if you found a way to let over the top grandparent gift giving go, tell me how you did it

[Anonymous]

I get so worked up over it every time. Logically I know that the joy it brings them isn't worth trying to put an end to it (and its not even all that much versus some of the insane situations you hear about). I have thoughts like "why do you think you get to give 5 presents a kid?!? that's 15 new toys coming into our house just from you, if all the family did that it'd be like 150!!". i'm getting worked up just typing this

i want to just let it go. be able to eye roll and shrug and say "oh well thats just nana being nana again". if you used to get very annoyed about it and now found a way to let it go, how'd you do that

[Anonymous]

We ask for practical things now. Dc is getting literally almost 10k of furniture from grandparents. I have no complaints.

[Anonymous]

What’s the absolute worst that happens from it? DC’s room is packed with too much stuff for a few weeks until you clean it out?

It’s one day, one pile of things. A month from now you can donate it all if needed.

I’d feel differently if we lived in a tiny apartment, but DC has his own room so plenty of space to hold kiddy junk.

[Anonymous]

I got over it by not having the bandwidth to care enough to die on that hill. It used to bother me a lot and after years of it, I realized it wasn’t an issue I still cared about. So, time and perspective I guess!

[Anonymous]

They are only little getting toys for a few years. Then they grow up and want other things. Let it go.

[Anonymous]

Stop trying to control everything. Who cares?

[Anonymous]

You just stop. I wanted to stop yelling at my kids, so I decided one day to stop and I did. This is much lower stakes. Make a plan: smile, say thank you, decide what to do with gift, take action. Repeat next year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We ask for practical things now. Dc is getting literally almost 10k of furniture from grandparents. I have no complaints.

Smart. I would ask for big gifts too. Computer. Expensive sneakers. Summer
Camp.

My parents have smaller budgets unfortunately

[Anonymous]

PP. I replied in a similar thread. Years later and I still have some resentment towards my MIL but the kids are teens now and she’s lost interest. She spends all of our money ( we financially support her) on a younger grandchild in the family. The way I dealt with it was to know I would donate 90 percent. The boxes wouldn’t even get opened, I would rewrap them nicely, and donate the following year. It helped knowing that we were giving to a family that would truly appreciate them. I tried my best to turn her shopaholic extravagance into something closer to the true meaning of Christmas and that helped a lot. I even started to include the kids so they knew their unused toys were going to good use. We continue this tradition today except now we buy all of the toys since Grandma has a new target.

[Anonymous]

I've seen several posts on this topic in various threads here and it's really not hard. Just let her give the gifts and whatever your kids don't want, don't play with, donate.

[Anonymous]

My mom was the MIL in this scenario. My kids never knew who the gifts were from though we wrote thank you notes for some things to my parents, but not every little thing. They just loved getting things and seeing the kids open presents. She still gives way more $ than I do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP. I replied in a similar thread. Years later and I still have some resentment towards my MIL but the kids are teens now and she’s lost interest. She spends all of our money ( we financially support her) on a younger grandchild in the family. The way I dealt with it was to know I would donate 90 percent. The boxes wouldn’t even get opened, I would rewrap them nicely, and donate the following year. It helped knowing that we were giving to a family that would truly appreciate them. I tried my best to turn her shopaholic extravagance into something closer to the true meaning of Christmas and that helped a lot. I even started to include the kids so they knew their unused toys were going to good use. We continue this tradition today except now we buy all of the toys since Grandma has a new target.

Same here, we don't open the boxes and then we donate them immediately. I don't have room in my home to keep them all year. There are often duplicates or age-inappropriate things so it's easy to cull.

[Anonymous]

We started using an amazon wish list so the items DS got were what he wanted and we approved. This year it was time for a new bike and if they want to spend $700 that is more than fine with me.

My bigger issue was that I wanted his most wanted item to be under our tree so I could see his face rather than Santa leaving it at grandma's house. My solution was not putting that on his wishlist and taking care of it myself.

We also buy much less for him, knowing that they are buying the majority.

[Anonymous]

I hear you, but this is a losing battle. I decided that I was grateful my kid had a grandparent that cared. A lot of kids don't have any. I will say that when we stopped saying anything about it, the gifts got fewer. It's almost like she was determined to go against our wishes when we obviously cared. And we stopped caring, she stopped.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We ask for practical things now. Dc is getting literally almost 10k of furniture from grandparents. I have no complaints.

Wrong thread. Grandparents only willing to buy gifts for "fun" things (and not experiences) they weren't going to get anyway.