We have everything we need. I'd be happy with a box of chocolates or bottle of wine but she really won't listen. It's just all stuff, and most of it goes straight to charity.

It's as if the pleasure of buying the stuff is more important to her than us actually being happy to receive it.

The worst thing last year was she wanted to come sale shopping with us just after Christmas then followed me round shops or waited in doorways with the most miserable expression reminding dp and me she had no money. I felt both guilty and bloody annoyed that she'd manipulated me into feeling that way by disregarding our request to rein it in.

It's as if the pleasure of buying the stuff is more important to her than us actually being happy to receive it.

Yes, that's exactly it. Which is why "it's the thought that counts" really doesn't apply.

People who like shopping that much should be encouraged to bypass the unwilling recipient(s) and give their finds straight to charity appeals.

OP sympathies, this is all horribly, horribly familiar. SIL does it as she has poor mental health and can't express herself any other way, also we are not close and see her for an hour once a year. She has no kids of her own to buy for. I have tried many tactics including telling her we buy the kids 4/5 things each at Xmas and have a limit of about £75/child. We don't think an auntie should get them more presents than the kids parents. She is also skint and can't afford it. I will try to communicate all this again next year, but once again, later this evening I will open the presents, keep one per child and the rest will go to our church collection.

I hate it. I hate the pointless consumption, the excess and the clutter. It really upsets me. The first year we let DD have all the presents and she instantly turned into a grabby brat and our few but thoughtfully chosen presents were lost under the mounds of Poundshop crap.

One year we didn't see her (because I was in hospital after a miscarriage). The next year she gave us the sack of present for DD from the year before, plus a new sack. I actually wept at the sight of all this crap and gave 90% of it away. I find it less stressful now I am resigned to giving it to charity but I resent having to deal with it at all.

Also OP I'd not just stick to the £20 pp limit but even reduce it to £10!

I doubt a child instantly turned into a grabby brat because they got a lot of presents one year

She was ripping the paper off each present then chucking it to one side and grabbing the next present. She was aged 3, I found it upsetting to see my kid behave like that.

So she didn't spend adequate time appreciating what you described as Poundshop tat? I don't think that makes a 3 yr old a 'grabby brat'.