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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to refuse to follow my MIL's ridiculous standards of etiquette?

173 replies

daisythedog · 08/08/2007 13:03

I'm not talking please and thank you here. She expects us (meaning husband, me and 2 young children) to follow conventions that would be appropriate for a Jane Austen novel. Do I stand on ceremony purely to stay on her good side, or do I act as I usually do and risk her thinking that i'm an uncivilized yob? By the way, by all reasonable standards I'm a very polite person, and am extremely respectful of other people's feelings.

OP posts:
CristinaTheAstonishing · 09/08/2007 15:45

Quattrocento - what shoes do your boys wear if not trainers? DS (7) isn't into sandals at all, much as I tried, and any other shoes would seem too heavy for this weather. Just interested, I know it has nothing to do with the topic of manners (apart from taking them off when they get in the house 0 something I insist on too).

meandmyflyingmachine · 09/08/2007 15:46

Blimey.

It's a bit inconsiderate to fill your own glass without asking those next to you if they would like their glass filled I suppose.

So I think that would count as manners

ladymac · 09/08/2007 15:53

Quattro, I must tell my children about mealtimes at your house. My older ones moan because I insist that everything has to be decanted in to a serving dish before it goes on the table.

Quattrocento · 09/08/2007 15:56

DS (7) and DD (9) on non-school days wear sandals occasionally. If not sandals then converses, which they swear blind are not trainers. If not sandals or converses, they wear casual shoes.

DS's current casual shoes are branded "quicksilver" which are nice and comfy and not like school shoes. He can run about in them too. Not that he wears them much because of covert trainer-wearing ...

fiddlemama · 09/08/2007 15:57

I too grew up in a council house (well until I was 9) 'cos we were very poor. But my mother, who's family considered that she had "married beneath her", was a real stickler for "etiquette". Try asking your council estate friends round for tea and having them laugh at the real lace doilies under the cakes!.

Even worse, in the summer, when everyone had their windows open with radio one or two blaring out, my mum had radio 3 on and would sing along with Puccini arias at the top of her voice. OK, she actually had a very good voice, but really!!! Try living that down at primary school!

Quattrocento · 09/08/2007 15:59

Getting up from the table. I am also a tartar on the issue of getting up from the table. It is totally BANNED now. I am immune to all pretexts:

"I need to get something"
No you don't

"I need to go to the toy I mean loo"
No you don't.

"But I'm desperate"
Tough. You know the rules

fiddlemama · 09/08/2007 16:08

Didn't bother me when they left the table to go to the loo as smalls, but now aged 12, 14 & 16, I expect them to go before the meal.
They still do it though, although they always ask to be excused. DS is the worst!

ladymac · 09/08/2007 16:12

My family pull grapes one by one off the bunch (leaving the stalks behind) just to annoy me. Every year I ask for grape scissors for my birthday and they just laugh.

pointydog · 09/08/2007 16:12

so we're talking a thank you letter after visiting granny?

That sort of stilted forced drudgery would pee me off too.

daisythedog, Rise and Resist!

flowerybeanbag · 09/08/2007 16:13

grape scissors?

[mystified emoticon]

ladymac · 09/08/2007 16:14

Oh yes. So you can cut a little bunch off at a time.

pointydog · 09/08/2007 16:14

quattro, you oddbod.

And lol at your sons talking about wearing their 'converses' and 'quiksilvers'.

flowerybeanbag · 09/08/2007 16:15

wow, there's a piece of cutlery I never knew I needed!

CristinaTheAstonishing · 09/08/2007 16:18

This grape knife thing - so you cut the little stalks but don't you still have to pull the grape off to eat it in the end? It's just that you do this individually rather than colectively.

ladymac · 09/08/2007 16:18

Glad I could enlighten you. Told you I was swapped at birth. Both my parents born within the sound of Bow bells, which makes them genuine cockneys. So where my grape scissor pretentiousness comes from I know not!

flowerybeanbag · 09/08/2007 16:19

yes, you'd end up with lots of little stalks rather than one big bunch of stalks, surely. Little stalks more messy, no?

ladymac · 09/08/2007 16:19

No, you cut off a little bunch to put on your plate. Then you can eat them how you like.

flowerybeanbag · 09/08/2007 16:21

oh I see

ladymac · 09/08/2007 16:22

This is with the cheese course, obviously.

flowerybeanbag · 09/08/2007 16:25

oh obviously, of course

ladymac · 09/08/2007 16:26

There is no excuse Flowery. I managed to find both cake forks and butter knives at Ikea.

flowerybeanbag · 09/08/2007 16:27
fiddlemama · 09/08/2007 16:36

Mum has grape scissors but we just pull a small bunch off 'cos I do agree that lots of little stalks sticking out of the fruit bowl look nasty.
Have cake forks for exceptionally sticky cakes, but butter knives?!! in 2007?! Come on Quattro, send your crinolines to Oxfam.

fiddlemama · 09/08/2007 16:39

Sooo sorry, meant ladymac! Give me your address Quattro and I'll write you a nice note of apology.

Quattrocento · 09/08/2007 16:40

Oh I am mad. Clearly bonkers. But not mad to the point of grape scissors.

Although here's another confession. Napkins rule here. This is DH's influence (DH was born and raised in a Yorkshire semi). Napkins happen every mealtime.

Without napkin rings - napkin rings would be just silly, no?