vegetarian xmas - parental etiquette

[trulyscrumptious43]

Me and the kids (16 and 11) are vegetarian, always have been (well in my case since I left home at 17). I'm having a big family and friends dinner this year, 11 of us, including my sis and her ex, lots of kids, some random mates and for the first time my mum and her boyf.
I do a fantastic(it has been said)spread, with cranberry and chestnut roast, roast tatties and neeps, sauces, sprouts, stuffing balls, veggie pigs in blankets and all the trimmings.
All of my guests, although not veggie themselves, are happy to eat my food, except my mum who wants to bring along their own turkey and gravy in tupperware and add it to their dinners.
I kind of agreed to this, but started thinking about my son, who at 11 is strictly vegetarian by his own will and very sensitive to animal welfare. He gets upset at people cooking meat on TV and if we take him out to a pub lunch, he can't bring himself to eat because people are eating meat next to him.
My mum will be doing a big dinner on boxing day at her home for my brother; I can't help feeling that she could wait a day for her meat.
I am quite proud of my son's principles, he wouldn't even hurt an insect, and think that even though he is a child and some of my family think he needs to accept that people do eat meat, I shouldn't break the habit of a lifetime and let it happen in our home. My daughter agrees with me.....
Thoughts?

I think she sounds very rude for wanting to bring her own food along, when you are providing a nice balanced meal and she has no specific food requirements which you are not catering for.

The fact that she eats meat, and wants meat, is not IMHO important enough a reason for her to do that. To an extent, I'd say the meat/vegetarian issue is a red herring - you are cooking a meal which she has no problems with eating, so why should she bring something else just because she'd prefer it? If she went to someone's house and they were cooking roast lamb, would she bring along a portion of beef because she prefers it?

I'm not a vegetarian, but if I was invited to a meal at the house of a vegetarian then I'd expect to be served vegetarian food and would eat it without any complaints about not getting a slab of meat with it!

It can be difficult at Christmas because Christmas dinner is 'the big meal' and most meat eaters would feel very hard done by if they weren't getting some turkey/goose or whatever. You have to accept that for a lot of meat eaters a meal without meat is not as satisying or as tasty. To that end I have always been happy for my mum to bring her own meat if she comes for Christmas - it is the only time she would ask and the only time I would accept.

However if you feel very strongly about it, it is your house and you don't have to have meat in it if you don't want to. You will have to give her the option of declining your invitation and you will have to be very sensitive in the reasons you give. TBH you son's reaction to meat eating is not something I would encourage - he needs to be able to eat around meat eaters during the rest of his life - but I would leave that out of your explanation as you don't want him scapegoated or getting extra negative attention. Just say it is a house rule.