Sister in law asking we don’t do Christmas meal as dinner

[Cartaz]

DH’s family have always had a fry up/homemade pastries for breakfast. Proper posh, homemade canapés for lunch with cocktails. Think prawn and lobster vol au vents, mini Brie and cranberry puffs, arancini etc - so properly substantial. And then the Christmas meal as dinner.

They are amazing cooks so it’s indulgent. But the thing I like about this is you are eating when you are hungry. My family did the more typical eat a bit later at around 2pm. But I always found after picky bits/breakfast just general grazing eating a full roast was too much. And you obviously want all the nice extra bits.

This new way I feel like the time pressure is off and everyone gets stuck in more. Just more relaxed (for us).

I’ve adopted what dh’s family do. But SIL who is staying with us this year as we are hosting has asked that we bring to forward as it more traditional.

I just don’t get doing something one way cause everyone else is doing it that way.

To me it’s just more relaxed and who doesn’t love a candlelight dinner. I can’t believe the cheek of SIL

It's rude because if you are invited as a guest... you accept or decline... you don't start making requests.

Of course it is cheeky, very cheeky. I don't know how many @Cartaz cooks for, but of course the person/people who are providing and cooking the food should be the ones to decide at what time they are doing so!

Maybe if all the guests coming to their house for dinner, all said en masse, that they wouldn't be coming to the hosts for their Christmas dinner this year as they had other plans, but when questioned nicely by the OP - if she didn't ask nicely, she would also be in the range of being a CF - if they all admitted it was because of the timing of the dinner, then she might have considered going back to what tends to be more the norm for the hosts' nearest and dearest.

But one lone voice complaining about the timing, and actually asking for it to be changed, is to me, the very essence of CFuckery.

Actually love your idea of Xmas eating well your DHs family sounds great!!!!!
I'm deffo doing your version next year ! So thank you for the idea 💡
Your the host so I'd just b nice and say sorry I'm working to my own schedule maybe if u host next year we can eat earlier on your schedule 😁

First post nails it.

We're evening Christmas-diners too. No right or wrong but the host decides and it's very rude to ask for a different schedule. She doesn't have to attend if she doesn't fancy it?

Sounds like my sister in law, strangely whenever we invite her and her family the time never suits. My 60th birthday was planned for 1pm on 14th (my own family live in another country), we were asked to change to following week and 2 hours later.
Eventually I stopped inviting them, maybe that was her intention lol 😆

I think it's rude of her to ask, frankly. If you accept someone's hospitality, you expect to fall in with their arrangements.

I think it depends if there are young kids involved. Children should be at the heart of Christmas imo and and meal times should be at vaguely reasonable times so that they aren’t over tired/hungry or, on the flip side, not wanting to eat later because the routine is so off.

However, if kids are all primary age or there are no kids then UANBU and SIL can take a jump…

I get why the op prefers what her DHs family does on Christmas Day. Eating Christmas dinner at 2pm is madness. I tried that for 3 Christmas's at Miller and Carter I couldn't finish it and it felt like a waste. I prefer spreading out the meals you don't get pissed when you eat good meals throughout the day.

How has she “made her sound like an ogre”?! She has described exactly what happened. I must have missed the bit about her SIL crunching up sheep in her teeth while mediaeval villagers run screaming.

Are there young children so it's a bedtime thing?

you don't need to justify anything anyway - just curious. You are hosting in the way you want and she can come or not - super simple.

It’s really not weird. I’d never heard of people eating in the afternoon until I joined Mumsnet. Everyone I know has Christmas dinner.

I kind of agree, but I also think maybe you shouldn't go and stay with other people if you have young children who can't cope without sticking to very rigid routines? You can't really expect to impose those routines on others?

I would hate to have Christmas dinner in the evening. Who wants to wait around all day for the highlight of the day?!

That being said, I would never in a million years ask a host to change their plans!

Just to say that we have our dinner at dinnertime too - Slow morning, pancakes eventually, some sort of snacky lunch with dips / olives / fun cheeses / whatever we fancy, maybe a walk or playing a new game and then later afternoon my husband starts cooking and we eat around the same time we usually do.

And that's the point, really, isn't it?

I wouldn't like to have my Christmas meal in the daytime, but if someone was being kind enough to host me, I would just go along with their plans.

Or decline the invitation if it really didn't work for me.

It's bad manners. You wouldn't ask someone to change their time. Why would you? Even think its ok?

Nailed it!

I can't imagine being so wedded to a plan that a polite inquiry from a relative as to whether it could be changed would offend me. Or ever see myself as having family over for Christmas as making me a host in such a formal capacity with rules about communication.

Cook decides

The reason could be health and a big meal not sitting well eaten in the evening...as long as you aren't offended by any guests eating lightly...no problem

You are being unreasonable to say she’s “cheeky” when she just asked if it was possible. You reply saying no in a nice way. End of.

I think it’s nice you have that sort of relationship she feels comfortable asking. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t family, but I’d happily suggest to my siblings if we could mix it up one year and would be happy for them to suggest it to me. In fact one year we did move the Christmas dinner to Christmas Eve (on the request of a sibling that wasn’t hosting), and everyone thought it was a great idea as worked out well with holidays.

I don’t think she’s cheeky for asking, but I don’t think you’re rude if you want to stick with what you’ve always done.

DH’s family have always had a fry up/homemade pastries for breakfast. Proper posh, homemade canapés for lunch with cocktails. Think prawn and lobster vol au vents, mini Brie and cranberry puffs, arancini etc - so properly substantial. And then the Christmas meal as dinner. They are amazing cooks so it’s indulgent. But the thing I like about this is you are eating when you are hungry

I am by no means a competitive undereater, but I would never get hungry after eating all that lot.

Too many people these days unable to distinguish between a polite request for discussion and being dictated to more like.

I agree.
The knee jerk reactions on here are a bit
Would you really tell a guest to fuck off, really?

The OP said that her SIL asked. She didn't dictate or demand.

I understand. My parents are from a different country and they have recently relocated here. We hosted and they said in this country we will do the traditions, so we were expected to do turkey. No consideration for whether we wanted to do a turkey or not.

@Cartaz So you're hosting your SIL and she's got the cheek to think she gets to dictate how you host? Er, no. Tell her you will be hosting in exactly the way you like and had planned, and whenever she hosts in the future she can then do things her way.
Honestly, the audacity of some people! 🙄