Is this gift giving situation unusual or am I a total Scrooge?

[helptodecide]

Perfectly willing to be told that I’m being unreasonable here. Genuinely unsure what the situation is in most large families.

DP is part of a large family and as a result we have multiple nieces and nephews (6 total). Me and DP are the only ones out of all his siblings who don’t have any kids, everyone else has at least 1. At Christmas we buy individual presents for all of our nieces and nephews, and this totals around £150, often a bit more. Everyone else in the family has their own children, so as well as buying gifts for everyone else’s kids they’re all getting presents for their child in return. A big present exchange is done every year on Christmas Morning, and we obviously don’t get anything from anyone as we don’t have children. For context the kids are all between 0 and 4.

Now I know you don’t give to receive, and obviously I don’t expect the kids to get me anything, which makes me think I’m being entirely unreasonable here. However it is a lot of money each year now there are so many of them! Would I be unreasonable to say look there are too many of them now for them all to get a present each, and maybe rejoin the huge gift giving exchange if/when we have our own?

Kind of theoretical as I know in reality we will probably keep buying them all presents come what may, just interested re what other people do in this situation?

Yes, I think that would be unusual, to say the least.

I bought for nieces and nephews before I had my dc. I bought them things because I loved them, and I wanted to.

I mean, in our family, we don't spend £25 per child, but that's going to depend on budget.

I think it would be reasonable to suggest a smaller budget, but I think IWBU to say you aren't getting them anything because you currently don't have dc (especially if it is on the cards - as you imply - there will be a time in the future where you hope to have dc).

You could buy them each a book for a tenner, would more than halve the overall cost, plus you become Christmas Book Aunt, which is a win/win. Kids of that age will already have a ton of toys.

Maybe a sort of secret Santa thing could be a solution? That’s what we did for ours, set a price limit everyone is comfortable with and stick to it. There are even websites now that you can use to organise it.

Why are you spending so much money?

Why not just reduce your budget, my budget this year for nieces and nephews is around £10-15. As they’re all still little you should easily be able to lower the budget.

i buy for my siblings until they have kids and then just the kids get something.

Wow that’s a really odd attitude to buying gifts for children.

Absolutely don’t bankrupt yourself (low budget or homemade treats would be fine). However telling the family ‘we’re not giving these children presents until we can be sure we’re getting a reasonable return’ isn’t really in the spirit.

I would set a £5 limit, and agree with the suggestion of a book (fact, fiction, puzzles, stickers etc). Lots of places have cheap books and you can even get pretty much new condition books second hand. It's also a bit off that none of them get you at least a token gift.

Yeah that's pretty scroogy I'm afraid.

Also, the kids will notice if you stop giving them Christmas presents. How would you explain to them that it’s all transactional?

You DEFINITELY don't need to spend £25 per niece/nephew!! That's excessive! Cut it down to a book and a selection box each, and that will more than halve what you're spending. Or just stop altogether 🤷‍♀️

First of all, 6 isn’t that many nieces and nephews really.

Secondly, yes, total and complete Scrooge to think you shouldn’t have to buy for them because you chose not to have children (yet).

It’s not a game of tit for tat.

I’m sure someone in your life, when you were a child, bought gifts for you without reciprocity.Now you’re paying it forward.

A budget of £15 is £90 for all of them. You can get plenty of decent gifts for children in the £15 range.

I think it’s grabby of the adults to expect you to buy for all their children and give you nothing.

I guess I also kind of think this but the overwhelming majority tend to disagree? I’ve not been in this situation before so I guess this is just the norm now!!

The reason that we spend a lot is because everybody does so Ive not wanted to buy them all something tiny when everyone else is spending a lot of money. But maybe that’s a fair compromise!!

I really do love them all and I feel like I sound like a proper dick, I’m just not familiar with how this all usually works😂

I always spent a little more, or made more effort I suppose for my sister who didn't have children when the rest of us (5 siblings) did.
We had entered the "it's all about the kids" phase and she desperately wanted it too.
There are 14 nieces and nephews now and mostly people seemed to spend £10 or less on a present.

OP - I think you are getting hard time on here, why are being called a 'scrooge' and yet no one is calling out your grabby family who are happy to take multiple gifts and let and your DH sit empty handed at the gift exchange. How would a couple of token gifts from the kids to their Aunt & Uncle hurt? I had my children late (early 40s) and bought for my friends children. Both sets of friends would get me a little gift that the child would be excited for present to me. It was thoughtful and much appreciated.

I also had a the reverse situation that an neighbour without children or close family would buy gifts for my children and would buy her small gifts chocolates for the children to give ro her.

*helptodecide *

I don’t think you are being unreasonable. It’s a bit different if you may have kids in the future but I have a childless friend in my friendship group who always buys for the kids so we all make sure she gets a present on her birthday and those of us with kids don’t as otherwise she is buying and getting nothing in return..

Same.

In my family, I buy for the kids and adults without kids. I think it’s rude for someone to buy for my kid without me returning the gesture.

At that age you don’t need to spend anywhere near that much
B&M have 3 toys for £20 and each individually costs £12-14 so a great saving. Includes Disney, paw patrol etc. That’s £40 for all of them!
If you wanted to get more then get a book each - can get 10 for £10 at the works (will be suitable for all of them due to their ages - put 4 by for next year)
You can even add a selection box/tube of milky bar buttons if you want (£1 each)
So the Presents for each kid will have a value of £16-20 each (for a toy, a book and chocolate) but you will be spending a grand total of £56 for everything

That's so crap that his family aren't buying you presents back from the kids. I don't know how you negotiate going further but yanbu with wanting something to change. My DSis has no kids and she is amazing to mine so I go way OTT for her every year to repay her. Hopefully when you have your own children things even out. Have a lovely Christmas 🎄

DH and I have 23 nieces and nephews between us. We will usually give a gift for the whole family to enjoy like a board game or cinema/bowling vouchers. I buy my siblings gifts and they buy me gifts. I don’t think YABU to feel left out the gift giving.

I have an aunt who has no children and growing up she always bought me a gift. She still does but now I also buy her a gift. I don’t get the whole Christmas is for the kids. It’s for adults too.

You don’t have to give them anything, certainly nothing expensive especially at that age. My extended family grew so much and the present exchange became so unmanageable that eventually the family units all chipped in a certain amount and each child got a present of equal value. The adults all got one present from the grandparents. Maybe suggest something similar? It can be tricky to make it work for everyone as there will be different financial circumstances, but remember Christmas is not just about the presents!

If they are your husband's siblings kids it's up to him?

My brother and sister buy for my kids. They don't ask their other halves.

@helptodecide I'm with you OP on this one. I have bought presents without fail for my nieces and nephews on my husbands side (6 kids in total) - never missed a birthday/christmas present- set a budget of £15 per kid but often SIL/BIL would send over something the kids wanted that would be closer to £20. Having done this for 5 years, I then had my own child and guess what, the CF's either "forgot to send a present or it was lost in the post or sent 2 months later and became a combined christmas/birthday present". And it made me really angry. They are money grabbers. I leave it to my husband to organise now. Don't bank on them doing the same when you have a kid. I would reduce the budget to a max £5-10. Loads of stuff you can get, argos have loads of 2 for £15 toys. Obviously if you can afford more, spend what you like.

Flash forward 20 years. The oldest of these children may be aging out of the niece and nephew gift exchange, but your child(ren) will be the youngest.