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 am not a fan of them either but honestly if it was my grandma i would pop in take a pic to show her ,if she wasn't so far away i would put them on for when ever the kids saw grandma .They don't have to wear them just make them grandma time clothing

I’ve seen these styles on Temu. I think you should tell her you won’t be dressing your baby in anything from there and send her the article a pp posted about the elevated levels of toxic substance found in their clothes. Also, this whole bullshit re grandma is a mum without rules, bog off, grandma! A relative handed out Diet Coke to all of his young grandchildren the other day late evening. Their mum told him no way, I was amazed given he refused to allow anything but water when his dc were growing up! Why do some grandparents change so drastically?

In preparation for our first child my MIL bought loads of charity clothes for both boys and girls. Across multiple age groups. It was both weird and ridiculous. What a waste of human energy for all parties. My tongue has scars.

@Copenhagener definitely have a chat with her about it OP!! Hopefully she’ll pay attention and that’ll be the end of it. Before it gets to the toy stage too!!

I had to with mine when she wouldn’t stop buying crap and unfortunately she didn’t listen. She buys absolutely everything from Temu/Shein/AliExpress/random Amazon sellers and doesn’t believe any of the articles as “they wouldn’t be allowed to sell it if it was bad”.
DS is now 4 and every birthday/Christmas Ive had to remind her about not buying from these places and every single time she still turns up with some cheap shitty toy that is clearly dangerous (button batteries easily accessible/loose tiny magnets etc). She never asks if there’s anything he’d like or what he’s into - she genuinely must just type in “toy for 2/3/4yo” etc and buy whatever comes up.
At 2.5yo for Christmas she bought him guns that shoot solid plastic balls just smaller than marbles 🫠 they fire them hard enough to bruise an adult!

Im aware that sounds horrendously ungrateful but I’d genuinely be happy if she just went to Asda and got him a £1 colouring book and a pack of pencils or something! It’s not about the money. At 4yo he’s not had a single safe present from his gran that I’ve actually been able to let him keep and play with. He actually now brings her presents to me and asks if it’s ok for him to have which is sad!

I can understand how you feel. My MIL did this and made it very clear she felt the slogans were completely true. It was even noticed by my friends when they met her at my child’s baptism. It infuriated me. However 10 years on, my child finds her boring. Obviously I encourage my child to spend time with both sets of grandparents in the name of family harmony, but secretly the petty side of me is amused that she is thought of as the least fun family member.

This

She's pushing it. I'd just give them away. Make some excuse if she asks about the clothing.

My SIlL used to buy some unusual stuff when DD was little. She couldn’t have her own kids so it was slightly different and I felt it was the decent thing to do to put the clothes on the baby (I’m talking bizarre semi-violent slogans, handkerchief tops, tutus and leg warmers for a 6-12m.o) so I would fire them on, take a photo then take them off again. To be fair they made for quite funny photos as well. If SIL was visiting I’d also put on an outfit shed gifted. With your MIL the focus on herself and her relationship to the baby seems a bit overbearing and I can see why it would be really tempting to tell her to pack it in. If it was just they weren’t to your taste I’d be less bothered. Maybe you could humour her the odd time but not every time. If she’s taking the baby out a walk or letting you get some downtime or whatever, she could dress the baby as Ziggy Stardust as far as I was concerned 😂 I think MILs maybe feel they’re ranked behind the mum’s mum sometimes so just let her know you appreciate her and wait for this to pass

Fucking inspired!

I think this is the best approach. I am a grandma and would never buy from Temu or Shein.

should have read the full thread, nah, ignore me. If the stuff is dangerous as the article posted indicates, then I’d just say we can’t dress a baby in this fabric, did you know it’s got all these chemicals, MIL, please have a read. Maybe she actually needs that explained to her. I didn’t know (although I don’t use these sites) Damaging her grandbaby’s health is presumably not her endgame, even if she’s oblivious/ unconcerned about production ethics. She’ll probably just start buying slogan vests from supermarkets but at least they’re not dangerous (I hope).

Say thank you! Smile 😊 and take a photo of your baby in the outfit, then change them. As far as she knows the baby had an outing to xyz in the new outfit.

if she ever asks why baby isn’t wearing it just say they had a explosive nappy and you changed them.

She’s excited, wants to participate. You’ve said what you like and she’s not listened or maybe not understood your preference with purchases.

I remember my aunty being very gushing over the cute clothes available now as she had little choice in her day. It may be she’s really enjoying reliving babyhood a little and buying things she would have chosen for your husband as a baby.

She's got carried away, but this is also more than a little creepy.

I think you cpuld tell her when clothes disintegrat in the wash. You could also suggest that a funny thing is only funny the first time and after that it definitely isn't.

You don't have to accept distasteful stuff from her on the basis that any attention or help with your baby is something you should be endlessly grateful for and never feel frustrated or resentful about. In this case, I think she has hijacked your baby.

In a few months your baby will be starting solids, and if any of the clothes are still in your home or if she sends more, make sure baby wears them and gets them covered in mashed and pureed food, preferably carrots, apricots, or peaches.Then dispose of them.

Just sell on vinted. When asked just say they are in the wash.

I wish she helped out! She always said she would which I was so happy about as I don’t have a relationship with my own mother. However, when I asked her to help, she woke baby up when I asked her not to when I went to another room, took photos of her, sat down on my sofa, watched TV and asked me to make her dinner. Everytime I went to leave the room she asked me to do something for her.

The next time, I asked if she could take care of baby while I walked my dog and ran a short errand. Came back to a baby lying on the floor in wet thrown-up ok clothes, crying with a dirty diaper and her chatting on the phone oblivious.

She also started jabbing baby to get her attention in the car seat the other day - and made her scream. She’s really rough with her (though I do believe it’s unintentional).

I told my partner I don’t think there’s any point in MIL ‘babysitting’ until baby is more robust and older, and so I’d rather use a professional babysitter. I’m fine with her seeing baby supervised or with her husband, who is a very level headed and kind man, and my partner there too.

It’s so true! My SIL won’t let her babysit much because of this. She gives her toddlers loads of Haribo and fizzy drinks (she only drinks Pepsi Max and thinks water is boring and tells them mommy is boring for giving them only water and milk) because she thinks grandparents should spoil their kids. She also likes to do ‘firsts’ and took niece horse riding without permission and uploaded all the photos to Facebook after to be ‘first’ with that - in comparison; she never did anything with her own children back in the day.

I’ve been speaking with my partner about all of this; and he’s very defensive of his mother but has agreed they won’t do unsupervised visits until baby is older.

I think you have done the right thing by letting DH know and then he can either tell his mum or not. If he doesn’t, feel free to do with them what you wish.

My MIL spent years buying furniture items for the house. DH told her that we have a small house and can’t fit a lot in here (we don’t have great storage space either). Then when DC came along she bought bedding, furniture items and clothing. She missed the mark on many items of clothing, many of which were not appropriate for a baby, clothes that gaped open and had lots of long straps (it is hard to carry a baby safely with tons of straps hanging down that can catch on anything). Thankfully MIL has finally slowed down and stopped buying so much.

In the time we were inundated, I would quietly place the unsuitable furniture and clothing items aside for charity. DH didn’t keep track of this kind of thing, so I just did it all. To this day, neither him or MIL have asked where an item is. I guess they both are similarly scatterbrained to some extent😁

I wouldn't put baby in them or take photos. It'll just encourage her to buy more -- and it doesn't sound like she needs more encouragement!

I think it's part of having kids that people buy them ugly/ cheesy/ inappropriate things. If I just take ugly clothes and shove them to the back of a cupboard. If I get asked about them, I look confused and say they have so many clothes it's hard to keep track of them (which is true!).

My MIL mostly seems to have realised it's best to check before buying clothes for the kids.

This - use overnight (when staining more likely) or for layering or nursery. Or quietly give away and claim they were horribly stained. Which they are, just by the slogan rather than a poonami

My MIL was like this when all my children were young. At first it was annoying but then became a running joke of what crap we would receive at Xmas/ birthdays etc.
My kids are all grown up now but if one of them is wearing something a bit random, one of the others will say “did Nan get you that?!”

I would be honest next time she points it out and say they are just not your cup of tea .
she points it out and tries to make you feel awkward so just do the same back .

This would irritate me too.

Depends how much of an issue you want to make of it, you could either say they're not to your taste and you don't really like the slogan style of clothes, or you could say she's growing so fast she's already too big but we have so much so no need to buy anything else. Or set your DP on it

Honestly, she sounds utterly unbearable. She is absolutely bloody useless but full of self-importance. She doesn't even sound like a safe person to have around your child.

If she was a bit overbearing and tactless but a kind, loving and helpful grandparent, I would try and be tactful about the awful clothes so as not to hurt her feelings. As she sounds like she has skin like a rhino, and everything she does is for show, not for love, I would tell her that you hate the clothes, have as little to do with her as possible and massively reduce the time that my baby spends with her.

I appreciate it’s a problem for another day but with your updates I wouldn’t be doing any unsupervised visits ever. You’re a better woman than me because I wouldn’t even be texting her any photos after i found my baby dirty and crying on the floor and I’d barely be bothering to see her at all.
She’s shown over and over that she’s disrespectful, selfish, has poor judgement and is incapable of basic care for your precious child.

This. And don't , as a pp suggests, reject them on the basis that you are only dressing baby in organic cotton , you'll look like a complete twat

Having just read update, you have grounds to hate your MIL but it's not the babygros that are the issue