Family member has bought refrigerated gifts

[ScottyandWestie]

AIBU - Family member arriving on Saturday to stay for the whole of Christmas has just advised me they are bringing gifts which need to be refrigerated. It’s not alcohol but they will not explain what the items are for fear of “spoiling the surprise” and will need “possibly two shelves of the fridge”. I have a large fridge but due to catering to a huge amount of people over the Christmas period it’s full and will be at capacity tomorrow. I explained this but they are adamant. AIBU to suggest they store their gifts in a cool box in our shed?

Guessing cheese

It will be an entire wheel of cheese they got in a raffle at work or something 🤣 something smelly and offensive!!

2 shelves in a big fridge is a lot of cheese.

Maybe it's an elaborate fruit sculpture.

Pah. Didn't post.

It's a fuckton of caviar (which will hang around for ages as lots of people - kids especially - will hate it. ) plus lemons, rye bread, onions etc.

Who thinks you can just free up 2 whole fridge shelves at Christmas? I'm intrigued to know what it is. Hopefully something that can be eaten quickly!

Yes this time of year the boot of the car will be fine- just hope it’s not anything smelly

My guess is a big charcuterie and cheeseboard

We always accommodate this family member and I’m pretty fed up of it Perfect reason to be quite blunt about it.

I wouldn’t mess about with photos; I think I would just be very blunt about it and say;

‘You don’t seem to be understanding me. It is Christmas. I am feeding a large amount of people that has required a large amount of food. I do not have a spare inch in the fridge so you cannot have any space in the fridge at all, let alone one or two shelves. I’m also spending a lot of money and going to a lot of time and effort to prepare dinners and puddings for everyone, so you turning up with unspecified food stuffs, expecting me to magic up a second fridge and disrupting my meal plans isn’t something that I’m able to cater for. Whatever it is that you’re planning on, you need to bring a large amount of Tupperware with you so that it can be broken down and stored in the garage, which is the only chilled place I have available. If this doesn’t suit, then it’s probably best to keep it at yours and freeze it for another time, when you’ve given me a bit more notice and I don’t have so many people to feed.

It’s quite simple, the fridge is full, sorry

You say the are adamant but what are they saying when you say there’s no room? Are they telling you to throw out / not buy other food items?

I mean you are obviously not BU

Have you all got full-height fridges? Mine only has four shelves (five if we count the salad drawer) and I couldn't clear two on a normal week, let alone Christmas!

How annoying! I’d tell them once then refuse to make it my problem, there’s enough to think about!

Instead of no room at the inn

it’s no room in the fridge

😂😂

I'd just message them saying “good one lol everyone knows there isn't free fridge space at Christmas time, how ridiculous. Two shelves hahaha” with lots of laughs emojis and let them scramble to sort it.

But it's the very opposite of thoughtful. How thoughtless do you have to be to not realise that you can't just commandeer two shelves of someone's fridge, let alone in the run up to Christmas?

I'm imagining that scene from the Motherland Christmas special from a few years ago where all the guests kept turning up, ramming something in the fridge and quickly shutting the door and when Julia opened it, everything fell out.

Placemarking. I have a fridgeful of cheese - posh cheese I will add - which came as a gift yesterday, Great - apart from the fact several of them are soft and cannot be frozen for later. All need using by first week in January.

We had cheese after tea last night and didn't even manage a 1/4 of it - (package says to eat within 3 days once open!!) There are basically 8 lots of a similar size and two of us eating it 😭

I do have friends who may be getting a cheesy gift soonish.

You're suggesting they source a new fridge for them? Really??

@ShawnaMacallister I would imagine that's a little joke/fantasy?

Cheese lasts for ages after the use by date if wrapped properly. Quite often, Brie type cheese isn't even ripe by the date it apparently 'expires'. I wouldn't be panicking about using it mega quickly.

Watch out for the buggers trying to take your stuff out of the fridge or 'rearranging it to make room'... 😬

Maybe those expensive chocolates which have to be refrigerated

I’m suggesting the CF family member does that if you read what I said properly.