Family ”bullying" re: gifts - add your vent!

[wanderingback]

This is a just a vent! We live in a small apartment. My partner and I don’t celebrate Christmas/gifts. I told my family like 15 years ago stop buying me presents, I just hate the waste.

Our daughter’s birthday is in Nov.
I opened a 529. Told my mom and aunt about it. My aunt insisted she needed a gift. Told her to get a children’s museum membership.

Last night I sat down and made a list of a few things like my daughter has been asking for a pillow and scooter. She also needs some new toddler stainless steel cutlery. I gave them the links. I mentioned that she has plenty of clothes (my mom buys all her clothes, 1/4 don’t get worn and she bought her a bunch of white stuff, so weird!) Sent that to my mom, aunt and dad. My dad, like a normal person lol, responds with the 2 things he bought.

My mom says "your daughter is going to be so sad seeing her cousins open presents, what small toys can I get her." And my aunt says "I already bought her 2 educational things. I can just go ahead and return the clothes since I bought them locally." I do not want anymore plastic light up educational things!

I know I just need to accept it, be grateful for a wonderful family, just put the crap I don’t want on Buy Nothing and move on, but grrr. I know it’s not gonna get any better as she gets older. She’s only 2 and doesn’t need to be influenced by wasteful consumer culture already! Plus we literally don’t have the space….

Please add your (family or not) vent

[smock]

I'm on this train, too! My MIL likes to shop garage sales and then send us boxes of stuff, even though we've said we don't have room and it's often stuff my kids don't need/want. She has also saved tons of stuff from when her kids were young and randomly sends us things, like a book for potty-training boys when we had two already potty-trained girls.

Sadly, you can only ask so many times before giving up. We do a lot of donating unnecessary gifts.

[jinkies]

My mom has literally cried when I asked her to get my kids experience gifts instead of physical items.

When my oldest was a toddler, my SIL once "had to" host Christmas because she had bought my 1.5 year old so many gifts (without even asking what he wanted or needed) that they wouldn't all fit in their car.

So I feel you, very very deeply on this issue.

We could not control them, so we settled on packing up anything that they weren't instantly enamored with and putting it in the attic or basement. Sometimes on desperate winter days we'd pull out a new toy for entertainment, but mostly we regifted or donated everything within a couple months. Since you don't have the storage, I would just go straight to the donation option.

[meanie]

We went through a few years of firmly saying no thank you, asking for gifts to be returned, and generally being a disappointment to our families before they really got it. It sucks to be the Debbie Downer but your space and sense of peace within your own home matter.

[waverly]

I feel you. It can seem wasteful. On the other hand my friend asked for no gifts for her toddler which seemed kind of sad. We were out of town and couldn’t attend anyway, so I guess it didn’t matter. I’m sure when the kids are older they might have their own opinion about this which is why friend parties for older kids don’t stipulate.

My vent is the emotional labor regarding providing ideas for gifts. Not so bad if I can give them ideas and they figure it out. But my mom can’t seem to figure things out so I might as well just buy the gifts for her to then in turn gift to myself and the kids.

[pierogigirl]

There is hope. My husband has 3 sisters and my kids are the youngest. We used to get a houseful for every occasion. Now that they're older (kids and people), my MIL and the aunts mostly give money with maybe a small thing like snacks or other consumables for gift giving occasions.

[Deleted]

Every year my MIL asks what I want for my birthday, and every year I ask her for a massage, and every year she gets me….something else.

She gave me a massage maybe ten years ago and it was amazing, and was such a great gift. The gifts she does pick are generally the same price or more expensive than a massage would be, so it’s not about the $$$.

I don’t know why she bothers asking if she’s just going to get me whatever the hell she wants anyway.

[jinkies]

We are in the throws of trying to plan a family celebration for DDs birthday next week. I floated the idea of doing a haunted hayride with SIL's family, and H actually jumped on planning it. But now MIL wants to host a birthday celebration in addition to the hayride, and there are no days that work for both our families. MIL keeps insisting on different days and while, yes, I guess we are technically available, I don't want to have to rush through other plans to make sure I'm at her house at a certain time.

And then we are going to have to go through the same thing with my family-- they just haven't started hounding me yet bc my parents just got back from vacation today.

I know some people would love to have their families close, but the logistics of having to plan to see everyone for every occasion is overwhelming. I really just want to celebrate as our family of 4, go to the hayride, and be done.

[macmars45]

Oct 15, 2024 17:21:44 GMT -5 waverly said:

My vent is the emotional labor regarding providing ideas for gifts. Not so bad if I can give them ideas and they figure it out. But my mom can’t seem to figure things out so I might as well just buy the gifts for her to then in turn gift to myself and the kids.

I feel this so hard. My DS(8) is so hard to buy for. Legitimately hard so two of my four sisters I just buy stuff and they repay me. The other two sister know him better and still ask for ideas but they find the presents and wrap them themselves.

[hermione]

This is my daughter’s twelfth Christmas and for the first time in her life, my SIL is being reasonable as far as gift giving. It’s always been quantity over quality. This year she asked for an idea and I suggested a loungefly backpack my daughter has had her eye on. She said, “Perfect, that’s what I’ll get. Is it ok if I put a little money side too?”

I post this anecdote to give others hope that the out of control gift giving might get better!

[minniemouse]

I hear you. The amount of gifts my kids got for years was wild. Gift giving is my in laws love language for sure. If we tried ask for an experience gift they would give them that on top of a bunch of clothes and toys. Then my mom tried to match it. In the early years it was ok because I could switch out bins of toys and get rid of stuff they no longer liked. It got tough around age 4 when they really remembered where every individual thing came from and didn’t want to part with any gifts! We are finally moving out of that stage. The kids no longer play with toys , so they are selling what’s left to make some money. For gifts, the family either asks for links to specific items on the gift list or just gives money/gift cards. The girls make their own wish list on google docs and include the links, so much less work for me!

[Jalapeñomel]

Leave them in a box and give them to a local women's shelter.

[tiki]

My MIL is an off-the-charts shopper and gifter and the wastefulness and clutter of it all drives me up the wall. I wish she understood that every random item she sends *makes work for me*. Alas, venting about it here is pretty much the only catharsis I get.

[wanderingback]

Well thanks for commiserating with me!
Glad there might be some hope for the future haha.

[glitzy07]

My mom is a clutterbug and gift giving is definitely her love language. Thankfully she has learned over the years to ask before buying something tragically large for the house, and last year she finally bought science museum memberships for all of the grandkids instead of random stuff that would get quickly donated.

I feel like you've done a lot of leg work already to share your views and even other ideas of what to purchase. If you still get stuff that you know you can't store, I'd just donate it and be very honest with whoever if they ask where the gifts are at a later date. Maybe hearing that you straight up didn't use it will stop it in the future?

[shauni27]

wanderingback, I am in denial that your kiddo is old enough to be riding a scooter. NOPE, no way.

@villainv, that would infuriate me.

I am fortunate in that my mom and sister, both of whom have a love language of gift giving, prefer to do experience gifts for our son (day to urban air, encounter with penguins, trip to ice castles, etc). Or my mom will buy him one thing that he can use for an activity (giant bounce house, trampoline, etc). My in laws, however, are a quantity over quality family and boy do we get random little plastic toys with every visit. It is insane.

[ssmjlm]

The first Christmas we asked MIL and her husband to give us a membership to anywhere local, aquarium, living museum, etc. My child was gifted a bag of goldfish and a board book.

It was right then I realized it was no use. We've finally graduated to gift cards, but I just have zero expectations that my ILs will get it. My BIL's girlfriend keeps gifting my kid the weirdest clothes. They just get donated.

There was also the birthday that MIL told DH she was sending Legos. Imagine my surprise when an art kit showed from amazon with no gift info and after posting on FB to ask who it was from, MIL said she sent it. Ah, well since it wasn't Legos imagine my confusion.

[186momx]

MIL sends DD weird stuff that is great for someone half of DD's age. She just sent DD a tie blanket kit and the fabric is baby pink and purple with butterflies. DD (13) looked at it and said she would donate it to the school raffle basket fundraiser. It isn't DD's birthday and it wasn't wrapped or noted for Christmas. I thought we had gotten to a point where she just sent her $$$ for the Christmas and her b-day but then she goes and does weird crap like this.

My family asks DD for lists but she can't give them 1 list she has to give each person a different list. Thank goodness she is old enough to do this on her own now. She also sends links to items she wants but my mom refuses to buy the linked item and buys something she thinks DD or I would like better. I flat out told her I'm not giving her a list if she won't shop from said list.

Dh's brother and his wife/kid live 2hrs north of us. I got a random out of the blue text from SIL asking when we will be in their town next so we can visit. They come to our town for the college football games but can't/won't see us then nor will they ever come see us to just come visit we always have to go to them. We haven't seen them since 2019 and have had very little communication (no happy holiday/happy b-day texts). I have not responded to the text from SIL as I don't know what to say as I have zero desire to make a trip to their city to visit.