MIL buying baby cringey clothing

[Copenhagener]

A very short AIBU.

I had my first baby last year. My MIL wants to buy baby clothing - I’m fine with that.

Instead of buying baby items we’ve said we like or need, she keeps buying baby clothing with pointed and cringey ‘grandma knows best’ slogans that I find so embarrassing to dress her in - so I don’t.

See picture below for an example: ‘Grandma: a mother without rules!’

There has also been: ‘grandma’s best friend’ ‘pass me to grandma’ ‘’if mommy says no, ask grandma!’ ‘call grandma: she always knows what to do!’ Etc. I have no idea where she finds this nonsense. She’s deliberately going out of her way to buy them. A lot are clearly low-quality rubbish from the internet.

She keeps asking why baby isn’t wearing said clothing and going on and on about how funny these outfits are when I see her.

AIBU to not dress baby in these outfits / ask her to cut it out?

It’s not her first grandchild and up until now, I thought we had a good relationship, but now I feel a bit irritated with her.

I think that's a bit harsh. Everyone has different tastes. I remember when my daughter was a baby and a friend bought her an outfit which I thought was awful, but I wouldn't have dreamt of saying anything to her.

Oh dear! Why are tops either hearts on only for girls? Talk about gender stereotyping!

I hate slogan clothes too, but honestly, just use them as house clothes for spit up changes etc, and shove the vests under something you actually like if you're in public. I wouldn't say anything. She's clearly just excited to be a grandma, and the clothes reflect this.

Yeah, she's massively over-stepping if she changed your baby into one of her outfits while you were in another room.

And as for pointing out the slogan to everyone, surely everyone must think she is ridiculous? She sounds very self-involved.

Well, if one lot fell apart in the wash, you know what to do with the rest.

Just tell her that you won't be putting the child in any Temu clothes and the reason why.

@Copenhagener also sites like Shein and ?Temu I’m sure we’re found to have higher levels of lead /heavy metal contamination on their clothes than acceptable?

so I don’t dress kids in anything from those sites either.
id ask grandma for specifics eg white short sleeve vests please and multipack leggings. Or just take a photo and move it on.

if it’s meant in a harmless way I wouldn’t get annoyed by it- it’s just different taste.

I had the same issue with my mum OP. She kept on buying things from Temu that had not been manufactured to EU/ UK regulations. There are loads of articles out there about how unsafe it is. This was my angle and not that i dont like the items themselves. I told her I dont want anything from Temu/ Shein/ similar and she stopped. You need to nip this in the bud now or it will get even worse when your MIL starts buying unsafe toys. Tell you husband to talk to her if you dont want to x

They are cringe, but tbf I don’t think it’s worth the hassle. Just stick her in them when your MIL is round to keep the peace. My FIL got all my kids football kits, I think he’s hoping at least one of them will get into it since his son won’t to go to a game with him.
edit: just seen it’s from TEMU. Don’t put your baby in it. There’s a bbc doc about it free on YouTube you should show her. It talks about the lead they found in a child’s jacket.

My FIL who ignores all my parenting requests and preferences bought my 3 yo a t shirt saying ‘that’s it, I’m calling grandad!!’

I put it in a drawer for a year and then last week I took it to a charity shop (tags still on and all). Fuck that shit; my child isn’t wearing that

Yes - she said baby spit up and needed changing, which is totally okay, but when I did the laundry that afternoon, the original clothing was dry and not stained.

I think it may come from a place of insecurity more than malice - that she must be the ‘fun’ one so the grandkids will love her most.

She did something similar when we got a dog - she kept buying and feeding her copious amounts of treats - handfuls at a time - so dog would love her, and telling all her neighbours that she was the dog’s favourite person in the world. She eventually cut it out when we had a very big vet’s bill from dog getting incredibly sick from some random food she got from the internet and fed to her without our permission (she was on a medicated diet at the time).

She’s obviously just loving having a new grand baby. She doesn’t mean any malice. Try and see the bigger picture that you have a MIL who wants to be an active part of your child’s life and will one day be a huge gift when you need to pack them off for over nights etc to get a break.

Ahhh so that's the sort of person that buys this tacky crap!

Dress them in it only when you see them, or take a photo of baby wearing it then put it in the wardrobe and claim they pooped on it so had to be changed just before you came out.

I was all ready to tell you to suck it up amd then read about the slogans- no they're really passive aggressive / manipulative. I would tell your MIL that you're not amused. "Grandma loves me" is fine but not "grandma knows best".

Honestly OP smile and nod, smile and nod. My ex MIL used to do this when DC were small - they were the first grandchild and she was excited. It wasn't the hill to die on.

My MIL went a bit crazy when DC were born though and I could write a book about the crazy shit she used to do.

Why? People have different standards, many have different standards to you, and you need to get over that 😉 Ultimately it's OP's choice if she wants her child to wear better quality items than some of the awful Chinese tat people flog on the internet.

Every member of my family has different taste in clothes so my DC's got outfits raging from slogan type like these, neon stuff, everything knitted and bowed, plain, barberry check. You name it, we had it. I was just grateful and made sure to put baby in everything at least once, take a photo and send a thank you to who bought it. Not everyone has the same taste but its lovely that she wants to buy, she sounds proud as punch bless her.

Just tell her once "we don't like babies wearing clothes with slogans on them" and leave it at that.

Quietly donate.

Really? Bloody hell. One more reason not to buy from Chinese sites, then.

If my MIL gave me a vest like that it'd go straight in the bin!! I would tell her straight that that's incredibly cringy and she is not a mum. A grandma is not a mum without rules FFS.

If her response to you sending photos of baby is to ask why he's not wearing her cringe clothes, I'd stop sending her photos. Your DH can deal with that.

And get rid of the clothes so she can't change baby into them. If she asks where they are just say they disintegrated in the wash or shrunk so you had to get rid of them

Anyone who made my dog sick because they were such a complete idiot would not be getting near a child

See if you can find somewhere that does personalised items and have one made up saying "my granny (name) is a weirdo" or "my granny (name) has poor taste in clothes and buys me crap like this".

I actually quite like that vest, it's one of the more tasteful slogan stuff and I usually hate the slogan stuff.

I would kill to have a Grandma for my son, my myself and my husbands mum have both passed away. So just be glad your baby has someone who loves them very much.

I honestly feel ethically icky with donating clothing from TEMU/Shein/etc. I’d be worried in case it was contaminated with toxins / poorly manufactured and caused a baby to get hurt. I hate throwing things away; but in this case I probably will for my conscience’s sake.