It's our first Christmas with our baby who will soon be 4 months old. We're not doing anything too mad for Christmas because he has no idea what any of it is, so no meeting father Christmas, etc. But the one thing he is into at the moment is lights, so I thought it might be nice to go to a light show. There's one at botanical gardens near us that is doing a light trail, but it's about £18 each adult for midweek evening (baby is free). Partner is reluctant to go, because baby may well just sleep through the whole thing and keeps saying we could just go to some garden centres for free and see their lights.
£18 each is not free, but it's also not completely extortionate in my opinion. Also we have separate money and he's not financially supporting me on maternity leave (I saved up in advance to cover earning shortfall) so I'm only asking him to pay for his own ticket / will pay for him if he's such a tight arse!
We're not going to the city centre to see their light because they have a market on and it is always rammed, and I find that over whelming myself, let alone a 4 month baby!
I keep going back and forth on whether we should go, because yes the baby may well sleep through the whole thing, or worse it may be too noisy/busy/overwhelming for him but when I mentioned it this morning partner said about garden centres again and I snapped. He doesn't drive and we don't already go to garden centres so I pointed out that I would have to look up garden centres and find out if it's worth going and drive to it and it would basically be more awkward for me. I'm not currently enjoying driving at night and car is 17 years old (no money for a new one while on maternity leave!) so I don't want to be driving out to unfamiliar places if I can help it and larger garden centres tend to be out in the sticks.
I think I need an outside perspective though:
You are being unreasonable - find something free to do / make effort and find garden centres - the baby might not be bothered anyway.
You are NOT being unreasonable - put your foot down and say this is the only Christmassy thing you are asking to do with the new baby, who might not remember it, but you will.