How often does your toddler see his/her grandparents?

[rebelmum72]

Was just wondering how often your LOs saw their GPs, and how important it is to you that they do so.

I try to make sure that ds (almost 2) sees his GM once a week. She doesn't live very far, about a 20 min drive away, and he is happy to be left to play with his gran for a couple of hours or so.
But I don't always manage it, as some weeks we just have a lot going on or need to get other things done, and I do feel a bit guilty that they haven't seen each other.
On the other hand, there are weeks such as this week when they've seen each other three times!
I do think at this age it's vital to have regular contact so that they can build a trusting relationship. I'm particularly pleased that they get on so well he hardly notices whether I'm there or not

BTW, this is my MIL I'm talking about - my parents live in a different country, so we see them every couple of months or so, but for at least a few days at a time.

Anyway, was just wondering how you all do it / feel about it

My mum, about 3/4 days a week. His parents 1 or 2 times a month.

His mum has caused a LOT of greif in the family and its best if we dont see them very oftern. I dont really trust them to look after my boys either.

I suppose it depends on circumstances and whats right for you as a family unit. There is no right and wrong with these things.

Maybe once a year? If we plan.

Mine live abroad, so only twice a year when they were toddlers (and still the same) but then for longer periods. My ILs for long weekends maybe 5 or 6 times a year. (FIL now dead, but my youngest can just about remember him).

My mum lives a 45 min drive up a motorway but we see her once a week either at min or hers (we take turns). I love my mum loads and have a great relationship with her. She also babysits when we need her to, staying overnight in the spae room if ness. She never ever says no, and we pay her her petrol and havea nice meal ready for her.

My MIL lives in the next village, 2 miles away. She never ever pops round to see me and the kids, but will babysit about once every 2 months if we are desperate. She's a loving granny to the kids, just very selfish - we have to visit her in her ouse at her specified times. So the kids see her about once a fortnight, or 3 weeks.

On the otherhand my ex-MIL (granny to my oldest DS) is great and sees him once a week without fail. She lives about 20 mins away and will come and pick him up and take him to hers!

MIL about once a month (she lives an hour away)

My Dad about once every 2 months

My Mum (they are divorced) well DD3 is almost 7 months and she has seen her twice, she lives an hour away as well, long story

I do think it is important for children to have good relationships with their GPs, I just wish mine had better GPs

My two preschool children see my mum every week and my dad tags along on about every third visit.

My MIL saw my son when he was born last March, FIL has never seen him (he is nearly one!)funny family dynamics!
We generally see them once per year, twice on a good (some would say bad! year)

I think it is quality not quantity to be honest!

I have tortured myself with this one too. Being an only child my Ds and DD only have one cousin (from my hubbies brother and wife) and we rarely see them too as they live in another country.

See what works for you and what your kids reactions are to the contact.

Contact with all ages is great for pre schoolers and kids generally to be honest. My Dd loves our neighbours who are in their seventies. They are as good as having grandparents and are kind and generous to my children.

Don't just assume contact with people inside your family group is good for your children. It could be right next door!

Oooh, very varied answers (as expected ).

I have a nice relationship with my MIL - I'm happy to see her, we get on fine, she doesn't interfere at all with us, but I wouldn't be making the effort to see her once a week if it wasn't for ds.
Before ds, a month could easily go by without us having seen each other.
But I really want ds to have a gran who he has a good relationship with, and now that he's a little bit older, I'm happy to leave him with her for a couple of hours while I get a few things done.
I think they relate differently when I'm not there (I don't meant that I interfere, just that it's not the same when "mum" is also there) and I can see that they are beginning to have their own little routines and things that they do together. It's really, really sweet.

The other day he astonished us by counting up to three - it turns out she'd been teaching him to count using gummibears

my mum and dad live just around the corner and i would say he sees them almost everyday or every other day at the least. My mum regularly stands in to pick him up from nursery if he´s not well or offers to have him if I can´t take the day off work and he´s not up to going. She babysits lots for us, either coming here or at hers where she sleeps in the spare room next to his cot (awww).

He sees MIL once a week come rain or shine. I think he is very lucky to be surrounded by so many people who so obviously love and care for him. I did not grow up with grandparents and cannot even imagine what a lovely bond it must be. When i was young i couldn´t understand how people could be close to their gp, I literally could not conceive of that relationship and what it would be like.

My parents have plans to move back to the uk so we will see them a lot less but i´m glad he´s built a good solid foundation even if he doesn´t consciously remember his times with them here. And there´s still skype etc. etc.

Ours are quite far away so we don't see them as much as we'd like. We see ILs every two or three months they live about 4 hours away. my mum lives abroad and we see her 3 times a year and always have a week holiday together. My dad's not that into little children (and I'm not that into him) so we see him about twice a year. We see aunts ans cousins about the same.
Despite not having very frequent contact, my DD 2 loves them all and is happy to spend time alone with them and talks about them a lot. A HV suggested that we should give her a box of photos of all the people we want her to be familiar with and look at them together. Don't know if that's what's made the differnce, but she certainly likes the 'albun'

Both my parents and MIL live abroad .. however, thanks to the joys of Skype and parents willing to pay ( broadband is pretty expensive for my folks) my daughter and son see their grandparents every day.

my parents - well my mum looks after him 3 times a week, we usually go for tea once a week, and sometimes go for lunch once a week. So mum sees the pre-schooler lots, and mum & dad together see both of them once or twice a week extra.

ex-inlaws - every 4/6 weeks.

my parents see dd most days, dps parents live in australia, so she has only met them once

I'll be flamed for this, but my children never see their paternal grandparents, as they are divorced, hate eachother, hate their son, hate me, have called me every name under the son, abused my mother "for making it too easy" for me to leave their son .

So, they see my parents all the time and never see their poisonous fucked up paternal grandparents, and that's not going to change no matter much I'm flamed.

Do you think that how often your dcs see their gps is influenced by your relationship with them (obviously assuming they are within a reasonable distance) ?

oh absolutely, in my case definitely. I feel no inclination to arrange meetups that my children aren't bothered about for the sakes of two poisonous individuals who have done nothing but abuse me and insult me.

Come on now, TheFirstLiffey, say what you really mean

My parents live about 45 minutes away by motorway, they visit DD once a week. She is their only grandchild, and they are besotted.

My MIL lives an hour and a half away, and we tend to visit about once a month. She tends to stay with us for the whole weekends, over christmas etc. She has 9 granchildren in all , and says she feels more like a great granma.

I used to see my Grandfather once a week at christmas, and made it a really happy occasion.

Qulaity not quantity

"have called me every name under the son " - a Freudian slip, perhaps?

I will rebelmum73!!

I had no grandparents growing up and it didn't harm me. Might have been nice, but I'm sure Ididn't suffer because of it. I had good parents. And my children have one excellent set of grandparents who they see allthe time.

I made you a year younger!! Barbie Orr, RebelMum91

RebelMum, you're so right, TOTAL Freudian slip! Even though they bitch about their son to me, they're angry I didn't stay with him for their convenience. My life on a plate for their convenience, even though they know he's an abusive bully...

We see DH's parents between 4-6 times a year. We Skype every week and go on a 4-6 day holiday with them every other year.

We see my mum once a month. She and my dad are divorced.

We see my dad 3 times a year. We Skype him every week too.

It may change of course. It's not set in stone.

We are the ones living overseas, so we see gp perhaps once or twice a year. When we see them we spend a good deal of time together, which is great fun. I have to say, that even though my 3 dc don't see their gp very often it makes not a jot of difference to how they react and their relationship with them when we do see them. Ds2, at 21 months saw a picture of my mum whom he hasn't seen since August and shouted granji, totally umprompted. I was delighted

You are lucky Rebelmum you have such a lovely MIL, please don't feel guilty about not seeing her one week, I expect as ds gets older and playschool, then school happens, it will become more difficult to see each other so often. I'm sure your MIL will understand.

Do your parents get a little envious that she sees so much of ds compared to them? My mum always feels a little green when we go back to the UK because then we stay with MIL as Mum lives in Greece!

DH's parents - once a month maybe (but they go off on holiday for long periods several times a year), mine - every 4-6 weeks.

No particular reason except distance, and that we both work ft so have a lot to do at the weekends