should i offer to cook xmas dinner at mil's?

[thegreatescape]

Myself, dh and ds (20 months) are going to mil's xmas eve and staying til xmas day afternoon. It will be us, mil, sil and sil's partner for dinner. Mil doesn't like cooking (has bought HUGE turkey though!) and sil/bil are vegan (so will just eat veggies and their veggie dish). No-one has mentioned the cooking and dh has suggested several times maybe I should 'take charge'. I've just sent an email to sil offering to help with the cooking but not offering to do it. Basically I don't want to get saddled cooking dinner for 6 and miss ds's xmas but feel a bit guilty about not offering to do it which I feel is expected by them.

Last year, invited them to us and my family. They didn't come but mine did and I cooked for them. Mother's day I offered to cook at mil's and everyone sat around, then just came to the table when it was ready and I walked crying ds round the garden whilst mil had nice meal with her kids.

Sometimes I have to work christmas so won't be with ds every year. I think dh is anxious for me to 'take charge' (basically do/organise all the cooking) because he is worried about his lunch. He claims he will be busy 'running errands'

Any advice?

Sorry its a bit long winded!

Good idea. Will hope 'unspecified errands' include lying in bed eating chocolate!

Perhaps dh and bil could cook?

Dh will be cooking my Christmas meal.

bil goes off to see his kids in the morning so won't be around but he is actually quite good when he's about in terms of helping. DH doesn't seem to compute that him eating a big tasty feast means someone else has to cook it. Personally, I think M&S should cook it and we should heat it up!

I think if your MIL invites you to her house it is up to her to organise the catering. Relax

If MIL invited yu, she should cook unnless she is really awful at it and you want somethng edible.
Suggest DH gets stuck in.
Six isn't that many to cook for and if everyoen helps - no work at all

If MIL invited yu, she should cook unnless she is really awful at it and you want somethng edible.
Suggest DH gets stuck in.
Six isn't that many to cook for and if everyoen helps - no work at all

6 wouldn't normally be too many but xmas dinner and its 20 side dishes is a bit more hard core. I do agree with you in that I like cooking when people are coming to our house but I resent doing all the 'host' stuff at someone else's at it feels much more like a chore. Mil does seem to check cooking time on meat and then double it so might just need extra cranberry sauce with the sawdust turkey

Good lord no! You did it last year. She's the host, she has to organise it. If she really didn't want to cook she could have bought everything pre-prepared a la Delia cheats.

You should esp not do it after the Mother's Day experience. AND if you do do it after that then they will expect you to do if for ever more!

ta anybody, the dh has told mil I want to speak to her re xmas cooking - no I don't!

Still awaiting reply from sil.

if SiL is vegan, then she won't be handling turkey and gravy etc. So that pretty much rules her out.

What are these 'errands' that your DH thinks will take up all his time? No shops will be open, there will be no bins to put out for collection. No bloke type errands at all actually.

If it were me, I just keep banging on about ... 'oooh i'm sooo looking forward to xmas and someone else doing the cooking for a change'

themoon66 - I like that line, think I might steal it! As for DH, he likes to 'potter' so suspect he thinks he will be playing with his/ds's presents and doing the odd job when specifically asked to he can claim to have 'helped'. He is busted.