To not want to get MIL anything for Xmas this year?

[PippaKing]

I know how heartless that sounds but I'm 6 years in with DP and not a Christmas has gone by where she hasn't moaned about what we've bought her...

• Didn't like the fact one year that she hadn't got a gift specifically from her granddaughter (she was 4 at the time)
• Didn't like the joint present we got her & FIL one year. It was a hamper that DP spent over £100 on, with thoughtful food & drinks inside from nice garden centres etc. She said she didn't like joint gifts.
• Bought her Swarovski earrings one year. Made a side comment to DP that 'she would have preferred diamond earrings'
• Bought an experience voucher another year to go for afternoon tea. Told us she didn't like 'experience' gifts
• One year said she didn't want anything, was very adamant, so DP bought her a lovely seasonal bouquet of flowers as a nice gesture. She said the quality of them was terrible, rung up the company and complained about them it in front of us.

I can't even remember the other one but she's never happy...

You can buy a tracking bracelet for a sloth. A sloth! I mean, they don't move, what is there to track?

I used to have the same issue with my BIL. He spent years telling to "get him something I think he'll really like. Something really thoughtful."

About 10 years ago now I got him a gift voucher to a new steak restaurant that had opened in town, after we had discussed - literally that summer - how much he likes steak restaurants.
A few days after Christmas I asked him if he was excited to use the voucher, and his response was "huh, I don't really fancy it."

And thus ended any effort on my part to provide "thoughtful" gifts. Now he gets a box of chocolates and a big dose of "shut the fuck up". Dropping the mental load felt amazing.

She sounds like she wants to be Uber pampered, so no shared gifts, no gifts that disappear, she wants to be all
" oh, this little thing? From Tiffany's, I suppose, I'll have to ask my son ,he spoils me so!"

It's all about ego and having something to show off
She sounds very ungrateful and like hard work

We had this and bought a star for her Christmas gift one year misspelling her name. Think Mohag instead of Morag. Of course she didn’t like it, but we couldn’t stop laughing! 😂

After that we had a fierce competition between us as to who could come up with the ‘best’ present! Have some fun, lighten up and don’t take it too seriously.

She has all sorts now. Coral in the Maldives, a donkey in Africa, a title in Scotland 😌

What? Diamond earrings? Is she for real?
My in laws got a Christmas bouquet (a nice one around £50) or books when my DH was alive. They were totally grateful and happy. Just the one present from us (we have four kids - they did not give each grandchild a present either).

Who are the 3% of people who think you are being unreasonable?! lol

Everyone else has the right idea - not your circus, not your monkeys.

I voted YABU because it's not your circus and not your monkeys.

Assuming your husband knows how to get himself to a shop.

OMG used the same phrase and I swear we X posted! 😲🤣

Leave it to DP
You know whatever you buy will be criticised so disengage" grey rock" her.
I'd be tempted to give a book on etiquette but a generic box of chocolates will do.
Someone will eat them or she can regift

I voted YABU because as per usual, another woman feels the need to take on the mental load of this - why? - and her dumbo husband has let her. Drop the rope op. It’s not your problem.

Sorry was replying to @slightlydistrac not you* *@MuddyPawsIndoors!

Just get her an Argos gift voucher fuck it.

I was reading about mustangs in the US, and found out that you can adopt one! I thought it was something like "pay money, support the cause, get four photos and updates a year about 'your' horse."

It turned out that it was an actual adoption of a mustang - you get to/have to bring the horse home with you!

Buy her a copy of 'A Christmas Carol' by Charles Dickens. And a tangerine wrapped in silver foil. In the words of Julia from Motherland, "What an ungrateful old cabbage". I would be over the moon with any of the presents you've bought her in the past; they sound lovely. There's no pleasing some people. My father-in-law and sister-in-law haven't even thanked me for this year's birthday presents, so this year they will get nothing for Christmas and I expect that will be wrong. All the moody in-laws should be sent away to In-Law Island at Christmas to moan about us all. I reckon it would make quite good TV. 😂

@BraveBlueDuck I hear you. Good for you

Get her something from B&M Home Bargains. A sparkly ornament or a garden gnome or something equally naff. And fluffy bed socks 😂

My sister is like this. I now buy her a charity gift each year, so for example you pay £20 and it funds 5 birthing kits for a war torn area. i do admit to trying to make it as fun as possible (for me). Last year she got a pint of prize bull semen I think (not literally but that’s what the gift funded and she got a voucher saying that). Her face on reading that one out on Christmas morning was a treat.

we use GoodGifts 😀

£20 Boots voucher. Done and done.

I'm a mil, and would adore a garden gnome and fluffy socks. Maybe she has similar taste to me!

If you do gift exchanges, I wouldn't buy her NOTHING. I'd get her something really run-of-the-mill you know she likes because she buys it for herself, like a wine she always drinks or chocolates you've seen her eat. Then say she's never liked anything you've picked so you've gone this route. I would definitely have DH do it though -- his mother, his problem.

Make a charity donation in her name. That way you’re helping others and she’s not complaining about what you got her.

Exactly this. DH rings her and says 'What would you like?' If she replies 'Anything' or 'Don't get me anything' he can use your list. 'Well you didn't like the joint present, the earrings, afternoon tea or the flowers, so give me a clue'

"Worlds best MIL", matching t-shirt and mug.

I'm not getting my FIL a gift this year. I've told my husband if he wants to then please go ahead. Same has previously applied to birthdays but have now included Christmas. He's not horrible but never thanks me and just generally doesn't seem bothered about anything I have ever got him. I tried but now I give up! If the last few birthdays are anything to go by my husband will get him a B&Q voucher....

This gets my vote!!! 🤣