Grandparents

[BippidyboppidyBoo]

Looking for opinions of others in the same position. I have 4 children, 2 from a previous relationship and twins with my husband.

All the kids birthdays are close together, my husbands parents send gifts for the twins (there bio grandkids) but nothing for my older children, not even a card.

My older children are now young teens, myself and husband been together about 8 years.

I know they obviously don't need to send gifts but I cannot understand why they wouldn't send a card, it's more awkward at Xmas time

How often do they see them ? What's their relationship like?

Do they get cards from their own grandparents?

Personally I think that's crap of them.
Our family doesn't go too wild with presents but my parents make sure DSD gets a rough equivalent of what my kids get in terms of physical gifts. They don't think of her as a grandchild but she's part of the family and treated as such.
Their "real" gift for their grandchildren is a hung for their ISAs which they don't do for DSD. Fair enough.

*bung, not hung 🙄

This.

If they do, then your perception of fairness would actually be your first DC getting more.

Unless they're really struggling financially they could send a card with £5 in it for birthdays. And they should give a token gift at Christmas if everyone is opening presents together.

Not doing that is poor form I think.

Bio father's family have no involvement. So all the children have my parents as grandparents, then the twins also have husbands parents sending cards and gifts, my parents are pretty local and his parents are about 9 hour drive away in distance

Agreed.

You can't control other people's behaviour you can only control your reactions to it.

Your husband's parents rightly or wrongly don't view your older children as their grandchildren or even part of their family. That's up to them.

One of my older brothers' grandfather was like this. His loss as that brother didn't like him either and wasn't upset when he died. On the other hand my dad's relatives, who were all step ones, weren't as mean....

I can see why this is upsetting. You’ve been with DH for eight years, so it’s basic courtesy for them to send birthday cards, even if they rarely see your DC.

What does your DH say about it?

I think that is a shame and hurtful for your children especially as they have no contact with their father's family.
Even if they don't view them as their grandchildren it wouldn't hurt them to send a card and give them a gift.

Thank you everyone, wasn't sure if I was being too sensitive and if this was normal behaviour, but I'm glad it's not just me who feels it's pretty poor form to not send a card even, for what it's worth I don't expect gifts from them, but I can't understand not sending a card.

DH says its just how they are 🤷‍♀️ they have grandchildren near by to them but don't have the kids over to play/watch them while parents work etc, I know this isn't a given of grandparents, however a lot do these things!

They don’t view your kids as part of the family and that’s fine as realistically they are not to them.
I don’t think they are doing anything wrong really although it would be nice if they did send a card but they don’t and that’s also fine.

My parents do buy my step kid a token gift at Xmas and birthday but only because they probably see her 1-2 times a month so have a small bond with her kinda

My parents send birthday cards and gifts to my step children and they don't really see them often. My OH works shifts and they are round different days each week or every other week so my parents don't regularly see them. They still feel it's the right thing to do, and the same at Christmas. My partners family don't send my daughter from previous marriage any cards or gifts though. Maybe your husbands family have never considered this and if they were told years ago that a card would be appreciated/appropriate then they may have.

Try not to let it get to you then the kids won't care as much