My parents live locally and see the kids (even if they're just swinging by for 20 minutes) at least once or twice a week. They go to their soccer games, occasionally eat lunch with DS at his elementary school (and will with DD when she starts next year), call to see how the kids are (quick phone calls - not big productions). They genuinely love being grandparents and are great at it - loving and unobtrusive. In-laws actually live about five minutes away and maybe see them once every month or two... and even then it's very forced. It's sad but it is what it is. We're so grateful for my parents (DH as well).

Anonymous wrote:OP here. They're a 30-60 minute drive away, and though we get along fine, we just don't have much in common and our visits are nothing to get excited about. It's more out of habit at this point, and I don't think I'll want to give up too many more weekend days with both of us working . I'm just not sure how kids might change that dynamic.

This is my in-laws too. I do ask them to come to us a good amount since our baby is still young and napping all the time and it's easier if we're at our home. My MIL complains bitterly about not seeing us every weekend. But we both work and weekends are OUR time with the baby too. We love sharing her, because she's a delight, but we're not going to spend every weekend with my MIL. Anyhow, it's annoying because she spends most of the visits she does have making comments to the baby like "oh your mommy and daddy don't let you see grandma enough" and "oh you would love to see grandma more wouldn't you?". I wish she'd just enjoy the time she DOES have with the baby instead of constantly trying to guilt us into more. We have friends, we have my family, and I think we do a really good job of balancing everything. She is the only one who openly disagrees.

Anyhow, my advice is to be open to as much as you're comfortable with and realize it might change as time goes on. When my baby was a newborn, having other people hold her "wrong" could literally make my whole body ache. Hormones are insane. I sometimes felt my skin was crawling off when my MIL held my baby. It was good for me to ignore the intense feelings occasionally but I also needed to realize it was ok to say no to more visitors if we'd had enough. Now that my baby is 8 months old, it's easier and I'm much more open to it. My MIL still drives me crazy, but she can make the baby smile which makes me happy too. The baby is also big enough and strong enough to let her opinions be known, which helps immensely. If my MIL is holding her "wrong" she'll squirm away from her.

Good luck! It can be tricky. But try to remember it's always a GOOD thing to have people in your life who love your baby as much as you do.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. They're a 30-60 minute drive away, and though we get along fine, we just don't have much in common and our visits are nothing to get excited about. It's more out of habit at this point, and I don't think I'll want to give up too many more weekend days with both of us working . I'm just not sure how kids might change that dynamic.

Oh wow, this just made me sad. My parents are on the other side of the country, and we try to see them when we can (usually two trips there a year, and they come here two or three times a year). DC is 6. I would give an arm and a leg to be able to see them more often, but we're stuck with the limitations of work and school schedules. I grew up with my maternal grandparents two blocks away from us, and I saw them daily; they were an integral part of my childhood.

I think it really depends on your relationship with your parents/inlaws. I would love more time for our family with my parents - DC loves them, they love DC, and the distance is hard. Skype and FaceTime have been key. MIL, on the other hand, doesn't like to Skype or FT, and won't travel to see us, so we try to travel to see her at least once a year. I don't get upset about this - I can't change her unwillingness to travel, and I understand that she loves our DC. We make an effort to Skype/FT with FIL because he really appreciates seeing DC, and he and his wife aren't in a position to travel (they've come here once, and it will probably be the only time due to physical and financial restrictions).

Overall, I wish we could be closer to family.

About once a month for my mom, once ever 2 for my dad and about 4 times a year for MIL (she has to fly- my parents are a 5 hour drive).

Would love to live more locally to my parents but grew up in an economically depressed area

Anonymous wrote:It depends on how helpful they are.

+1

If she is local, visits twice a year, to sit and read the newspaper (comics section, mind you) and ignore the children, like my MIL, then why bother? She sees giving them any type of food as "serving me", so she refuses to do it. Whacko.

I would be thrilled to adopt a local grandparent who is warm, loving and actually likes children.

Anonymous wrote:My MIL said she'd like to see us every other weekend after the first baby was born. I very politely said there was no way in hell. I counter-offered every 6-8 weeks, DH nodded in agreement and threw in Facetiming with the baby at least once a week and they wisely accepted.

My parents tried to pull that. So we tried Facetiming. Quite funny with a newborn as they're sleeping half the time and will not remember anything.

"Where's the baby? I can't see the baby!!"
Screen freezes.
"Hello?"
Screen is black while grandma keeps cooing at the baby.
"Where'd the baby go?" Hello? Hello?"

It eventually stopped. It's more about the grandparents than anyone else.

i think its good for kids and grandparents to see each other often, maybe once a month? since theyre not far away, they could just stay for a day (not even spend the night). This may be a good thing to foster as once the kids get older, you may like to be able to leave them w/ your parents sometimes and if they already are used to spending time w each other, this will be easier to do.