My baby shower was this past Saturday... My first child and my parents threw us a party. We decided to make it guy and kid-friendly so that everyone who wanted to come could and also to include DH in all the festivities. Well, my MIL, her mother, and my FIL showed up... and man was that "fun"... not.

MIL immediately walked in, said hi to DH and I, gave us hugs and then started showering Skids with bags of gifts, candy, etc. Now, this party was scheduled during the usual lunch time and my parents provided a large amount of food to feed everyone. MIL decides that she is going to feed skids junk and candy rather than anything resembling an appropriate lunch. Okay, whatever, I let it go. They are her grandkids and it was a party so whatever, right? Unfortunately the skids nap time came during the party. DH and I figured that it wasnt something that happened all the time so we could let them skip their naps for the day... that bit me in the rear later but whatever.

Well, MIL, GIL, and FIL spent all of their time with the skids, completely ignoring me and DH (me much more so...even tho it was my baby shower) except for when I opened their respective gifts. The rest of the time we were opening gifts GIL and MIL were inspecting skids head to toe, taking off their shirts and checking every inch of their bodies to see where DH and I were "messing up" in our parenting. Now the kids had chicken pox but were no longer contagious by the time of the party. They did however have some of the marks that were still healing. MIL decides its her business to tell DH and I that the marks are not from chicken pox and that the pox last for 3-4 weeks and we have no idea what we are talking about. We need to take better care of "HER GRANDCHILDREN" DH rather quickly informed her that they were HIS children and that he was taking very good care of HIS children and that we had taken them to the doctors because we were worried and wanted to ensure that the rash was in fact just chicken pox and not something more serious. MIL then stated that chicken pox last longer than what we had described and that our doctor must be wrong. DH replied by telling her that the children had received their chicken pox shot and therefore had an extremely mild case... That their pediatrician knows more than she does and that he did not appreciate her inspecting his children during the party and would appreciate it if she showed him some consideration and treated him like an adult who could take care of his own children. Needless to say MIL didnt like that too much. She told him that she didnt know about the shot and he interrupted her to tell her that it is fine that she cares about the children but without every iota of information she needs to stop butting into our lives and understand that we are the parents, not her, and it is our responsibility and if he wants her opinion he will ask for it.

I was so proud of DH because I have often seen MIL walk all over him and often talk to him like he doesnt care about his kids welfare. His standing up to her made me so happy because she is not the easiest person to get along with and while I am not afraid to tell her what I think, she often gets quite irritated with me and will not speak with me after doing so. Like the silent treatment actually hurts me?? I thinks its a relief lol. She once blamed him for trying to keep the kids away from her b/c in order to get the kids for one visitation BM had him sign a contract that he would not be taking them to her house and we would not stay there while we had the kids (this was a while ago and I had nothing to do with it... he just came out with the paper and the kids). This was a contract that DH had to sign or BM would not allow him visitation (total GU in case you havent been following any of my other blogs/forum posts). He did what he had to do to see his children in that case and MIL cried and yelled at DH and told him he was doing it just to spite her...

Yeah Im not a big fan of my in-laws.

Oh and while at the shower, FIL pushed SD3 much too hard in the swing set my parents have in their backyard (he was too busy talking on the phone and not paying attention to what he was doing) and pushed SD right off the swing. Now, this kid is tough but she started crying (mostly cuz it scared her). DH and I were in the middle of opening gifts and couldnt jump up to check on her... well all the in-laws crowded around her making a big deal of her falling, causing her to go from just crying a little to screaming her head off. I politely told them if they didnt make such a big deal out of it and reassured her she was ok then she would calm down. MIL gave me the stink eye and replied in a snotty tone "I want to give her attention... I can do that, can't I" Gah I do not like this woman.

I just hope she realizes that I will not allow her to be this way with my BD when she is born. I will not have her talking to me like I am not a good mother or picking my child apart to see where I am making mistakes. She will not be this damn controlling because I will put her in her place. I am the mother. She is the grandmother. She is more than welcome to care for them, spoil them, love them, but my rules will be upheld and she will not talk to me like that again. I am so tired of her controlling ways!!!

Okay... I think my rant is over... for now.