The MIL

I'm sure this is just the first of many posts about my lovely mother-in-law (MIL) because she is often a source of stress for me, but I have to tell you about last night. We went over to their house for dinner (she is a fabulous cook and we go there often for food), and on the way there Maddy falls asleep. I must also preface this with the fact that my brand new stampin' catalog arrived yesterday (it's like having another Christmas for me), so I really wanted to pour over every page of the 200 page "bible" of mine, but of course, had motherly duties to attend to when I got home. Anyhow, Maddy falls asleep in the car. We take her into his mom's house and instead of letting her take her usual little cat nap in her car seat, she has to fidget with her and take her out of her seat and thus, wake her up. I was so pissed! So, she takes her out of the seat and holds her for a little bit until she really wakes up, and I think she could tell by my face that I wanted my daughter, so she handed her back to me so she could finish making dinner. So, I play with Maddy for a little while and we rock in the rocking chair and talk... Then, it's dinner time, so Jerry takes Maddy and lets me go eat. I eat, then he eats, and then we play with Maddy some more.

Now, tomorrow and Friday, the MIL and the SIL are having a garage sale at SIL's house. They've been planning this for months, yet had to load everything up and get it all set up last night. This is very typical of them, they wait to load and unload things until my ginormous husband is there to help (even though we have nothing to do with this garage sale). They spend all this time hauling shit over to her house and setting it all up, and they are going to sit in the 90 degree heat for two days so that they might get a couple hundred bucks each - if a bunch of crazy people buy their junk. No thanks. My time is more valuable to me. I could go on about this, but I want to fill you in on the rest of the night...

We finish dinner and then it's time for Maddy to eat, so I get her bottle ready and pry the baby out of MIL's arms to feed her (this is the first time I got to feed her all day), and Maddy falls asleep in my arms. So, I sit in the rocking chair and hold her, while the rest of the family starts yelling up and down from the basement about things they want to sell/not sell. Their yelling wakes up Maddy, but she was still rubbing her eyes and obviously still tired. Instead of letting me rock her back to sleep - Jerry's mom takes her from me because SIL's baby, Jenna, was up and playing on the floor and MIL wanted Maddy to play with her. So, she takes her from me and plops her on the floor with Jenna. Maddy immediately starts screaming because she's tired and just wants held. So, I pick her up and start to rock her. MIL says, "Mommy has to rescue you." I shot her the evil eye - there would've been no need to "rescue" her if MIL hadn't pissed her off.

It just amazes me at how she does things for her own amusement - she wants to take a picture of the two of them, she fusses with them and makes them all mad until she gets what she wants. She wants them to play together - so she plops on the floor regardless of what they want or need. She wants to hold her, so she wakes her up! Ugh.

This is especially stressing me out because after the summer, when Jer goes back to school, MIL is taking care of both babies. This is good because we are leaving Maddy with family and we don't have to pay for daycare/babysitter; however, I feel like once she starts to watch her, I'll lose a little bit of control over my daughter's life.

We've been having discussions about "solids" for the babies, and back in the day, babies were given cereal really early on, but now our pediatrician says nothing until 4 months. Well, SIL listens to everything MIL says and doesn't consult her dr. about anything, and she gave Jenna cereal at 8 weeks. Last night, she tells SIL she should start giving her fruits (Jenna is now 12 weeks old). She teases Maddy about being on a "liquid diet," but I get mad because she second guesses everything... My mom says to me, "I would never give you advice about such things because I know things have changed so much since I had babies," but NO, not MIL - she knows everything and tells me all the time about how I should give her cereal and stuff. Maddy is 14 weeks old, and I have given her 2 tablespoons of cereal on two occasions - it is a complete mess and she gets all mad between bites. So, I decided when I gave it to her the first time (2 weeks ago) that I would start by just giving it to her once a week - to experiment and see what she thought of it and then once we go the pediatrician for her four-month check-up start giving it to her everyday, depending on what she recommends. MIL thinks I'm starving the kid. I am in for a real treat come Sept.