Christmas family bashfest
- Thread starter dmclone
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My wife has a cousin that is like this. She has been late for every major holiday event and family gathering. Occasional tardiness is excusable. She has three little boys, so being late every now and then is completely understandable. But she’s hours late for meals that she’s known about for weeks. It’s gotten to the point where we will tell her lunch is at noon when it’s really at one so she won’t be so damn late.
I have a whole family of in-laws who don’t listen to anyone, including each other ... until they hear something that interests them ... and then they interrupt and expect you to repeat what you just said ... and if you do repeat yourself, they still won’t listen.
Here’s my rant. You may think I’m a horrible, heartless person after this...
I am the youngest of four. But I was an accident. So I’m 5 years younger than my next sibling but they are all within a year or two of each other. I was basically an only child because I was so much younger. My parents divorced when I was 5 and the kids split with them.
My siblings insist on acting like a family at the holidays when we just aren’t. They want to do gift exchanges and ask for all this effort to get together. We don’t keep in touch outside the holidays. I never speak to any of them aside from the occasional FB comment. I get so annoyed when they talk about how we have to do this or that because we’re a family when I just don’t feel that way because of the age difference.
The fact of the matter is that we won’t even get together when my parents are gone. We really only do it for them.
I am the youngest of four. But I was an accident. So I’m 5 years younger than my next sibling but they are all within a year or two of each other. I was basically an only child because I was so much younger. My parents divorced when I was 5 and the kids split with them.
My siblings insist on acting like a family at the holidays when we just aren’t. They want to do gift exchanges and ask for all this effort to get together. We don’t keep in touch outside the holidays. I never speak to any of them aside from the occasional FB comment. I get so annoyed when they talk about how we have to do this or that because we’re a family when I just don’t feel that way because of the age difference.
The fact of the matter is that we won’t even get together when my parents are gone. We really only do it for them.
Your older sibs sound like a-holes. 5 years isn't a big difference in age. There's no reason for them to have excluded you from feeling like a family.
Sounds like the type that needs screwed with. The best would be have someone find out what she's giving people and then get the same gifts for several people but make sure theirs is opened before hers.
The only thing that bugs me with our extended family Christmas gatherings is the asinine amount of young screaming children.
Its not really exclusion so much as how I view my family vs them. Like I said, we don’t talk, text, or keep up in any way outside of this one time per year. They’re not bad people, were just not close in any way. So it’s silly to me to go through all these hoops once a year to pretend like you’re something you’re not. Sounds harsh, but it’s true in my opinion.
I could have written this post myself. Some of my wife's family is chronically late. We've taken to telling some of them that dinner is an hour earlier than it really is, knowing they'll be late. But then the people who generally show up on time overcompensate for this and end up late themselves and it just always turns into a mess.
Which annoys the hell out of me, because I like my hot foods hot and my cold foods cold, and everything just ends up sitting around and it's all lukewarm.
My side of the family has a blast when we get together. I'm the youngest of 8 and we are spread around the country. It's loud, but it's loud with laughter and not arguments. My wife comes from a very small family (3 kids and one cousin...that's it) and she still gets overwhelmed being around my family when we're all together.
But since this is a bash thread, my SIL can be really tough to take at times. She is always late, never offers to help clean up, and has judgment laced in a lot of her conversations.
A couple years ago, her and her husband showed up at 4pm for a 1pm Thanksgiving meal. My wife was already extremely pissed off since it was only us, her brother's family then her sister's family for the meal, and her sister hadn't called about being late or responded to phone calls.
When my SIL finally stepped in our house (they brought nothing), she says hello, looks around, and then goes "Wow, it looks messier in here than normal."
Seriously.
My wife absolutely lost her ****. She started yelling at them before eventually telling them to leave. It took about 6 months before they started talking and nearly two years before they got together for the holidays....not at our house. My wife can hold a grudge like no other. She swears she will never have them over for another holiday meal.
But since this is a bash thread, my SIL can be really tough to take at times. She is always late, never offers to help clean up, and has judgment laced in a lot of her conversations.
A couple years ago, her and her husband showed up at 4pm for a 1pm Thanksgiving meal. My wife was already extremely pissed off since it was only us, her brother's family then her sister's family for the meal, and her sister hadn't called about being late or responded to phone calls.
When my SIL finally stepped in our house (they brought nothing), she says hello, looks around, and then goes "Wow, it looks messier in here than normal."
Seriously.
My wife absolutely lost her ****. She started yelling at them before eventually telling them to leave. It took about 6 months before they started talking and nearly two years before they got together for the holidays....not at our house. My wife can hold a grudge like no other. She swears she will never have them over for another holiday meal.
Ah, got it. My second oldest brother is a little that way. There's 15 years between us and he was already married by the time I was 7. It's gotten much better as we got older, but I went a lot of years without really knowing or talking to him at all.
My brother really had no idea how to talk to me and felt guilty about not making much of an effort when I was younger. I don't thing he ever knew how to get over that wall until we sat down and talked about it one day.
This drives me nuts. I realize it is well-intentioned, but it means I basically have to do most of the shopping work myself. It is amplified with kids. You basically need to track which items on lists you send to who so there isn't overlap. Setting up gift registries for Christmas seems ridiculous.
1st world problems. Not really problems, just annoyances...
All of them. But to be fair, most people annoy me. I like people in small doses so you stick me in a group for a prolonged period and they'll all likely annoy me. I'm REALLY fun at parties!
Tardiness gets me too. Especially when they don't communicate about it and it happens a lot. Then we have to wait. HELL NAW. F THEM. We are the responsible ones that were here on time. Especially with kids now, nope were not waiting. If they get hangry I am leaving them here with you and eating somewhere else.
Also stop scheduling holiday meals and **** in the middle of nap times. Especially my nap time.
The only other thing that really bothers us is my wife has an aunt that is a busy body and likes to get in peoples business. She has a weird way of wanting to be the center of attention that or just doesn't give a damn. I think it was last Christmas when everyone got there she gave her daughter a gift that turned out to be some kind of ring or necklace made out of diamonds from her grandmas ring or something like that. There were five other great granddaughters there left to say "wait is there anything like that left from me or did you take it all?"
Also stop scheduling holiday meals and **** in the middle of nap times. Especially my nap time.
The only other thing that really bothers us is my wife has an aunt that is a busy body and likes to get in peoples business. She has a weird way of wanting to be the center of attention that or just doesn't give a damn. I think it was last Christmas when everyone got there she gave her daughter a gift that turned out to be some kind of ring or necklace made out of diamonds from her grandmas ring or something like that. There were five other great granddaughters there left to say "wait is there anything like that left from me or did you take it all?"
Have I mentioned recently how much I like your wife?
Large family...we know how to deal with this type. Best would be have the Grandma in on it giving the gifts so they have to bite their tongue while all the gifts are opened.
That is a toughie. You could either do no wrong that day or stay the F out of the way because the buzz saw is coming through.
That choice was simple. Stay silent and get the hell out of the way. She was a five foot two nuclear explosion for about 3 solid hours.
