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The holidays and grands

sickofbs8's picture

Submitted by sickofbs8 on Sat, 11/28/2015 - 2:54pm

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Adult Stepchildren

This is likely a common problem...the holidays. My SD21 and SD17 have none to rare contact with their dad. But then along comes Christmas. How do others handle keeping things equal between bio children and steps? I have an understanding with my daughter who is 22 to keep it appearing equal at our house, but Santa happens to leave things at her apartment too. Does anyone else do this? Is it underhanded? And what about the grandbabies? We see my biograndson almost daily but Stepgranddaughter we have seen maybe 6 times since she was born in February...both live within 3 miles of us. I'm just curious how others handle this touchy subject.

ownpersonalopinion1's picture

Submitted by ownpersonalopinion1 on Sat, 11/28/2015 - 3:20pm

Lol. I do. Because my daughter does not act like my heathen stepkids and my grandchildren say thank you, etc. My stepdaughter complains about gifts (which were nice and expensive)bought for the grandkids and it was never never never enough so now I don't get them anything.

I buy grandkids things all the time and my ex and I split the big ticket items we want them to have.

Quoted from DRACO: My money and gifts come with conditions.

VicLee's picture

Submitted by VicLee on Sat, 11/28/2015 - 4:08pm

I kept it equal when all were growing up. But the toxicity remains in the inlaws which carries over in varying degrees in each sk. So yes now Santa does make some stops at their houses for good kids and their kids, including ss,bs,bd,our biod together.

Rags's picture

Submitted by Rags on Sat, 11/28/2015 - 5:01pm

Nope, not underhanded at all. My ILs draw names and each person only buys a gift for one person. We participate but also but also buy gifts for everyone. We give those to each person when we visit them at home either before or after any family Christmas gathering. At the gathering events we stick to only giving a gift to the person whose name we each drew.

I for one do not think that each kid/skid should have equal gifts. Each kid is different, each has different interests, each has different levels of performance. Gifts should reflect all of these things.

IMHO of course.

AVR1962's picture

Submitted by AVR1962 on Sat, 11/28/2015 - 5:43pm

We kept everything equal when the kids were young and into their 20's. When steps started running me down I stopped my interaction and told my husband it would be up to him to give gifts and keep in touch. He is not the gift giving type so they do not receive gifts from us. There is one grand from the steps and we were told that we would never know her as our grand. When we were told this we did not continue to try. We have not seen her in several years.

furkidsforme's picture

Submitted by furkidsforme on Sat, 11/28/2015 - 7:14pm

I have no bios, but I do have 3 SKids. The middle one is awesome. The other two are rude and selfish and barely acknowledge my existence. I gift the middle one incredibly generously at holidays and all year long. No one has ever dared ask me about the "unfairness", but I would not hesitate to simply say "Middle SD is kind to me and actually speaks to me, OF COURSE I do more for her. Why wouldn't I?"

Who cares what everyone thinks anyhow. If the other skids don't like it, they are welcome to stop acting like urchins.