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Original poster

How would you react if SIL said no presents for each other this year, lets just buy for the kids?

73 replies

northerner · 19/11/2006 22:13

This is what I said to SIL tonight on the phone.I have this arrangement with my friends, everyone has kids and it gets so bloody expensive.

Bil/Sil's income is about 10 times that of ours (no joke) so we can not possibly buy them anything they don't have. I said very nicely, it's getting very expensive, lets just buy for the kids.

Her reply 'Well if you don't want to buy us anything that's fine, but we'd still like to buy for you'

OP posts:
TheDullWitch · 20/11/2006 09:53

I would love to propose this. Because I do all the buying and as my dh has a brother and two sisters, that is a sweat - and as a mere sil, I get absolute crap in return. So I spend a month working out nice presents for them and their partners and six children in total and feel upset and insulted by what I receive in return. It really isn t at all about the gift or the money, but the thought involved. Sometimes one of my sils doesn t even get me anything! Two years in a row she forgot my present, the next year it was already broken when I opened it and she said "oops" sorry", no offer to mend or replace it. I had to fight back tears. It was so rude and thoughtless, after all the trouble I'd been to for what, at the end of the day, isn t my family.

I would love it if we could just buy for children. None of us will be together this Xmas. My sil lives abroad and I know I will post over a load of presents on Amazon and nothing will come back. Not even for my kids! She is so shameless. But if I propose it, I will be the Scrooge-killjoy. Suggestions how to raise it.

ledodgychristmasjumper · 20/11/2006 09:55

This is what we do every year there is 7 grandchildren now so it gets a bit stupid buying for all the adults as well. The inlaws buy for the adults but everyone else just buys for the children. Much more sensible imo.

gscrym · 20/11/2006 09:57

Get DH to raise it. I got DH to tell his friends and brothers not to buy for us, just kiddiewinks. They were all fine with it. He'll probably know the best way to talk to them without causing offence. Or it won't matter so much if he does.

Enid · 20/11/2006 09:57

I have a friend with an ENORMOUS family spread all over the world

they do a thing where everyone takes a turn buying for some of them each year - so this year she has three to buy for, next year she will have a different three etc

seems very cool and it means they make a real effort as well

gscrym · 20/11/2006 09:58

I know a couple of people in large families who do a secret santa thing. Sounds like a good idea.

hatwoman · 20/11/2006 10:04

grrrr. haven't read everything but I think your sil was being ungracious - albeit perhaps unwittingly. maybe - as the better off ones in the equation she genuinely likes getting pressies and can afford to do so, and wants to continue doing it - what she doesn;t seem to have realised is that most people feel more comfortable when things are more equally balanced. I would have been delighted if either sil said this to me (have been wondering for several years whether to say it to them). It's difficult for you now as unfairly you'll feel as if you're being mean - which you are not. perhaps you could get your kids to make them some mince pies - the kids would enjoy it - you couldn't possibly feel mean - as it would be extremely generous in terms of time and effort and it's a kid-centric gesture

noonar · 20/11/2006 10:05

i'd be delighted. i did this with my good friend, who has 3 children. we used to give the ch and adults a sep present each! barking.

TheDullWitch · 20/11/2006 10:06

But my dh thinks I m being miserablist. He wants us to buy for everyone. But he doesn t do any of the shopping!

puddle · 20/11/2006 10:08

We're doing this. It has made my Christmas seem SO stress free. We will do stockings for the people we are actually with on Christmas day with very small presents in.

hunkermunker · 20/11/2006 10:09

I'd be happy as a pig in shit.

noonar · 20/11/2006 10:09

DW, funny, thats what my dh siad when i suggested charity presents for people in developing countries instead.
he doesnt shop either!

LaDiDaDi · 20/11/2006 10:09

I think that you're being very reasonable. Present giving just gets totally out of control otherwise.

I have an aunt and uncle and their two children, much younger than me, who I usually buy presents for. They in turn buy a present for dp and I. That was fine and an arrangement that I was perfectly happy with. This year the arrival of my dd means that aunt and uncle are buying dd a gift too, I was ok with that as well but then I learnt that they have bought presents for dd from each of their children! No way am I going to be drawn in to reciprocating that, it's just bloody ridiculous, dd and their children have plenty of presents anyway, this is just creating expense and buying stuff for the sake of it imo.

FioFio · 20/11/2006 10:10

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

hatwoman · 20/11/2006 10:10

just read the thread - imho I think mums and gps are different - in my case dm is on her own and if we didn;t get anything for her she wouldn't get any pressies! she loves buying for us - her children, so I couldn;t take that away from her. I think we get pleasure from our kids presents so don;t really need our own, but gps it's not quite the same

danceswithmonkeys · 20/11/2006 10:15

Moondog I gave dd s (my apostophe is broken) godparents a picture of her last year and they (said) they loved it...it s up on their mantlepiece.

danceswithmonkeys · 20/11/2006 10:18

Oh and on the original point I'd be fine about that. We're doing just children with most of our friends. Hey my apostrophe is working again ''''''''!!!!
What a tedious person who can't see further than the end of their rich noses to realise you can't reciprocate

GoingQuietlyMad · 20/11/2006 10:18

This sounds like classic lack of empathy. When we were very skint, we got into debt every year because of Christmas, and I tried and tried to get people to tone it down.

Then when other people became more skint as they had children, the started to buy smaller presents, but whenever I tried to raise the possibility of buying for the children, secret santa (anything just to reduce the costs and the debts), I got the same spoilt child response.

I honestly think with some people, that present buying is another manifestation of one-up-manship. "See how wealthy we are and what good taste we have got".

Well done for broaching it. Ignore her.

princessmel · 20/11/2006 10:30

We do that. Except my sil buys our kids really big expensive pressies ( using the extra money she would have spent on us for the kids) and then we feel that our gifts to them are small in comparison.
But its much better not buying for adults, now that there are so many children in the family.

KTeepee · 20/11/2006 12:09

My siblings don't have any children so I do buy them a present each and they buy for me and dh but we don't get presents for dh's siblings, just their children (and they do the same).

However, this year dh's sisters have suggested sending my kids money instead of buying them a gift. I am a bit annoyed about this because I have put a lot of time and effort choosing nice presents for their children and feel a bit hurt tbh that they can't be bothered to do the same for mine, also I feel that I have enough Christmas shopping to do without doing theirs for them (they want me to buy something for mine with the money...) I am thinking that if they do insist on sending money I will just put it into the children's bank accounts.... I really wish they would just buy somthing small and post it, especially as this would probably be cheaper for them anyway....

Am I being unreasonable

nappyaddict · 20/11/2006 13:59

in our family we only buy for the kids and we have an agreed limit of £10-£15 per child (used to be £20 but i said i couldn't afford that this year so we dropped it) we have a big family and i don't even see half my cousins, 2nd nieces , nephews etc so i don't buy for them - just the ones that we see regularly. why don't you make your sil something homemade - the kids could help you - or you could bake them something.

hatwoman · 20/11/2006 14:05

KTeepee - I can see both sides here. in some respects I can see that people really find it hard to know what to buy and don;t want presents to go to waste. However - I don;t think it's fair to ask you to do the shopping for them - my db has taken to sending money - but he sends it directly to the girls - and whilst as first I was a bit disappointed - they certainly weren't - they loved that this was their money to spend how they wanted - and really enjoyed going into town to choose things - and I can remember myself, as a kid, that spending christmas money was part of christmas - so if I were you I'd tell them to send the money direct to the kids (or vouchers of course) - still essentially means a shopping trip for you but at a much later stage with no deadline

TinyGang · 20/11/2006 14:14

We've all come to the same arrangement in our family and what a relief it was too.

She's putting you in an embarassing situation by not accepting your suggestion. It's quite tactless of her to say '..if you don't want to buy us something'.

It's not a case of not wanting but not being able to stretch to it. That's perfectly ok - does she want you to go into details about the money you may or may not earn just to clarify things?? I'd be rather annoyed with her actually.

hana · 20/11/2006 14:28

we also only give to children on both sides , has cut down considerably as we have 8 siblings between us!
have also cut back on giving to friend's children as well - presejnt buying was gettingn out of hand and worrying about not having somethings for x if x's mum had something for my dds etc etc
so it's just kids in the family now

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