How do I reduce grandparents overindulgence?

[Bouldersandrocks]

I would never want to come across as ungrateful or jeopardise family relationships but I feel I have a dilemma on my hands.
Please could I have some advice or experiences which could help me find some way to approach this!
I have two preschool children who see grandparents regularly. Whenever they come back from spending time with them, they return with multiple material gifts - magazine, toys, chocolates, clothing, colouring books etc.
Whilst at first, I thought this was lovely, I have now realised that my children are being overindulged and it has spoilt their nature. They will frequently ask for presents as soon as they see the grandparents, before even saying hello. They will turn their noses up if the present is not the one they wanted. When I take them out myself, they pester me to buy them things and are not even happy or excited on the odd occasion that I purchase said item. It really feels ‘easy come, easy go’
When I was younger, I wasn’t spoilt with material items. I would love going shopping with my Mum and occasionally I would be thrilled to be bought some beautiful colouring pens. I absolutely treasured them.
I feel the showering of all these gifts have devalued them, my children don’t appreciate the items and are straight to the next.
I really want my children to be motivated to work hard, determined to strive for things. But it seems that this constant buying of treats is detrimental to them. They now have an expectation for gifts rather than any appreciation of them.
As their parent I feel I have no leverage to advocate good behaviour with a reward system. For example, once every two months or so I would treat my son to a magazine for working hard at preschool. But now, when I look at the shop shelves, it’s hard to find a magazine that he hasn’t already been given. Magazines are no longer seen as a special treat. It’s so disheartening.
It really feels that my toes are being stepped on but how can I ask grandparents to stop doing this without coming across as ungrateful or nasty? The showering of gifts is just excessive!

you pull up your big girl pants and have this exact conversation with them

stress how grateful you are but that it’s giving them a spoilt attitude. Suggest when they can spoil them - ie Christmas / birthdays etc

Thank you, I know it will be tricky with the in-laws. Another issue… I was absolutely upstaged at Christmas. They bought several big ticket items that made many of the items from ‘Father Christmas’ irrelevant or simply didn’t get a look in

If it’s PIL then your husband needs to have this conversation with them

suggest they set up a trust fund or investment account instead, that way they can spoil them now for the future

Meh-I'd say just enjoy it. Surely your kids won't be spoiled from extra gifts? Really? I was brought up in the 80s in relative poverty and kids now get way more than kids back then. It's just the way things are now. I used to stress about it but I think it's lovely the grandparents want to give gifts. As your children get older and become teens the gifts will get fewer and fewer so it won't last forever.

My partner had the opinion that the grandparents have a right to spoil their grandchildren. He says they might not be around forever, I feel guilty as I don’t want to ruin happy times. However, I have really seen a negative side effect of this overindulgence (think verruca salt from Charlie and the chocolate factory) and he has been shocked by changing attitudes as well so I am slowly getting him to see the adverse affect it has had and I absolutely know he really values education and wants our children to do well. It’s a balance isn’t it.. and it’s tipping too far! Surely love, care and time is all grandchildren require?

Also I don’t care whether most children in this generation are generally spoilt - I don’t want that for my children. I want to teach them the value of working hard, behaving well and to appreciate kindness in the way of behaviour not material things.
I hear a lot of people saying youngsters these days are not resilient, entitled and not able to put the hard graft in. Likely they were overindulged and didn’t have to try hard to ‘earn’ anything.

Op I'm with you on this one, spoilt children really aren't very pleasant and it doesn't set them up well for the future. I'd take the situation in hand and speak to ILs, outline what you've said here and that you're trying to teach dc that it's not just all easy come easy go, things need to be saved up for and looked forward to. Just because society is full of spoilt brats doesn't mean you should change your parenting. Good luck!

We have this issue and DH had a conversation with his parents about it and we pushed hard on the issue as they seemed to understand and take it on board but then slipped back: we’ve kept it up to the extent of saying that if they don’t respect our boundaries we won’t see them so much. They still buy a lot but now instead of sweets they now bring over fruit and they buy a lot of clothes for our DC which they’re less interested in but still gives the grandparents that same feeling. I also asked them to be part of the reward idea so they can still buy a toy but it’s in relation to something DC have achieved.

Dh has 3 gc....the other GPS go bananas with gifts every week. They have been told again and again..... last time we saw them, the eldest asked if we had a present for her. We said no 😀
DIL is going low contact with them as they overstep many other boundaries.

suggest they set up a trust fund or investment account instead, that way they can spoil them now for the future

This is a really nice way around the issue....

There are other ways of spoiling. With my grandma it was making (gingerless!) gingerbread men. My mother always bought strawberries for when my kids visited. Both spoiling treats but leaves the leverage (though a notion of a magazine every few months for working hard at preschool is away off the other end of the charts in my view).
you and the grandparents need to find a balance.

(The other thing my mum did which was so great and hugely appreciated was send letters and cards in the post - pictures of interesting stuff like one of the Queen when it was the jubilee and lots of animal ones). A couple of stickers in the envelope. Both sides got a kick out of it)

OP this is hard because although I'm with you, being spoilt by grandparents is something your kids may look back on fondly one day. Definitely there's a middle ground here.

I've found the only way to limit grandparents behaviour is just by seeing them less! Unfortunately in my experience when you are not there, these grandparents are long set in their ways & like to play by their own rules.

A tough one, I'm trying to teach my child gratitude, she's polite at home because we bring her up on it, but definitely being a bit bratty with wider family - could be age and stage / boundary pushing thing also.

Thanks for the support. It is hard to battle on something like this where grandparents are only trying to show their care and love. It will hurt them to hear otherwise but at the end of the day, We need to set the precedent sooner rather than later. I love the baking idea and sending letters, these
are the things I would suggest so thank you

Yes I agree with the playing by their own rules and I don’t want to end up making a further situation where secrets are then kept or that grandparents feel policed! Ahh so awkward, I hate rocking the boat!!

Spoiling children should be about devoting time to them and sharing experiences not about buying stuff for them.

I don’t have the GP issue as my toddlers GP are all dead or extremely elderly but the same applies to anyone who spends time with a child. Young children want to talk to you about where they’ve been and what they’ve done not about what they’ve got.

My 3 year old never stops talking about the visits he makes to my friends farm yet barely mentions anything he received for his birthday. Focus on shared experiences and if necessary set them up for your GP and DC to enjoy together.

I wonder what giving the gcs all those items means to the grandparents? Did they feel deprived as children? Is this normal for their circle of their friends? What were their own grandparents like?

It might be helpful to know what motivation the grandparents have so you know what you are up against, and you might be able to find common ground.

You could also frame this in terms of the positives you DO want for your children in terms of their relationship with the GPs and how the children see their GPs. Ultimately it changes the children's relationship with the GPs if they see them as walking vending machines of treats!

Are they aware of the non-material gifts they have to share with their grandkids? Our society is not great at honoring the wisdom that elders have, so maybe they need a reminder of the other things they have to share with their GCs, as they might not be aware the continuous gift giving is overshadowing these.

Another suggestion you could make is that they spend the money on experiences they can share with the GCs, which could be outings and even holidays as the children grow older.

Tell the GPs that you want your children to love them for who they are, and enjoy their time with their GPs simply because they want to be with them.
Point out that they're in danger of only being loved for what gifts they give, and that you've noticed the children immediately responding to news of their visits by wondering what they'll get.

I had the same issue with my daughter's grandma. (MIL) I explained that I didn't want her turning into a demanding teen who expected the latest in everything, therefore we needed to control indulging her at a young age. I told them that she wanted to spend time with them, not be bought things, as their time was very previous to her. It worked.

I set out from the start that I wasn't having a house full of tat and told grandparents (primarily my parents) that if they bought a bunch of stuff it would be staying at their houses.
Both grandparents are now very considered about treats and she does get regular treats from grandparents but both sets put thought into the treats rather than just grabbing at what is there. She has had sticker books and magazines when they come to baby sit for an afternoon or when she went to the aquarium she got a fish toy. For Easter she got a bunch of stuff from both grandparents but usually she gets a toy or magazines or a book. So she gets something but overall the frequency of each is ok over the course of the year.
I think first I would tackle the purchasing of multiple things at a time and a discussion about Christmas.
We do want, need, read and wear for Christmas and birthdays. We do one set and I get my family to do a set. My mum and sister both go mad with presents, always have even pre grandchildren and nieces/nephews and this helps to focus their minds and whilst she gets quite a few presents they give them more thought

I had a chat with my mum about this. I think part of the issue was that when I was a kid, we lived far away from my grandparents so they would bring presents etc when they visited (which was a few times a year). My mum lives fairly close and sees the kids at least fortnightly, if not more, so they really don’t need treats the same way. I think talking that through helped it click a little bit

As a grandmother myself I no longer have the energy to spend extended time or days out with my DGSs. DD1 actually suggested I spend money on them (having ascertained what they would like). I do write and message them too. It gives me great pleasure to spend what I can on my grandchildren and we don't consider them spoilt. I think YABU, OP.

I’m with you, you need to say something. Gifts should be for birthday and Christmas only. And it sounds like so much stuff, and terrible impact on the planet. I’d say something nicely that emphasises you want them to spend time but the gifting is excessive

Also - just do a stocking from Father Christmas, all proper presents should be specifically from you/whoever. Then kids must say thank you, and appreciate the effort someone made to get them a gift. No from a mythical source

So ours aren’t as bad as that but are very much if I want to spoil them I am going to.

so Christmas was a trip to Disneyland Paris plus loads of presents. And she always likes to be organised and buy gifts months before so it was never what the kids really wanted.

So I have slowly started to munipulate it a little bit. We tell her about 2 months before what they want and usually a semi-big present.

She wanted to do horse riding lessons for them every month but I say we are busy and let them do it on weekends when I need them to babysit

But I did ask them to slow down on all the extra bits because it’s all so such a waste of money and tried to hint on more experiences and we have had that a bit more