Apologies if this is not in quite the right area of Talk, I'm not sure if it counts as a relationship or money matters or more likely a bit of both... .Anyhow....I'll describe it and see if anyone replies :)
I'm in a relationship where my OH has 1 DS and I have 3 DC. We have the children on the same timetables (EOW and 1 or 2 nights each week) and they all get along great with each other and with us, so no real issues there.
Of course it's Christmas time coming up so I guess a lot of people have the same issues/discussions around money (although the discussions are on a wider scale than just presents). We both earn similar amounts of money, both full time jobs. We've not yet got joint accounts, so each have our own money as such. The question is, what is fair/unfair/expected/not-expected. E.g. these situations:
- Buying presents - OH has bought some presents for mine, I've contributed to hers and bought mine as well, should this be a 50/50 split of money spent? The children are in a 3:1 ratio, should the spend reflect that?
- Treats/Other spend - OH like to treat her DS, and IMO buys nice stuff for him quite often. At the moment I'm struggling to afford expensive items for mine so I do get questions off mine asking why DSS has x/y/z. One thing I will say though, which we often discuss, is DSS really appreciates the things he gets and plays/uses with them a hell of a lot more than mine play with anything. So it does feel almost right that he gets things he will actually use (does that make any sense?)
- Household bills - at the moment these all fall to me, the longer term intention is to split them, but at our stage of relationship it's me paying those at the moment. But again when we do split payment, is it 50/50 or some other split?
Any help/advice/etc welcome....