To be hurt we are always the Boxing Day/Easter Monday house

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DH and I have been together for 15 years. When we met my son was 22 and his daughter was 18. Now our children are fully grown up, with their own children, my son has 2 gorgeous little boys who are 7 and 4, his daughter has 2 beautiful little girls who are 3 and 5. My DHs daughter’s mum passed away when she was 12.
Now for some reason we have become the Boxing Day/Easter Monday. My son does Christmas Day with his wife’s family and New Year’s Day with his father. DHs daughter does Christmas Day at her in-laws.
I’ve grown quite used to it, we now go out for a meal on Christmas Day, go to church and have a very peaceful day. I then host a lovely but lighter meal for Boxing Day. However I’m a little sad we have become the Boxing Day house by default. I know it’s just a day and just as special, but I do feel like everyone is a little tired, the kids are all a little miserable at being dragged from their new toys and everyone is starting to feel a bit fatigued from socialising.
The same happens at Easter, we see them on Easter Monday when everyone is just a little tired, and often we don’t even see DH’s daughter as they always go on holiday in the Easter holidays and sometimes leave on the Monday.
I’m not really sure how this started and I don’t think we were ever consulted on it which is fine as obviously I’m grateful to see the children whenever it suits. DH doesn’t mind as much, but he’s a very unbothered man in general. I know his DD doesn’t like me but I like to think I’ve been nothing but lovely to her, she is adamant her children call me by my name as I’m not their grandmother which while it hurts I respect. Though I do find this a little annoying as we pay a 1/4 of her children’s school fees and this comes from our joint pot and while I’m happy to do that and don’t expect anything in return it does sometimes make me feel like I’m good enough to take money from but not to spend Christmas with or be called granny. AIBU to be hurt by this? I know it’s probably not worth actually mentioning as that will just cause upset.

I wouldn't bring the money you give into it. You aren't buying their time - it makes it all sound very transactional.

What? All that money and not one iota of responsibility

OP what don’t you visit the daughter in boxing day? Why don’t you nip in Christmas morning when they are up, why not go and play with the kids?

You can do Christmas eve with your son, you can bake with the kids, play games and have a good time.

See SD Christmas morning and have boxing day to recover.

I wouldn’t push this either. Fine to vent on here and feel cross but I would just make the best of it and appreciate seeing all your family. Have a lovely day and don’t let that resentment build. From their point of view doing the rounds at Xmas IS exhausting with small children. We have opted to stay at home the last five years as everyone is so tired from school and work ..you don’t want that either. Be grateful for the visits, make a fuss and have a great time. The better the time you have, the more you will see them in general.

I can’t believe how many have voted YABU.

IMO, YANBU because these things should alternate year on year, and you give them a significant amount of money each month for school fees! I would be mad. You’re not a piggy bank! You’re a person with feelings.

You said in your OP you go to church on Christmas Day though so DS being a Christian now is not a problem surely? Your DS and DSD don’t need to come to yours at the same time, work on DS separately. It doesn’t sound like you’ve actually invited them tbh.

Either you’re happy to have the Christmas Day that suits you, as you said in your OP, or you’re not, as your thread overall suggests. Mixed messages. Be clear and maybe you’ll get what you want :)

I have a few points and I will try and be kind, please do take this in the spirit it is intended.

How much non-financial effort do you make the rest of the year? Do you meet, in a low key way, at the weekend? Do you text on special days like the first day at school, do you babysit occasionally? Because, if other "grandparents" do so, they are probably first on the list for important dates - partly because they'll be more important to the kids, but also because there is a proximity there - in July when the idea was casually floated - a present grandparents is able to just say "you can come here for Christmas if you like" without it being a thing.

Is going to your house a child-centric experience? Rightly or wrongly these days, children are increasingly seen as having the right to actively enjoy and participate in special days - gone are the 1990s days of a colouring book and a Tizer while the adults chat.

Have you offered to go to them on Boxing Day? You could even make a new tradition like it's a PJ day or you turn up with a takeaway.

As a mum to young children, I am often knackered and prone to taking the path of least resistance. To reframe it, I think it is lovely that your respective children make the effort to travel to see you over the Christmas period. Their lifestyles sound pretty knackering (and expensive). I do think you'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar - being accommodating without being a doormat is likely to strengthen the relationship. However, try not to forget how hard it was / is having little kids and the weight of expectation. I do think you've been harder on the females in this scenario than the males, though that might be because it is your son so of course you cut him more slack!

It's really hard trying to please everyone, I keep telling my mother in law we are spending Christmas at home and she doesn't seem to take it in? We've gone there every Christmas day afternoon for the past ten years, we have a little one now. When I say we are not going she will say just come for an hour, when she's done this previous years she does a whole buffet and forces us to stay. She also invites other people, the house is small so there's not enough seats or space and there grandad dictates the TV so the kids can't watch anything Christmasy. We invite her to ours and she said they would rather be at home 🤣

Make a lovely thing of being the Boxing Day or Easter Monday house and make it more chilled and enjoyable than Christmas Day or Easter Sunday. Enjoy your lovely relaxed Christmases and Easters without ever having that stress of the big meal.

If you know your SD doesn’t like you, why would you expect that she’d want to share her Christmas Day with you? I feel
sorry for you son. He’s open to spending more time with you but you don’t want him to come over on Christmas Eve because your husbands daughter isn’t coming? That is so hurtful to him and his family! Why aren’t they good enough to see on their own? Why is it essential for the children to see each other? Don’t your son and his wife and their children matter just for who they are?

Why would your son and DIL prioritise you over her family on Christmas Day when you don’t even want them unless your step daughter is around too?

If your SD would have been supported to pay her children’s school fees with or without you in a relationship with her father, you have no reason to expect personal gratitude directed at you for it. Maybe she feels that it’s just her children benefitting from what their grandmother left behind. Is it rawly you that’s making the difference to her children being able to attend private school, or would they be doing that regardless of the relationship her father chose after her mother died?

You also have no business feeling hurt at not being called grandma or whatever. I’m am honestly astounded that anyone would be so self centred as to post that. This is a woman who lost her mother very young, who has to cope with the pain of not having her mother by her side as she had her own children, to know that neither her mother or children will ever know each other, yet you want her to have to hear her children call their fathers new wife Granny? Honestly, you need to give your head a huge wobble on that one.

I just wanted to say I’m really sorry you feel less important to your step daughter than her mother in law. That must hurt since you contribute so much to her children and have known her so long. On the other hand, try to reduce any expectations of her and enjoy her company and her children. A close relationship will naturally follow. Please don’t force any use of the word grandmother or granny. I know how this could feel for her as I lost my own mother at a young age and it’s not something that is easily navigated.

I think Christmas is a complicated time for people with divorced parents, and your family do have a way to see everybody over Christmas.

Have you asked about joining your step-daughter and her husband at your in-laws for Christmas. Is that an option?

If she doesn't want to travel on Christmas day with children, could you do the journey instead?

You say ‘it’s fine’ a lot. But its clearly not fine and I feel like it’s all a little passive aggressive on your end. You need to use your words and speak up when things bother you rather than simmering and resenting things.
if you’ve never said that you mind being the ‘Boxing Day house’ how is anyone to know it bothers you?! Maybe they think you like it better they way.
The granny thing…her mum should be their granny and she died. I can totally see why she is sensitive about that, I think you need to let that go.

People are banging on about Christmas but that doesn’t explain Easter.

It is unusual for there to be zero alternation of any kind. Even if the alternation is few couple of years.

Yes, I’d be hurt.

Don’t young/ youngish couples with children just do their own thing with their own family anymore? I can’t imagine having to drag my kids anywhere other than their own house on Christmas Day. In answer to your question OP I think Boxing Day is fine, stop putting pressure on them to please everyone, they could be ‘miserable’ like us and not go to anyone.

OP, I do feel for you, but...my Dad was always the Boxing Day house because I couldn't bear being with my step-mum on Christmas Day. It reminded me of everything I had lost. Christmas Day with my mum was magical and it reminded me that I can't have that any more and that my children would never know her. My kids also call her by her Christian name. She is not their grandmother. Again, it's not about her but about the fact that my mum didn't get to be called Nanny.

I would not take her money though. DH's parents help us with uni accommodation (DS is in Kensington and it's eye-wateringly expensive). I absolutely would not expect the same from step-mum.

My Dad died this year so step mum will be spending Boxing Day with her own family. We're going to see her end of November time to catch up. Geographically, we're a couple of hours away, otherwise I would see her more.

I think she's a lovely woman but I wish I'd never met her because that would mean my mum was still here. From my pov it is absolutely nothing personal, although I imagine it might feel that way for her.

I have never got over losing my mum when I was young. I thought it was just normal grief but when my Dad died it was totally different - really sad but not the decades of trauma I have experienced after losing mum.

Frankly I think the ship has sailed. If your son doesn't want to spend Christmas with you, you can hardly expect your DIL to.

Since it sounds like nothing is going to change at the other end you really need to deal with the latent resentment. Perhaps do something else - like go somewhere at Easter for instance rather than hang about waiting for them. Or just enjoy Christmas for what it is.

Big holidays are so stressful for families could you do New Year or a completely different time of year. Something in the summer might be welcomed.

I’m afraid I wouldn’t rock the boat. Traditions like this when changed can end up not happening at all unfortunately.

You know the reasons why so I wouldn’t fight it. The distances unfortunately are key. I would love to spend the day at my dads but locally we can fit in about 4 different family households in that time which would be wiped out to do his so we do Boxing Day but do love that tradition.

Why don’t you add in some new traditions with the kids? Perhaps a late November light show or perhaps an after Christmas panto.

i wouldn’t fight a losing battle against what works but build on it

Travelling an hour on Christmas day with a 3 and 5 year old is a pain. Her parents are nearby and it means she sees her stepbrother and his kids every year rather than alternate years. It does make more sense logistically.

I would rather have whole family every year on boxing day/Easter Monday than have the main day every other yr.

The granny thing is a bit hurtful but also shows she is still grieving so fine. I think when you lose your mum young all the milestones she misses can be quite upsetting (that has been my friends experience anyway).

Your feelings are valid but notice then let it go, appreciate all you have rather than "getting the main day" (especially as the other 9 people involved are happy with current arrangements). Try not to waste any more energy on this.

To be honest I would just accept it and pack those feelings of hurt away. We are the post Christmas part of our complicated family and it took me ages to realise that there isn't any other solution Christmas is such a tiny part of the year proportionally and worrying about it was definitely impacting on me. I know that all sounds like rationalising away something that's important to you but I realised that it was too stressful to dwell on it. Enjoy the time you have with them.

Instead if trying to change things up for them, which they would resent and no doubt find impossible, I would try to let go of your own resentment.
They have young children to consider. It’s hard for your offspring to fit you all in and it seems everybody has found a pattern that sort of works. It’s not ideal for you as you have Christmas Day without extra family, but you do at least see them the following day. And you have each other.
I would think it’s not entirely ideal for each of them either and they also wish it could be perfect but they go along with it. Having lost her mum, I’m sure Christmas is a difficult enough time for your DH’s DD.
I wouldn’t rock the boat about which day you see them at all. Just try to enjoy what you can.

But, as a separate issue, I would certainly have a think about your finances and whether you can afford to continue to subsidise school fees. Does your DH’s DD actually know that you contribute or does she think it all comes from her dad?

I personally think that's very unfair. I'd love to spend Christmas with my family every year, I do not enjoy Christmas with my in-laws at all, but I suck it up every second year because it's fair.

I have put YABU because people should not be so precious about Christmas. We are grandparents. When our children were at home we did Christmas dinner here. Now my children have their own children, they want to do it at their own homes. In fact they do it alternately and we get invited. One child is close by and one lives in London. If we go to London we stay in a hotel to give everyone space. We have told our children many times that if they want to have Christmas without us then that is fine but to give us notice. We have no objection to spending Christmas on a beach somewhere.

My MIL was actually a step MIL and my children called her by her first name but they still loved her. She was not insensitive enough to be ask to be called grandmother. She knew my husband had a mother who would have loved to have been a grandmother but didn’t live that long. If your step DIL’s parents live close enough of course they are going to go there. Who doesn’t want to not drive on Christmas Day. Also perhaps going to your house would be a reminder to your step DIL that she is missing her mother.

I agree with this. Don't miss out on seeing your son when you'd like to see him.

How much are the other set of grandparents giving towards their grandchildren?

I’d second popping over for coffee in the morning before they leave or bringing a takeaway a few days before Christmas. It’s a horrible, emotionally loaded holiday for some and the pressure to be a certain thing, act a certain way, provide certain things can be dire. Personally - I’d rather hunker down with some sandwiches and the TV until it’s all over than fuss about who is where with whom. I think many of us have difficult triggering memories of this time of year which make it fraught with a sense of rejection and disappointment.

The media doesn’t help.

You will never be that important to your adult step daughter no matter how nice and generous you are, so all you can do is support her dad to see her and the gc whenever it works for them both. I wouldn’t be surprised should he ever end up alone, he’d be invited to join them every year. Can’t you each go off with your own families? Blended families can be so tough for everyone - such an artificial set up.

It’s only a day a couple of times a year.

I think the advice along these lines is good .I actually think it's lovely that you have a blended family of sorts but they still want to spend time with you as adults even if it isn't your preferred calendar day.
However still worth exploring why it makes you feel second best.
Could you do something else special with your son's grandchildren over the holidays before Christmas? Eg start a tradition to visit Santa or similar?
Or in general start some traditions for yourself and your OH.

It sounds like you’ve got a solid option to do something that’s not Boxing Day or Easter Monday with your son.

Youre just choosing not to do that because your husbands daughter isn’t keen. You describe the various grandchildren as cousins. That might be your view, but it quite likely isn’t everyone’s. As I understand it the only connection between them is that their respective actual grandparents married later in life. So what you’re trying to pull together is two fairly disconnected groups of people. They’re all your grandchildren but they’re not actually cousins and it’s not unreasonable for some to see things that way.

Driving over an hour each way on Christmas Day with small children is madness if there’s a good alternative.