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Original poster

Gifts for grandchildren - different amount for each family

166 replies

SweetSally · 07/12/2019 14:50

Hi all,

My husband and I are a bit confused about a situation that has occurred in our family. My parents in law have 3 grandchildren in total.
One girl below 1y old
Two boys below 2y old

What we believe to be a bit confusing is - one child gets £100 and the other two kids get £50 each. Basically the brother and the sister have £50 each and the child without siblings receives double this amount because he has no siblings.

Everyone is on very good terms so this is very confusing for me and I am not sure what to make out of it. Are they being reasonable?

(To avoid drip feeding - 2 of the children are mine, and SIL has 1 boy). Please don't get me wrong, we are not jealous of her and we are financially comfortable and we appreciate the grandparents generosity... However, my side of the family doesn't operate like this and I am slightly confused why are the grandchildren being treated differently?

Last Christmas (before DD was born) each grandson received £50. Now, the child without a sibling is being topped up another £50.

Please share your comments (let's keep it civilized and avoiding turning this into a nasty threat)

OP posts:
Thread gallery
5
wornoutboots · 07/12/2019 15:18

at the age of 4 my child said "mammy, do [grandparents] love [cousin] more than they do me? Coz he gets loads of presentsmore than me!"
obvioulsy I told him that it's about love, not finances. But kids don't see things from an adult perspective.

and a recent christmas saw them removing several bags of his presents (all expensive) from the room to stop my children playing with anything, before they were given their own (about £20 worth) of gifts.

Yes, small children do notice.

motherheroic · 07/12/2019 15:19

It actually reminds me a bit of how my nan did her will. All the grandkids got the same amount of money, even if they had children. They could split it up how they saw fit, but they didn't get more than those of us who didn't have kids.

RightYesButNo · 07/12/2019 15:19

Maybe you sanctimoniously told them what to do, too, and they came up with this evil plan after you saying, “Keep it civilized,” like a debate moderator during Christmas Dinner 2013 made them see red. Just a guess?

WheresTheEvidence · 07/12/2019 15:23

Each family gets £100 of toys seems fair.

cstaff · 07/12/2019 15:23

That is so bizarre. Surely it is done per child. It is not like the adults benefit from the money.

Confusedbeetle · 07/12/2019 15:23

A staggering amount of money. I have ten granchildren and spend about £30 per child.Wouldnt dream of doing it as an amount per family. Also it would never be cash

Catapillarsruletheworld · 07/12/2019 15:24

£100 per family is fine. Which I expect is how they see it. It was your choice to have more than one child. I expect if the other family have another child, they will also have to split the £100.

They’re getting a very generous amount either way.

IckyIsAFuckingStupidWord · 07/12/2019 15:24

I have 5 kids and my sister has 2. Should my mum spend the same on my kids that she does on my sisters kids? No. Because it’s too expensive for her. And I’m not grabby so I wouldn’t let her.

Get over yourself.

Namenic · 07/12/2019 15:25

Yeah - it’s likely a per family thing. Look at it as them being fair to you and your sibling (different people prefer different family sizes - sometimes due to finance). Their intentions sound like they are good. It’s good to be able to explain it to your kids if they did end up asking.

MistyCloud · 07/12/2019 15:26

@MeanMrMustardSeed

Oooooo. I hate being told what to do on MN!

@RightYesButNo

Maybe you sanctimoniously told them what to do, too, and they came up with this evil plan after you saying, “Keep it civilized,” like a debate moderator during Christmas Dinner 2013 made them see red. Just a guess?

............................ Errr, are you tryin' to start something? 😠

Grin
Gifts for grandchildren - different amount for each family
Parmavioletgin1 · 07/12/2019 15:26

Well, if your sil has another 3 children & they all end up with £25 while your 2 still get £50 you will be in a position to tell the gp to only give yours £25 to keep it fair.

Bluetrews25 · 07/12/2019 15:27

If your sibling has a second DC in a year or two, and they don't all get the same amount then, you have my permission to take offence.

Onesnowballshort · 07/12/2019 15:27

Gifts should be per person, especially if they are going to be opened together

sarahjconnor · 07/12/2019 15:31

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

NoSquirrels · 07/12/2019 15:31

If your DH can’t discuss it with his parents without it being “escalated to a big row” then there’s more of a problem than money, tbh.

DesMartinsPetCat · 07/12/2019 15:32

Please share your comments (let's keep it civilized and avoiding turning this into a nasty threat)

Who died and made you moderator?

Aycharow · 07/12/2019 15:35

It makes me wonder how they would do it if one side has five kids and the other one. Would one child get a gift worth £250 and the other kids get a gift worth £50 each?

christmassymcchristmas · 07/12/2019 15:35

No comment Grin

RightYesButNo · 07/12/2019 15:37

@MistyCloud Oooo, blimey, it’s turning into a “nasty threat” now!

Gifts for grandchildren - different amount for each family
Original poster
SweetSally · 07/12/2019 15:39

@MistyCloud

I think it has already started

Hmm
OP posts:
Frazzledbutcalm · 07/12/2019 15:39

My in laws do similar stupid things ... it just escalated to even more unfair things as they got older. My kids noticed the difference made when they were aged 12 ... it’s horrible.

One thing they used to do was give £50 to the birthday child ... this changed to £5 per sibling of the birthday child, then birthday child gets remainder - so 3 siblings got £5 each, birthday child got £35. So my family of 4 children took 12 months to get their £50 birthday money. SIL child got theirs all at once. Just seemed confusing, stupid, unnecessary.

astralweaks · 07/12/2019 15:40

Who died and made you moderator?

astralweaks · 07/12/2019 15:43

...

Gifts for grandchildren - different amount for each family
housinghelp101 · 07/12/2019 15:44

Some children are constantly vying for equality, my dad's family are like this. My dad has 3 dc and my aunt (his sister) has 1 and she was always complaining that my dad got more than his fair share, so her dc had to get x3 what we got Hmm So she would get £100 and we would get £30 and a few bags of sweets to make it 'fair'. I think it is a bit odd, but can see where they are coming from if they are that way inclined.

Christmas/birthdays can get very expensive the more dgc you have. My dc were the first dgc, sibling 2 has 4 dc and then sib 3 had one recently, after 8 years of the last dgc being born. My DP's have had to cut back over the years on how much they give each child simply because they cannot afford it. DM lost a private pension she ploughed money into and they are comfortable, but just about. Sibling 3 is silently resentful that the oldest dgc 'benefited' a lot more than his future children so I did suggest that my DP's stop giving mine as they are the eldest, but they wouldn't hear of it.

IHateBlueLights · 07/12/2019 15:46

I'm guessing it's SiL's idea after last year. She thought it wasn't fair that your family got more.