Was I in the wrong?

[eatlessmovemore]

Am I in the wrong here- bit of a weird one, anyway I've just done some Thankyou cards from dd for her birthday presents and partner has had a go at me because I didn't put auntie and uncle on the envelope on his side of the family and I did mine - here's why- when she received a gift from his brother and wife it has love from uncle..... and ...... ( no auntie in front of her name ) one of his aunties signed the card from auntie and the other didn't so I thought maybe they don't see them selves as auntie so instead of forcing them to be known as auntie or offending them I just done the card to mr and mrs ..... and then a standard Thankyou inside with no names, partner has had a go and said it's not really fair that I put auntie and uncle for my side of the family, dd sees my family weekly whereas she hasn't seen his side of the family for over a year despite me inviting them over etc so was I wrong for doing it this way?

Not sure why they wouldn't call themselves auntie I've always referred to her as auntie, as for inside the card I didn't just put Thankyou I put Thankyou for my present and that she's had lots of fin playing with it etc

If I left it to him I don't think they would get Thankyou cards either

There's two issues as I see it.

How he treats you / speaks to you etc. All addressed gere and rightly so. He should have done his cards if he wants them done and of your said you'd do them all, he should have been thankful not treating you like a stupid child.

Secondly the cards. love from uncle..... and ...... ( no auntie in front of her name ) one of his aunties signed the card from auntie and the other didn't so even the ones who wrote uncle and aunty, you disregarded that and still wrote Mr and Mrs? That isn't respecting how they label themselves, that's point scoring.

and then a standard Thankyou inside with no names did you also put no names inside your cards? I think that's pretty rude. It basically suggests you wrote 20 identical cards.

If you are going to take on the job, which you're not obliged to do, you should have wrote Uncle John and Sandra as they had wrote it but you're partners siblings is always write as Uncle or Auntie

The auntie/uncle stuff is irrelevant.

Your husband is expecting you to do the ‘wife work’ and to be allowed to criticise afterwards, if he thinks you didn’t do it right.

You need to stop this nonsense now.

Refuse to do anything that he could be doing himself until he accepts that he is not your manager and learns to appreciate all that you do for the family.

Make sure he writes out all the Christmas cards and does the gift buying for his side of the family this year. If he leaves it and tries to get you to do it, refuse. He needs to learn a valuable lesson here and if you give in because you’re bothered about how his side of the family will judge you, you will have given him carte blanche to treat you like his employee for the rest of your marriage.

Stand Firm OP.

His family aren't going to see the envelopes you've written to your family, so how would they know?

Regardless, putting Uncle and Aunt on the envelope is strange, unless you're hand-delivering it. I'd put "Mr X" or "Mr and Mrs Y", then Aunt and Uncle inside the cards.

If they're a sibling, they're Aunt/Uncle automatically, if they're married I'd say the same. If they're a girlfriend/boyfriend I'd use how they'd signed, so that might be "Uncle Alex and Rosie", or "Aunt Lucy and Tom".

They're married not boyfriend and girlfriend, I thought it would have been signed auntie too

You know, i had a similar thing happen when I sent thank you cards to everyone when my DD was born. I was so tired I just addressed the ones to my DPs parents as their names, not mum and dad. 3 months later we drive across country with DD so they could see her and DPs father refused to hold or acknowledge her. His mother tried to give me a dressing down for it too. It came out that they were royaly passed off that the cards I sent werent addressed to them as mum and dad...I hit the roof and gave them a good firm talking to about how I expect them to behave (I.e. you tell me if I've upset you so I can put it right and under no circumstances are their issues to translate into how they interact with their own granddaughter). I ended up sending them another thank you card addressed correctly and they apologised for the behaviour. All in all I would just write auntie/uncle/nan/grandad/mum/dad for everyone regardless of what they put in their cards. It could save a whole load of unnecessary drama in the future.

I am an Aunty and great Aunty to my husbands relatives. I don’t think any one of them has ever addressed me as such. Or called him uncle.

@eatlessmovemore

Not sure why they wouldn't call themselves auntie I've always referred to her as auntie, as for inside the card I didn't just put Thankyou I put Thankyou for my present and that she's had lots of fin playing with it etc

That doesn’t make it better. You didn’t sign the cards to them and that makes it impersonal; it’s just a generic thank you and that’s very rude.

It’s not hard to write a persons name at the top of a card.

Proper names on the envelope is normal, I have never received a card or letter addressed to Auntie Eerily.

Inside the cards I tend to match too, I don't see what's wrong with that. Maybe Rosie doesn't like being called Auntie (I dislike it myself). Either way it seems a very trivial thing to get worked up about.

He can do them if he's that bothered. I agree with you on letting your bil wife decide if she's aunty or not. I grew up with my parents sibling's husband/wife being aunt or uncle. I thought this was the norm. But then when I met my partner he said he doesn't call /think of his uncle and aunt's partners as uncle and aunts.

We don't have children ourselves but dote on our nieces (my sitsefs kids) to begin with I used to joke with my partner about being uncle and he wasn't sure on it. I'm also not sure he thought of the as his nieces. But oldest is 4 now and he loves spending time with he and is definitely uncle and she's definitely his niece. The little one is 11 months and we've had less contact due to covid so that relationship is still growing.

I don't know if he just don't want to over step and force a relationship he had no experience with. So anyway I think you were really thoughtful about calling her aunt.

Does every one know you can put what nes you want on an envelope. As long as the address is there royal mail don't care! Have a bit of fun ffs. Its cute to get a card with aunty xxx on the envelope.

OP, tell this lazy arse to fuck off. Seriously, he is not the boss of you and if he is bothered he does the cards for his family. From now on, do not be sorting out birthday or Christmas cards/presents for his side of the family either. He is a grown man and can do this himself - or choose not to. It is not your responsibility.

@Plussizejumpsuit Agree! It’s joyless and bizarrely antiquated to say that “Mr and Mrs” is the correct and normal thing to do on the envelope (especially if people aren’t married...) – I generally use real names on parcels in case post goes astray or needs to be collected from the sorting office, but often write “Grandburrito” or “Uncle Nickname” on envelopes; and if sending something for nieces and nephews just write their first name in big bubble writing or whatever for fun.

DP’s family insist on writing me as Miss Burritosurnamespelledwrong on the envelope though I’ve never been a miss in my life!

No "thanks for doing all the cards eatlessmovemore" just criticism about how you wrote them? He's is 100% in the wrong and an ungrateful twat on top of it. Let him do his own admin in the future

I'd have left him to do the cards for his family, even if they continued to sit there. His penis doesn't prevent him from writing cards.

I don’t think so.

I don’t like being called auntie either. I prefer just my first name!

I have no idea if I’ve put aunt / uncle consistently on the cards I’ve sent to my nieces over the years. Nor therefore whether their thank yous reflect whatever I wrote on that occasion (given I wouldn’t have a clue whether it matched).

I don’t think frequency of seeing the relatives should make a jot of difference though.

What does your child call them? That should be what is written inside the card, so if she calls them 'Uncle Dave and Charlotte' that's what it should be, but if she calls them 'Uncle Dave and Auntie Charlotte' it should be that.

Some people go on auto pilot when they're writing cards. The one time my dad was in charge of writing the Christmas cards he wrote them from his and my mum's real names instead of Mum and Dad on ours .. so it might not be what they want to be called - just go with what you know she calls them!

On the envelope should always be Mr & Mrs though, it's weird to put Auntie and Uncle on that.

If I'm honest dd doesn't really know them as she hasn't seen them for over a year now, I refer to them as auntie and uncle to dd

There has also been a few comments over the years that I'm not family so maybe they don't see dd as family as such

@MaMaD1990 That’s mad - they’re not your mum and dad? If they want a card from their son, he can send it. They would know from the handwriting that it was from you, not him.

@TerribleLizzard I know! It blew my mind how worked up they got about it. Some people eh?!

That's really odd MaMaD, because presumably you usually call them their names?

The only person I know who called his in-laws "mum and dad" got divorced, still saw them afterwards, and found it really awkward to start using their first names!