This is not an in law bashing thread I actually adore my mil and my bil and sil are nice people too just sometimes a little over bearing.
Bil and his dw do not live locally they live about 3 hours away from us so we don't see them an awful lot mil who does live local has gone to visit.
Its my dds birthday at the end of the month and and mil has just messaged saying bil and sil are coming down for dds birthday problem is that we have made plans already and it actually kind of annoyed me because dh and i are lucky to hear from them once a year we always contact them first asking after them they never once contact us and ask us how dd is doing or if we are Okay. They never invite us to any of their birthday celebrations but when they come here to visit they expect dh and i to cancel all of our plans and gather around mils it's always on special occasions so Christmas or birthdays and then because bil doesn't live here mil tells me we should cancel everyone else to spend time with them so my family and our friends get given the elbow.
I messaged mil back and said I thought it was lovely that they wanted to come down but asked her to set the expectation that we wouldn't be spending the entire weekend with them as we have made plans and we shouldn't be expected to push everyone else out to accommodate them when they don't even ask after dd we also haven't made plans with my family either we are taking dd and our friends children out for the day.
Mil got annoyed with me which is a shame because we usually get on so well so I explained again that i didn't say we wouldn't see them just that we wouldn't be changing any of our plans and that bil and sil shouldn't come expecting to dominate the whole weekend which is what they usually do.
Just to give you all an idea of what i mean 3 Christmas ago we went to bils house with mil we were there from Christmas eve until boxing day night so didn't see my df until after Christmas was over the following year we said we would go to my df for Christmas lunch then down to mils for the rest of the day. from 1pm onwards dh and i were bombarded with calls telling us we had to leave my dfs house and get to mils as they wanted to see their dgd/dn we ate half our dinner but the calls and texts became too much so we just had to leave. Christmas just gone I put my foot down and said they have spoilt it for everyone and from now on the 3 of is will have Christmas at home alone nobody in and nobody out it didnt go down well.
I'm just a bit tired of people we barely see or speak to demanding so much time from us on special occasions but never can be bothered to ask after us or dd. They did this on dhs birthday didn't ask me if i had planned anything and just went and booked a meal without telling us. I had made plans weeks in advance so we didn't go to the meal and I got bollocked and told I should of cancelled dh surprise the morning of his birthday when i found out about the meal.. I was like uhh fuck no!