Am I being irrational?

steffj1 · April 2018

deleting this post now because i heard what I needed to. thanks

yes, it seems the consensus was i was being a little irrational. I'm still blaming the hormones on that.

spottedginger · April 2018

Just don’t use it. How you use or don’t use a gift isn’t up to the gift giver. Being given a gift does not oblige you to that decor. Write her a short but polite thank you note for the lovely gifts and the obvious effort they entailed and leave it at that.

Do not engage in any additional discussion or phone calls with her or the rest of the family. All the extra involvement with parents and bil will not help. She was excited for you and wanted to “help” by doing something from afar. Her sentiment was in the right place, but the execution was poor. You don’t have to change your decor or use the pieces in the nursery, but she also doesn’t need to hear how mis-places her efforts were.

lovesclimbing · April 2018

spottedginger said:

Just don’t use it. How you use or don’t use a gift isn’t up to the gift giver. Being given a gift does not oblige you to that decor. Write her a short but polite thank you note for the lovely gifts and the obvious effort they entailed and leave it at that.

Do not engage in any additional discussion or phone calls with her or the rest of the family. All the extra involvement with parents and bil will not help. She was excited for you and wanted to “help” by doing something from afar. Her sentiment was in the right place, but the execution was poor. You don’t have to change your decor or use the pieces in the nursery, but she also doesn’t need to hear how mis-places her efforts were.

All of this. I do think it's a little over-the-top to automatically jump to "the whole nursery is being taken away from me." This is your house. Do whatever the heck you want.

lovesclimbing · April 2018

spottedginger said:

Just don’t use it. How you use or don’t use a gift isn’t up to the gift giver. Being given a gift does not oblige you to that decor. Write her a short but polite thank you note for the lovely gifts and the obvious effort they entailed and leave it at that.

Do not engage in any additional discussion or phone calls with her or the rest of the family. All the extra involvement with parents and bil will not help. She was excited for you and wanted to “help” by doing something from afar. Her sentiment was in the right place, but the execution was poor. You don’t have to change your decor or use the pieces in the nursery, but she also doesn’t need to hear how mis-places her efforts were.

All of this. I do think it's a little irrational to automatically jump to "the whole nursery is being taken away from me." This is your house. Do whatever the heck you want.

ETA: Also, everyone's feelings are different. Decorating a nursery is not a rite of passage. It may not be a big deal to her as it is to you. Sure, it's important to many people, but I would not consider it a rite of passage for anyone. My daughter still doesn't have a nursery at 10 months old and never will.

DanyTargaryen · April 2018

spottedginger said:

Just don’t use it. How you use or don’t use a gift isn’t up to the gift giver. Being given a gift does not oblige you to that decor. Write her a short but polite thank you note for the lovely gifts and the obvious effort they entailed and leave it at that.

Do not engage in any additional discussion or phone calls with her or the rest of the family. All the extra involvement with parents and bil will not help. She was excited for you and wanted to “help” by doing something from afar. Her sentiment was in the right place, but the execution was poor. You don’t have to change your decor or use the pieces in the nursery, but she also doesn’t need to hear how mis-places her efforts were.

This.

Just because she sent you decorations does not mean you have to use them. It's not worth getting upset over and no, she hasn't taken the whole nursery away from you. The fact that she paid enough attention to make them in the correct theme, even if they ended up being pieces you don't actually want to use, tells me she was just trying to do something nice. A simple thank you would have been enough, then you could have proceeded to decorate the nursery as you wanted to.

Wishilivedinflorida · April 2018

Agree with all of the above. We got gifted a huge canvas picture of my son by my husband’s aunt and uncle, a candid casual picture we wouldn’t ever want to place so prominently on our wall, so it lives in our closet. We thanked them politely, and moved on. It’s your house, do what you want.

steffj1 · April 2018

Thanks all. I know my husband (and myself) often lack a little tact when dealing with her - and what i mean by this is we are much more direct and speak our minds than she is use to. It was the "more to come that" prompted the discussion of including us in other projects she was sending. If it hadnt been for that part of the note, we both would have left it at a quick "thank you" over the phone.

lovesclimbing - "rite of passage" wasnt quite the phrase i was looking for when typing it out, but i couldnt come up with anything better. Some people look forward to it, some dont. For us, it was something that we were working on and planning out together and just one step in our journey to meeting our little one. I fully recognize this might not be the same sentiment shared by everyone.

runsomewhere · April 2018

I have to be honest. After reading your post all I could think was, wow what a huge over reaction!

In my opinion using terms like "terroristic demands of my SIL" because she poured effort in to making something for your son and being in tears about it is too much. She's clearly excited about welcoming her nephew and wanted to express that. Of course you don't have to use any of it, but why not thank her and leave it at that?

Parenting and "rites of passage" when it comes to having kids aren't about perfectly matched nursery themes, and believe me, having a loving aunt in a kiddo's life will enrich their life a whole lot more than what was on their nursery walls.

I don't want to dismiss your feelings, especially since you've had a long road to get here and the above is not intended to be harsh, but let it go. Go ahead and plan your nursery the way you want but keep in mind that that's not the stuff that matters.

spottedginger · April 2018

Woooow, OP. A dirty delete after people took the time to thoughtfully respond? This is why I don’t usually bother with people.

DanyTargaryen · April 2018

WTF is the point of deleting the post? It's not even a "I'm pissed because I didn't like the answers" delete...

nackie · April 2018

Can anyone give a summary for those of us that were late to the party?

lovesclimbing · April 2018

Argh, I'm always forgetting to QFP. Basically, she and her H had some difficulties getting pregnant. They'd decided on a theme for the nursery and such. Her H's sister sent them a couple paintings she had done and a mobile. The mobile was the one thing she was super looking forward to doing herself, and the paintings aren't quite what she would have wanted. The sister says there's "more to come." OP says the nursery is a "rite of passage" and it has been taken away from her and the sister's behavior was "terroristic." Her H talked to his sister, and I don't remember what happened.

runsomewhere · April 2018

@nackie also bursting in to tears because this "rite of passage" has somehow been taken away from the OP. H told his sister and I think the sister's feelings were hurt.
Image result for shrug gif

spottedginger · April 2018

She also mentioned that the sil and parental in laws lived across the country and were unlikely to ever visit it know the gifts weren’t used in the nursery.
Eta: the husband told the gift giver they weren’t to their taste yada yada then called his parents to discuss the situation. Then bil (sil’s husband) texted the op husband bc sil was so upset. The op called bil to discuss and defend her husband. So, joyful familial relations all around.

nackie · April 2018

Thanks ladies!

Am I being irrational?

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