Am f*cking fuming at the woman. We go round theirs after christmas lunch at my parents as we normally do, only to be met with 'you don't mind if I give them their pressies tomorrow do you? M, (DD/DS's cousin) will only be comng tomorrow and as you're visiting then too I don't want DD/DS to feel left out whilst he is opening his'
I mean WTF!! It's bad enough she keeps her presents for Christmas afternoon (instead of giving them in advance and letting Father Christmas bring them for the morning) but now the kids can't have them til Boxing day?!!!
Her reasoning was that as DC's cousin will be coming BD and we will also be visiting, she didn't want DD (DS not relevant as only 4 months) to feel left out when he was opening his. She's 4 FFS and rarely gets jealous, she's quite reasonable once she knows what will be happening.
When DH arrived in after this had been said and MIL repeated to him, he insisted we all have our pressies xmas day as normal, and made a bit of a joke out of it saying 'aww want to open my pressie today not tomorrow' etc etc, so MIL comes out with 'well DD's isn't wrapped anyway so she'll have to wait until tomorrow' (doubt very much it wasn't wrapped, she just wanted to get her own way, selfish attention seeking little mare she is).
What's more Boxing Day rolls around and DH picks up his bro, GF and their DS and drops them off at MILs (car out of comission atm), comes back to get us - by the time we got there he had opened everything - we don't even know what he got! That's hardly going to make DD jealous is it??!!
DH and I have had a bit of a to do about it, he agrees with me but doesn't feel as strongly about it (it's his mum after all and I think he feels annoyed but won't let on just how much). He won't mention anything this year but we've decided to be insistent that next year all pressies need to be passed around before the day so they can be there in the morning. I mean, everyone else can manage it (including my parents) so why can't she?!
For the record, if she were a normal MIL, and this was a one off, I wouldn't be so pissed, but she is a very controlling, attention seeking/loving person (and very insecure I've found). She likes to control every situation and everyone (she's always trying to discipline my daughter in my presence), this is the woman who hides the remote control and you have to ask permission to change the channel (and if it's not something she wants to watch, forget it!) and speaks to her husband like he's a piece of crap.
Gaaaahh!! I never thought I'd have any family trouble over christmas and this has turned into a huuuuuge rant!! Scream