Parents won’t come round without the dog - but I have a brand new house, with a cream carpet

[rightonthemoney]

let me start this by saying I absolutely LOVE my parents dog - I was still at home when they got her, so I’m not completing detached from her!

Anyway, I’ve just moved into my first home with my partner, we live about 45 minutes away now from both sets of parents (the only affordable place left in our county.) My parents came round to see the house when we first got it, about three weeks ago, and I’ve invited them round to see the progress of it this weekend.

My mum said they want to come, but they’d like to bring the dog. I said they can bring her, but she’s not allowed on the carpet. I have a brand new home, with cream carpet. We have no pets or children, so it will stay clean, because I want it to. For reference, she’s a very hairy, smelly cocker spaniel. I’ve said the dog can come in the kitchen, but apparently that isn’t ok…

Anyway - they don’t want to leave the dog for hours on end, which is completely fair enough. However, they would be gone for four/five hours MAX. Plus, my 30 year old brother lives at home! I got frustrated with my mum and this is verbatim the text she sent: “I don’t want her to be alone. Minimum of 50 mins to you, and back so that leaves a couple of hours max at yours….simple, you come here 😊”

Am I being unreasonable?! Just the way she worded the text, expecting me to drive 50 minutes away because of the dog, even though I have invited them to mine. I don’t mind driving to them, but it’s the principle.

Am I going to spend my whole life only travelling to them because they have a dog? 🤦🏻‍♀️ Really needed to vent because I’m so angry!

I think family relationships are more important than pets, and everyone has the right to decide whether they want other people’s animals in their home. Parents are being incredibly unreasonable.

Being in a kitchen and garden for a few hours is exactly like being confined to a crate where you can't move. Perspective needed.

My kitchen is a tiny galley where a table doesn't fit. There is maybe 1m² of floor space.

Sometimes people on Mumsnet live in a very wealthy and privileged bubble.

Still not a crate. It's a dog and we're talking about ops kitchen and garden, not Your kitchen

@MooseBreath

dog would still be fine

actually I see those banging on about the dog should be allowed on the carpets as being a reflection of mumsnet privilege.

They are clearly happy to bear the expense of having to replace their carpet sooner than if they just exercised some common sense and looked after it. Is a sense of easy coke, easy go for some people?

i work v hard for what I have and I want it to last

Thanks, this is exactly my point! I’d love, love vinyl or wooden flooring throughout, however that would cost over £3,000. I do not have that kind of money to spare. I want to keep my carpet for as long as possible and maybe in five years time, we may need to replace it. If that’s the case, so be it, but at least we may have time to save. I don’t like having to justify why I don’t want my less than a month carpet to be filled with dog hair and potentially have people walk mud through the house because they have kept their shoes on.

I'd be the same, not wanting muddy paws on my new carpet. Or kids eating and drinking in there, that is perfectly reasonable, it's your house.

Both my dogs know to wait in the hall while I get a towel and dry them off but I wouldn't want other peoples dogs running around who aren't as well trained, making a mess.

Tbh I'm more concerned about why your parents dog is being neglected. Dogs shouldn't smell, if they do then they aren't being bathed or groomed properly. Dogs do have a natural smell but you shouldn't notice it unless you literally press your face against them.

I mean this in the nicest possible way, but I really think you should get some perspective. It's a carpet. It is just a carpet. Surely your parents are more important

Family is more important than carpet. But clean carpet is important too, and there's no need for the dog to be on it. It can stay in the kitchen.

It is an animal after all

Nah. It's faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamlee! 🙄

This thread is making me quite sure that I will never get a dog. I feel claustrophobic just reading it. Can't leave the dog for three hours, even at its own house with another responsible adult? Can't visit a friend without the dog being literally alongside you in the friends house? Even my kids can be left at home with a babysitter.

🤣

and faaaaaamileeee comes first!!

YANBU at all. I have wood flooring everywhere aside from the stairs but I wouldn’t want a dog in my house either. It’s your house so your rules which they should respect. Absolutely crazy that they won’t leave the dog for a few hours with your brother or even bring the dog but keep it in the kitchen as you suggested.

This is all very odd. Why can’t OP have cream carpets if she wants them. I can’t understand why you’d take other people who don’t even live with you into account when decorating your home. Anyway, having just swept and mopped my laminate floors for the second time today after pesky mutt trod dirt everywhere, I don’t think you’re being unreasonable OP.

I love a cream carpet. Makes a room lighter; it's restful and just generally nice. However, I also hate housework, have two teenagers, a dog, cats, and family/friends with a motley selection of children and animals who like to visit. DH and I like hosting and it can be a bit manic here on occasion! I had a cream carpet once. Never again. It's not compatible with a full-on life. I have now deliberately got rid of all carpets downstairs and anything fragile is above a certain height. 😂My home still looks lovely but I don't have to worry about it.

No one is being unreasonable, you just have different perspectives OP. Your house, your rules. You have the choice to enforce the rules or flex them, your DM has the choice to honour them or choose not to come. There'll be a compromise somewhere I'm sure. Not entirely sure why DB can't help though.

No food fair enough
But no drinking tea in the living room? Really?

You get to choose whether or not to have a dog in your house, your parents get to choose whether or not they want to visit you in your house if they can't bring a dog.
I wouldn't have a dog in the house but accept some people may then choose not to visit me and we end up meeting elsewhere and going for a walk together in a park or something

This. Completely this. Both parties here are demanding the other bend to their way of seeing and doing things, both are being unreasonable.

DH has some family with very strict house rules and who are big on keeping a spotless home. They have a right to their rules of course, but I also have a right not to go if the long list of do’s and don’ts are too anxiety provoking to make a visit enjoyable. Maybe they like the rules because it keeps visitors away! Their prerogative.

Similarly, my dad does not visit me because he doesn’t like pets in the house and in my house, our dog goes in carpeted areas, on the sofa etc. I keep the dog in hard floor areas and off the furniture when I visit him, or outdoors in summer. But my dog is ok to stay in another room, he wouldn’t whine or scratch or anything. It isn’t for either of us to tell the other what to do in our own homes, but it’s also up to us to choose whether we a) visit and accept the rules or b) don’t accept the rules and don’t visit. OP’s parents are choosing option b, which is as fair enough as OP having the rules.

Both parties here are demanding the other bend to their way of seeing and doing things, both are being unreasonable

All OP is asking is that the dog stay out of the living room. Is that really so unreasonable? My experience with friends and their dogs is that dogs are routinely kept out of living rooms and bedrooms. Not all of them of course. But it's surely not so unusual as to be thought unreasonable.

Not literally everything, no. We don't drink our tea in the dining room!

I mean this in the nicest possible way, but I really think they should get some perspective. It's a dog. It is just a dog. Surely your child is more important

Rewrote that for you.

@WildNights

*My dogs are family, in fact they’re better than a lot of my family. 😂

My friends children are adopted. No blood shared but very much her family so this was a stupid, offensive comment. HTH*

Are you seriously comparing dogs to children? Surely you get the general gist of my meaning. It's an animal. For me, and many other people, no different than a rat or worm. Would you treat someones pet fleas as a family member?

See, some people are weird about dogs in the way others are weird about being apart from their DH or DCs. There's people on MN who never do things unless as full family, would not consider getting a babysitter to go out childfree, would not go to something without their DP. Equally, some people (like the OPs mum) won't leave their dog even if its not for that long or there's someone else able to look after it.

OP - were your parents odd about going out without you /your brother when you were kids?

Oh give over

The dog won't be alone though, her brother would be there

Whether or not it’s considered unreasonable depends on your individual values, how you treat your pet and how your pet is though doesn’t it. I don’t think it is unreasonable for me and my circumstances, but my dog would be fine left in the kitchen in a strange house while I go in another room and socialise. Not all dogs are.

OP wants parents to abide by her rules in her home - fine, reasonable, but parents are also free to say those rules don’t work for them and not visit and suggest an alternative - also reasonable, rather than pressure OP to change her house rules for them.