To tell mil to shove her opinion on the way I run my home?

[hannah1992]

Just had a visit off my mil this morning. I'll start by saying I keep my home quite nice. Kitchen is always clean and tidy lounge is clean barely tidy as that's where my youngest (19 months) plays etc. I have a kitchen diner so table and chairs in there. Completely separate room to lounge no open plan or anything.

Anyway my dd has just had a custard cream biscuit so there were crumbs on the rug where she'd been eating that an playing. She said "there's crumbs on your rug" I said yeah she's just had a biscuit. She then goes on a rant of how "my kids never ate in my lounge, they ate and drank everything at the kitchen table and at that age they ate everything and drank everything sat in a high chair" I was like right ok, so it's warm weather and I'm supposed to keep taking my daughter every 10 min to sit in her highchair to have 2 bloody sips of water then get her out again and carry this on through the day?! So Aibu here to be thinking what the actual fuck?!

I'm not going to set times of the day where my dd can have a drink! I just leave her beaker on the coffee table and she gets it as she pleases
I am literally gobsmacked. My kids eat meals at the table but if they want a biscuit or piece of fruit they can have it wherever my only rules is rubbish is in the bin not on the floor etc. Only thing I give my youngest as a snack in the high chair is yogurt.

I am doing it wrong here?

Was it actually a rant or an observation? Really? Personally I can't stand small children running around with food and spreading crumbs and sticky fingerprints everywhere and splashing juice or whatever all over my sofa. Casual grazing isn't good either. So she has a point. You are at liberty to think about it and change or ignore.

Along with the child's father of course

I finally get why people need to hoover every day...

I'm with your MIL. Snacks at the kitchen table only. Who wants food on their floor???

Just smile and say, 'I hear you', but this is my way.

Am with your MIL. Couldn't get too worked up about her observation. Unless there is some massive back story.

Mine ate snacks at the table too, as I cant be arsed tidying up toys just to hoover food crumbs. I personally don't like crumbs/food amongst all the toys as its harder to clean up later (and cleaning isn't my strong point). Never liked leaving a, possibly a crumb encrusted, luke warm sippy cup hanging around either. Its good at that age for them to get into good habits and not eat while playing with toys, have snacks at a table (a good habit for when you are eating out) and start to ask/indicate for a drink if they are thirsty (obviously give them reminders too).

That said its up to you how you do it and you MIL should keep her opinions to herself.

Once I got the knack of the parenting business I sent the DC out into the garden to eat between the months of April to September. I wasn't such a fan of the Hoover.

My own MIL was obsessed with many things keeping the sitting room for 'best' and adults only. In her world I think they would have been issued an invitation to step over the threshold at 18. Or 21.

I explained that wasn't our way. over and over.

These MIL threads are getting ridiculous.

Instead of whinging on MN why don't you tell her that if you want to give your kids a biscuit and some of it drops on the rug that you're fine with it.

It's a non issue. As these threads usually are.

I don't think she sounds like she's ranting at all
I was always in the 'let them wander around with a biscuit' camp but DH was the total opposite, it's actually far far less work to get them to sit at the table if possible. I'm a lazy bastard who wouldn't want to hoover every day though

I suspect the people who feel that a 19th-month-old should eat a mid-morning biscuit at the table or another 'designated location' care an awful lot more about housework than I do.

This ^

Yabu. I couldn't be arsed to get the hoover out every time my DC have a snack. Your mil has made a very good point.

I doubt she was ranting too, she was probably just saying how she did things.

Eating while playing is a choking hazard which is another reason why it's preferable to eat sitting at the table.

In any case, it's your house and your not asking her to do the cleaning. Just politely say, I prefer to do it this way.

Eh, my own mum practically clutches her pearls when she sees my boy sat eating on the sofa, crumbs are, of course, one of the top 10 worst things in the world but I just laugh it off because that's what the Hoover is for.

I do things differently to my mum but we don't fall out over it, just brush it off, like the crumbs

I think its a generational thing. My mum was born during post WW2 austerity, and housing and goods were still scarce and expensive when she came of age. When they got their first house (after living with parents as a young married couple for some years) it was a big, big deal. New furniture, carpet etc was to be fussed over and protected to the point that as a child we never ate, drank or even played in the lounge! New items were treated with kid gloves and kept for best, and being called houseproud was one of the biggest compliments going! I'm sure my parents valued the Axminster which was scrimped and saved for more than my sis and I who just came along

Just ignore, OP. Times have changed.

To tell mil to shove her opinion on the way I run my home?

i read this as

To tell mil to shove her opinion on the way I run home?
i thought she was saying your route was all wrong!

All these people posting about chocking. The only place my child had ever chocked is sat in his high chair. It's not a magic protective chair. I dint see how a child sitting on the floor is more likely to choke then one sat in a chair, strapped in so it's harder to get them out to help them.

Tell her it's so kind if her to offer to hoover and show her where it's kept!

Times have changed? Yet women are still talking about running their home and hoovering and childcare seems solely a female domain.

You did nothing wrong. May be you got a bit over upset about her comment. Does she always say stuff like that? If it was a one off ignore it, or come up with neutral comments to head her off if she comments often like that.

My mil is lovely and would never pass judgement. It's mum is the judgemental pain in the arse. Luckily I can tell her to knock it off because 90% of the time it's rubbish. I can remember - she can't!

She did too do something wrong. If anyone else in the world had said teh same thing it would have been taken as mere conversation.

I thought the mn mil hate was just another myth but it's not. you really loathe them all.

So are you saying she did or didn't do something wrong? Do you mean the mil?

I don't think it's relevant whether people sit their children down to eat or not. The fact is, commenting on how someone does things is rude. My MIL tries to subtly comment and I'm not having it. She doesn't get to criticise me just because she's my DH's mother. Also when she tried to 'advise' me on cleaning I told her she should talk to her own child about that (which she would never do of course because he's man and men shouldn't be bothered with silly women's work).

Your house, your rules, your MIL is out of order, it's none of her business.

Your system wouldn't work for me, but that's irrelevant. I wouldn't dare commenting on the way you manage your house!

YANBU I wouldn't sit a child down just to eat a biscuit. A few crumbs is easily hoovered up.

I've seen my MIL cast her eye over my front room in despair when the kids were littler! but she says nothing. If she did, she'd get a smile, a 'oh really?' and I'd keep doing things as I saw fit.
Unless there are huge issues I'd file this under annoyance that can be sorted with an internal eye roll and external not really giving a shit smile and nod.
But no, YANBU, your kid, your house, do what works for you

It wasn't so much what she said it was the way she said it. She has made other comments about other Things before. I don't know just felt as though she was having a dig. She finished off her "rant" by saying but I kept an immaculate house etc.

She said something before about me letting my dd who's almost 7 to play in her bedroom because she makes a mess (that she has to tidy up) because she didn't let her kids do that they were only allowed to play upstairs when she was up there so they couldn't make a mess.

Just sometimes feel as though she's trying to push her ways onto me