Sleeping in on family vacation: what is reasonable?

[Anonymous]

What activities are being missed?

If you want a peaceful leisurely breakfast, why not eat at the time of your choosing?

[Anonymous]

Reasonable. It's a vacation, who wants to get up and eat breakfast before 9am??

If you want to OP, go ahead and do so and let them join you when they get there, after you have already eaten.

[Anonymous]

OP, I get it. I bet you thought you pay, they play. They are little kids, they'll be miserable with your breakfast schedule if forced to wake up early. Why would you do that to kids? Seriously?

[Anonymous]

OP, some practical advice here from the DIL's side of things. Pick 1-2 things that you want to do together, and if one of them is breakfast than that's fine but realize that you don't also get to dictate the rest of the day. Then say to your SON, "DS, it would mean a lot to me if we could have breakfast together and then go paddling, but you can do your own thing for the rest of the day".

Paying for vacation doesn't mean you own their entire schedule. I think it's reasonable to have some preferences and if breakfast is your 'thing' than that's totally fine, just don't think you can also make demands of lunch, dinner, and all the times in between.

[Anonymous]

OP, my mom is a lot like you. I can see her being annoyed we aren't "maxing out" the value of the trip by doing a 9am activity, or that we'll miss out on the waffles with blackberries if we get to breakfast late. She has a lot of anxiety that manifests around money and control.

But 8:30 is a pretty reasonable time for a family with kids to arrive at breakfast and TBH they probably had to rush to achieve that. If my experience applies (it may not!), we often feel like we are making a lot of choices and concessions to try to make Mom happy, while she fixates on the few things that she isn't getting from us (total cooperation on mealtime, for example). In this case you're all together in a nice place, you're spending a lot of time together -- can you change your frame of mind to focus on that instead of the times not together?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You can't control other people. Bend a little.

Get uo and have breakfast when you want.

Agree to meet up in the early afternoon for a mutually agreeable activity. Stop blaming your DIL! Why does your son escape your ire?

So many good points. OP is very hung up on the idea that she paid. One of those people who controls others via money. No thanks.

[Anonymous]

Be thankful that they are even making it to the tail end of breakfast. I have a hunch that they are not morning people. Probably they would miss breakfast entirely if they were traveling by themselves.

It is very challenging to vacation with others. People run very different schedules on vacations and you might have to accept that their timing is not how you would ever do it. You might want to consider this for the future.

[Anonymous]

OP you need to understand that even if you get what you want, you won’t get what you want.

Say they get up when you want. What happens if the kids spend breakfast whining and complaining because they wanted to sleep in? Will you be happy or annoyed? What if the lengthy breakfast means early bedtimes for everyone, so no playing games or watching sunsets with the grandkids. What if getting up early means your DIL needs a break (from her kids and likely from you guys) by lunchtime, right when you want to go out on a boat or head out for a hike?

You think “this would be perfect if they just got up an hour earlier.” But (1) it will never be perfect, and (2) it might already be as good as it’s going to get. Be careful with your meddling. Don’t rely on others to make your happiness out of their misery. It never ends well.

[Anonymous]

Enjoy your “family” vacation now because I don’t see it happening much in the future years.

[Anonymous]

What kind of resort stops serving breakfast at 9:00 am on a weekend? That’s a recipe for a rushed, unpleasant start to the day for all the guests. Regardless, as others have mentioned, the non-control freak way to handle this is for OP and her DH to go down at 7:30 or 8:00 to have a leisurely breakfast and make sure they are getting their money’s worth. That way OP won’t feel so put out if she’s asked to get a juice for one of the girls. I’m not quite sure why a 5 and 8 year old would need help cutting their food, but surely we are talking about less than 90 seconds of effort on the cutting front? That leaves 20 or 30 minutes for the late arrivals to eat and discuss the day’s plan.

[Anonymous]

I think someone already said it earlier but just tell them you will be down getting breakfast at 8 and to come down and meet you when they are ready. They can eat their breakfast while you have a 2nd cup of coffee and you'll be more available to cut food or get juice. You get to see them at breakfast and they get to wake up at a convenient time. If they are rushed then that's their problem.

[Anonymous]

That is reasonable. Vacation is precious, people don't normally get to sleep in. It's very kind of you to pay but also very generous of them to share their precious vacation time with you. Let them sleep, you still have the other 12 hours or whatever of the day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Being together is rather the point of a family vacation

OP, also you need to accept that your barometer of "enough" time together may very well be different than theirs. Both parties liekly want things to go well. But they may know in their bones that x hours of togetherness is the right amount, and not y. More and they aren't at their best. Again, you can not and should not impose your will.

You aren't in charge. The sooner you accept that the better.

I am not interested in imposing my will. But I do think rushed breakfasts and missing out while we’re treating is tough to take. I won’t say anything, because apparently only their desires and expectations matter. But I’ll keep my mouth shut. It was DIL’s idea to go here so next year if I’m paying, I’m selecting location at least.

Mt jaw literally dropped reading this. You sound horrible. You take this one thing - wake up time - and now suddenly NONE of YOUR expectations even MATTER. WHAAA! YOU sound like a big spoiled baby. Maybe you need more sleep!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's reasonable to discuss your plan for the day. Including what time people expect to wake and have breakfast

Yes but every time I bring this up, they say “whenever we wake up.” Kind of hard to plan.

So go get breakfast when you want to and go read a book or sit by a lake or do see thing you want to do without them. Or assumed they won’t be ready till ten or eleven and plan accordingly

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Before bed tonight, say to them, we are going to breakfast at 8 tomorrow. Would you like to join us or should we meet up after for x activity?

But the point of a family vacation is to do activities and meals together! We want to do activities with them.

Do you eat lunch and dinner together? That should be enough. Your son and DIL obviously have a different definition of vacation (getting to sleep in) and togetherness than you. You can’t change them. Swallow your disappointment they aren’t what you want them to be and be grateful they want to have any time with you.