Please excuse the length of this! I sincerely apologize, but I am trying to make sure I don't want to miss any important details.
Background on me and DH: Together for approx. 4yrs, married this past summer. Me: early 30's, DH: mid-30's. I have an almost 10yr old (LO1) from a previous relationship, DH and I have an almost 2yr old (LO2) and are expecting LO3 this spring. We have a wonderful relationship, except for this issue.
Background on DH: Grew up 9hrs from where we live, hasn't lived in his home state for 8yrs, hasn't lived at home for ~15yrs (honestly don't even know, but since his very early 20's). DH moved to our current state yrs before meeting me. Has 1 sibling that he rarely speaks to and has nothing in common with (still lives in home state but hours from IL's). Sibling doesn't have close relationship with IL's. IL's have no other close family/friends near them; they have their jobs. DH's family did not celebrate holidays or birthdays growing up (this is relevant later), and didn't have any family traditions.
Background on me: Have always lived in our current state. Have large extended family who we see for major holidays and occasional (every 1-3mos) birthday parties. I am close with my mom and sister and we talk weekly/see each other monthly. These visit do not always involve DH; holidays include our entire nuclear family and we enjoy it.
I am going to do this chronologically so I hope it makes sense...
~4yrs ago: DH and I meet. He has little to no relationship with his parents, hasn't seen them for a yr or two. Visits them once in the first 1.5yrs of our dating (on my urging).
End of 2013: We find out I am pregnant. DH's parents decide to make the trip to us to meet me (we had been dating for 1.5yrs at this point). They stay in a hotel for the weekend and we have a nice first visit. Unfortunately, I think we set a precedent here and are expected to spend the.entire.weekend. with IL's (3 nights).
The gifts begin...MIL likes to shop, sends food, random household items, etc. Sends lots of baby clothes (her first bio GC is LO2, so I understood her excitement). Nothing overwhelming, I thought it was sweet. DH still has minimal contact with IL's, I have no contact with them.
Summer 2014: LO2 was born Spring 2014, IL's come to visit 6 wks afterwards (perfect timing for us, I was fine with this). They stay in a hotel (we live in a 2br house with LOs 1&2 while saving for a house). Nice visit, exhausting, again spending every minute with IL's except for when they are at hotel to sleep. Try to rationalize it as we don't see them often. MIL and I exchange phone #s so I can text her pics of the kids once and awhile.
Somewhere around this time DH mentions he would like to see them more...hopefully every 3-4mos. Wants LOs to know their grandparents. I agree, ILs seem lovely (after my 2 visits with them), I think extended family is important. Still think it's strange though, considering he isn't close with them.
Fall 2014: DH, me, and LO2 make the trip to DHs home state (LO1 was with his dad the only weekend we could go). A 9hr drive with a young infant. ILs live in the country with a very un-childproofed home and several dogs. We stay with them, realize we will need to stay in a hotel in future visits because it isn't suitable for toddlers/children (not dirty, just not child friendly). There is nothing to do in their surrounding area so the visit is spent mainly in their house. Here is where the "off" things start happening... MIL begins to share with me (on my 3rd time meeting her) her and FILs marital problems (infidelity, etc.). Okay, she's a sharer/I'm not, fine. FIL mentions to me that DH and I should use coconut oil during our "intimate times". I walk out of the room without answering his statement, hoping he'd get the point that I was not comfortable discussing that. He proceeds to repeat the same statement when I reenter the room 15ish mins later. Okay, he is clearly more open with that than I am (I'd like my parents to think I am still a virgin after 3 LOs). I ignore his comment, visit ends, we move on.
Throughout this time MIL and I text very occasionally (I send her pics maybe 1-4x per mo.), DH has minimal contact with any of his family.
Winter 2014: ILs come up for another visit, stay in a hotel. Nothing dramatic happens, visits are exhausting but okay.
We realize that visiting them will be incredibly hard. We can't afford to fly all of us there, rent a car, and stay in a hotel for all visits – their home is not conducive to stays there with small kids, they live in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do outside of their house or a hotel, and a long drive would be hell with a toddler...
Spring 2015: DH and I move to larger home, begin planning our wedding. ILs come to visit for LO2s 1st birthday party and stay with us (we buy a guest bed and move LO2 out of his room into our room for the long weekend). Exhausting visit full of all.the.time togetherness; I realize I am not a huge fan of houseguests...they didn't do anything wrong, I just need my space to decompress at the end of the day. They give LO2 a birthday gift, cool.
Summer 2015: LO1s birthday passes, no mention of it. I brush it off as they don't celebrate birthdays and just happened to be with us for LO2s birthday. DH and I get married, ILs come up, stay in a hotel as we were not housing any guests over our wedding weekend. Saw them at the wedding and that was it.
The text messages ramp up. MIL decides to begin texting me like I am her facebook page. Random comments, 'funny' memes (not that funny to me, some slightly inappropriate but maybe I'm a prude), texts that she misses us. I respond to some, not all, not all texts are asking for a response. DH comments on how often she texts me (they still have minimal contact). I brush the frequent texts off as she is lonely.
Winter 2015: ILs plan to visit. Prior to visit DH asks me if I am looking forward to their visit, I tell him the truth...houseguests make me anxious, I have a hard time spending the entire weekend together, I am pregnant and can't drink wine to relax (haha). He understands, we agree to ILs staying in a hotel for future visits (too late at this time), he will spend Sunday afternoon getting his parents out to give me a break, he will help clean house and help more during visit (I usually do all cooking, cleaning, planning,etc.).
During the IL visit I am counting the hours. Again, they don't do anything 'wrong', perhaps I am hormonal. I handle prepping all breakfasts and lunches as ILs watch on, DH keeps LOs out of my way so I can get things done. ILs don't really interact with LOs too much (never have) which I found a little interesting, they seem to want to talk to us more than the children. I was raised to always say thank you, particularly as a guest), and I don't think I heard a single thank you for hosting them (again, never have). Alright, I remind myself that they will be in a hotel next time.
MIL mentions several times how much she'd like to move by us, how she loves it here, how it's so nice that we're by "family"(yes...MY family). I brush off the comments and tell DH in private that this will not be happening, I am not becoming their social life/caretakers if they decide to move here. DH says she wouldn't really do this.
Weird annoyance, but FIL decides to not sleep in their bedroom and wanders the house at night, falls asleep on our playroom couch in the basement. This freaks me out, I don't know ILs all that well and he is wandering my house while we sleep? Again, I realize I am probably hormonal but we move on, visit ends. MIL tries to give me a check, DH steps in and says 1) she needs to handle that with him, and 2) no thanks.
Christmas 2015: ILs send my grandparents a very large, nice gift (food gift). Don't send us anything (I don't care, they don't really celebrate holidays). A week or to after Christmas we receive a small package (addressed to me)...I open it, and it is a wrapped gift for LO2. Okay...this is where I start to get really annoyed. DH texts his mom that there are 2 LOs in this house, MIL says since LO1 told her he wanted an Xbox and that's too expensive so she didn't send him anything. DH tells her he is a 9yr old boy, he tells everyone he wants an xbox. MIL says 2 more gifts for LO2 are being delivered over the next few days. We hide the gifts from LOs, DH tells MIL to send return labels, she says she will. (The issue here is DH and MIL work different shifts and phone calls are hard to line up. Much of the Christmas gift fiasco is brushed under the rug because it's too hard for them to talk on the phone.)
Her frequent texts to me continue. I am irritated with her so I BH. Multiple texts about how she misses us (...okay? How do you tell another grown woman that you don't really know her well enough to miss her?) DH decides it's going too far, he tells her to chill out on her texts to me, to contact him instead (she never really contacts him). She continues to text me, DH calls her and tells her flat out to stop texting me and contact him...explains it as they need to build their relationship. MIL is really hurt, thinks I don't like her, said something else is wrong (yeah, the Christmas gift deal). Finally agrees to stop texting me, says she understands that some people "just don't like texting". A hotel stay is agreed on between DH and MIL for their next visit.
And here we are now...they plan to visit this summer after LO3 is born, ILs will be staying in a hotel. MIL does not text me anymore. She and DH have some contact, she requests pics of "the LOs" when she never requested pics of LO1 before. The gifts sat hidden in our room until last week when DH stuck them in his trunk because I am sick of staring at them.
I feel like the entire Christmas gift situation was brushed off (it was). MIL took the text situation as the bigger problem (it wasn't). MIL didn't 'forget to give LO1 a gift... she gave my grandparents a gift and sent wrapped Christmas gifts for LO2 - she CHOSE not to send LO1 anything. I realize that blending families is a new experience for her, but as a stepgrandchild I was NEVER treated any differently (I know that internal feelings may have been stronger for bio grandchildren, but outward signs of affection and all interactions among all grandchildren were equal). She ignored one of our children, and then basically ignored any responsibility for it by not sending the return labels (the one thing we asked her to do to move on from the situation). She continued trying to create this close MIL/DIL relationship with me, while having little to no relationship with DH, then made me feel like the crazy person for not wanting to be in such frequent contact.
If you made it this far, I will give you one giant internet high-five! My question for you is... How do we move forward from this? Am I crazy for feeling annoyed by them/are they just my BEC's at this point? How do I get rid of the 'grudge' that I am holding against my ILs? 