How do I stop Mother-in-law buying tat?

[Littlemissbusy]

MIL loves buying tat - she even boughtlittle teddies with valentine's heart for all three children this year. I don't like to see the waste of money and would rather her stop buying tat and save up to buy something special - or fund their university eduction - or anything useful! She also doesn't really have the money to waste anyway! Any suggestions as to how to tackle this?

do we have the same MIL?

I asked mine to buy books instead - can never have too many books.
It worked !!

the last lot of tat is going to the car boot with me and I shall put any money in my chidlrens bank

my MIL is lovely though so wont tell her this

Its not just MILs, my mum does it too. Every year dp gets beer for birthday and christmas (and then she complains he drinks too much!?!?) I always get Tesco value shampoo, may as well not bother washing my hair, and books (books would be fine, but its always the type she reads (shes 67, i'm 26) and I can't swap them because they're from a book club, not a proper shop). I must have perfected the pleased look, as she gets us the same every year without fail. MIL just forgets, doesn't even know when dp's birthday is!

My MIL to my way of thinking, ' wastes' loads of money on rubbish, toys the kids don't like, clothes they won't wear, and huge quantities of sweets, most of which they never even get to know about never mind eat. BUT she loves them, these things are her demonstrations of love and she'd be mortified if I seriously banned her from giving them. So i reckon there's nothing i can do, she's an adult who knows the value of money, and it's her choice. She loves the kids, the kids love her and at the end of the day that's the important thing.

Ohhhh, my MIL is just like this. To be honest she has always been like that with her own kids, much rather chuck money at them than take them to the park. Its really tricky because people think you are just being ungrateful but its not like that at all, the kids dont appreciate it, in fact they come to expect it when they see her, not something that I like.