Pack food for your kids.

Anonymous wrote:I still don't get why you come after everyone has eaten. Are you at another house before? I feel like this is the main issue or at least a huge missing part of the situation

Yeah. Answer the damn question.

Anonymous wrote:I still don't get why you come after everyone has eaten. Are you at another house before? I feel like this is the main issue or at least a huge missing part of the situation

+1 Is this really her passive aggressive way of getting back at you for not spending the early part of the day with them?

If you want to avoid McDonalds, and you pretty much know in advance that there won't be food, I'd buy something at a grocery store (do it the day before if there isn't a store around there open) so you can make sandwiches and have fruit.

Go by a grocery store on the way and pick up a chicken and some sides. Leave them in the car, just in case MIL has reformed. If not, have Dh go get them and proceed to feed yourselves and your kids.

I still don't get why you come after everyone has eaten. Are you at another house before? I feel like this is the main issue or at least a huge missing part of the situation

Anonymous wrote:No. We've never gone anywhere where the food has run out. There has always been food.

But when the kids were little they could be soo awful picky and the grandparents just weren't too sympathetic with that. Fair enough, they had a point. But still, little kids need to eat, lol.

So we used to stop on the way and get them happy meals. So they could sit at the table and pick at the food on their plate but not be cranky, irritable from being hungry and ruin dinner for everyone else. Really they would not eat what they didn't like.

Beyond that, unless you could bring something in a cooler for yourself, your options are limited. Maybe duck in a Chinese restaurant?

OP here. I think she might have it in her head that my DC are picky, like SIL's were really, really, really, really picky. I think SIl's DC only ate chicken nuggets, and is probably the same, even as a teen? Anyway, no, our DC eat what we eat. They are not picky, and my issue is Mil's selective memory (or whatever you call it) that DCs are picky, like SILs, is part of what rubs me the wrong way. Mil knows for a fact that my DCs are NOT picky, and she has ONLY seen them eat what we eat, so she has NO reason to believe they are picky. Its just the arbitrariness of her ways......

When we arrive, there are no main courses left, only crumbs (seriously) of side dishes, which she tries to scrape for them to eat. If I were not so aggravated, I would be embarrassed for her. And it has happened so many times, it is as if she knows DH won't say anything, so she keeps doing it. (She is kind of a bully.) I am trying to be nice here, but the idea of another Christmas non-meal really disappoints.

When we call and say we are on the way (at the time she told us) - I always say "and please be sure, no matter what, to save food for the children". If she gets it, she wants to pretend she doesn't. I have never dealt with anyone so mean and difficult, so I don't know what she will "hear".

Now that the kids are getting old enough (elementary school) to know about McDonalds and its detriments, they are going to start saying no to McDonalds, then we are without any food on Christmas?

I am venting because the more I think about it, the more hurt I get, so thank you for allowing that.

I wonder why guests come at different times. Am I missing something? This is not a soup kitchen...

Why don't parents and their own children TALK to each other? Seriously. Easy way to avoid: Have DH SPEAK WITH HIS MOTHER: "Mom, every time we come for a holiday meal, there is no food by the time we get there. Please have enough for us to eat when we come next week or we'll have to start making different holiday plans in the future."

Anonymous wrote:Why are you going at all?

Indeed, why?

No. We've never gone anywhere where the food has run out. There has always been food.

But when the kids were little they could be soo awful picky and the grandparents just weren't too sympathetic with that. Fair enough, they had a point. But still, little kids need to eat, lol.

So we used to stop on the way and get them happy meals. So they could sit at the table and pick at the food on their plate but not be cranky, irritable from being hungry and ruin dinner for everyone else. Really they would not eat what they didn't like.

Beyond that, unless you could bring something in a cooler for yourself, your options are limited. Maybe duck in a Chinese restaurant?

Why are you going at all?

Her weirdness aside....why don't you arrive earlier?

Why does she have you arrive after everyone has eaten?

Can you attempt to show up two hours earlier than she said? I don't think it would be any more rude than her feeding the other family members first.

How do I avoid this? Mil never (ever) makes enough food. When we arrive at the time she told us, the food is almost gone, if not gone. DH and I have gotten used to the fact that we probably won't have a holiday dinner. But our DCs deserve one just as much as the other grandchildren!

I don't know if I have posted this before - if I have, I apologize. But I just don't know what to do about my DC's holiday dinner. We travel during the break, so us making a huge dinner and having any leftovers, whatever, is not an option.

If I had to think about it, I think that Mil really fears having leftovers (I know she hates leftovers, for some reason) - but for crying out loud, send leftovers home with people if you must. Who invites people over and doesn't have enough food???? I also think she favors the other grandchildren, and offers them seconds, without regard for anyone else. But if it were reversed - WHOO BOY!

Any ideas, besides McDonalds again this year? It's kind of depressing, and not really what I had in mind for any kind of "holiday memories". Especially because my family is really great at the holiday thing. I am trying not to compare. I just want DC to have a decent holiday meal, other than refrigerated Pillsbury rolls and McDonalds.

Has this ever happened to anyone else?