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#Post#: 45505--------------------------------------------------
Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being opened.
By: Hmmm Date: January 14, 2020, 10:33 am
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In this Miss Manners article, a great aunt is bothered that a
family continues to allow a 6 year old to open the gifts of a
younger sibling. At the last gift giving event, the aunt asked
the 6 year old to allow the 3 year old to open her own gift. The
mother and grandmother chastised the aunt and told her the 6
year old was just trying to help.
HTML https://www.uexpress.com/miss-manners/2020/1/10/great-aunt-put-off-by-cute-tradition
As a parent of two, I remember trying to balance this issue out
when my youngest turned 2 and my 5 year old wanting to help. We
allowed her to help with the first 2 gifts but after that, she
had to just watch just like everyone else. (It sticks in my mind
because there ended up being a great series of photos of her in
the background looking very interested while sitting in her
aunt's lap at the beginning to a total look of "can we please
just get this over with" by the 10th gift.)
As the gift giver, it would bother me to have the gift opened by
the 6 year old. I personally think the mom and grandmother
should have backed up the great aunt since she was the giver of
the gift. Miss Manner's advice was to leave it alone as it would
work itself out naturally through sibling rivalry and that the
aunt could tell the niece that she didn't want help but seemed
to imply the aunt shouldn't protest when giving a gift.
What is your opinion?
#Post#: 45511--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Pattycake Date: January 14, 2020, 10:40 am
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I agree with you.
#Post#: 45514--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Victoria Date: January 14, 2020, 10:52 am
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I think that the actual problem isn't that the 6 year old is
opening the 3 year old sibling's gifts. It's that: "Ever since I
can remember, the 6-year-old has insisted on “helping” people
open their gifts, to the point of opening the gift and giving it
to the recipient...Later, the mother, my niece, called me aside
and said the 6-year-old was crying and upset that I asked her
not to open the gifts. (This was after she “helped open” all the
other gifts.)"
IMO the 6 year old reads as being coddled, if she's actually
crying over not being able to open everyone's gift for them. My
thought is that the 6 year old's mother was just trying to make
some sort of point and exaggerated how upset she was to the
great aunt.
In terms of the actual question, it would bother me if the 6
year old were opening my gifts, but I think that as long as the
parents of the kids trained them to figure out who it was from
and to say "Thank you," it wouldn't be that big of an issue if
siblings were opening each other's gifts (unless one of them
felt upset and like they were missing out).
#Post#: 45518--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Winterlight Date: January 14, 2020, 11:31 am
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I think the parents are setting up a terrible system here, and
the three-year-old will hopefully fight back when she's older. I
don't blame the aunt for speaking up.
#Post#: 45563--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Star Wars Fan Date: January 15, 2020, 1:05 am
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I wouldn't like it but I wouldn't say anything and I'd keep my
mouth shut. You just don't get to tell people how to parent in
situations like that.
Ed.
#Post#: 45566--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Aleko Date: January 15, 2020, 1:41 am
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[quote]You just don't get to tell people how to parent in
situations like that.[/quote]
No indeed: but nor do parents get to tell people who have
brought a present to one of their children, that they can't hand
it to that child to open but must hand it to the other child who
has the privilege of opening it. Or, indeed, that they can't
open a present given to them, but must let the brat do it while
they watch. So while you have to bite your tongue in the case of
presents given by or to anyone else, you can decide for yourself
who's going to be allowed to open ones given by or to you, and
insist on that.
#Post#: 45574--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: lowspark Date: January 15, 2020, 8:57 am
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I think that the best she can do in the future, is not hand the
gift over to anyone. Instead, she should take the child for whom
the gift was meant, and sit with her or next to her or have the
child sit in her lap or whatever, and THEN hand the gift to the
child and say, "this is for you." The child can then unwrap the
gift while in her company.
If the older child comes over to unwrap the gift at that point,
then Great Aunt can kindly discourage the older child by saying
something like "Gift is for [younger child] and I'd like to see
her open it."
In other words, she needs to maintain control.
Me? I've seen plenty of behavior I don't like in other people's
kids that their parents condone or even encourage, including
things that I find insulting or disrespectful, to me and to
others. I keep my mouth shut. Not my place to criticize or
comment, unless there is something that is causing someone harm.
Maybe they didn't like the way I was raising my kids. Who knows.
It's just not my place to parent other people's kids.
But yeah, if it bothers Great Aunt that much, then she can
attempt to take control, at least of how her own gift gets
opened.
#Post#: 45576--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Gellchom Date: January 15, 2020, 9:24 am
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Here’s what jumped out at me:
“The 3-year-old enjoyed her gift with such delight and was
oblivious to any of the silliness that occurred. She happily
continued “opening” her gifts after the 6-year-old had already
opened them and passed them to her.”
Maybe next year she will care. But this year she didn’t, and it
made her sister happy, so this is not a big deal.
I can understand the aunt wanting the recipient of the gift to
be the one to open it. But the recipient did “open” the gift
herself after her sister removed the gift wrap, so Aunt did get
to see her expression of delight. The removal of the gift wrap
is all we are talking about here (with regard to Aunt’s
feelings), and that just isn’t a big deal.
As to worrying about what the family is teaching these children,
I agree generally about not butting in, but this isn’t a
stranger in a restaurant or something. I think that as an aunt,
it’s not entirely inappropriate for her to give her opinion,
although she should choose her time and place carefully.
I would not call the six-year-old a brat. She’s a little child.
No one has ever told her this was wrong, and her sister doesn’t
seem upset, so it seems awfully harsh to blame her for anything
here.
#Post#: 45578--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Kimberami Date: January 15, 2020, 9:43 am
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Once you've given a gift you lose control over the gift. I think
this would include the opening of the gift. I would feel
concerned if the 6 year old was taking all of the presents, but
this set up obviously works for the family. It would seem weird
to me, but I'm guessing this is something that's left from the 3
year old's baby days.
#Post#: 45580--------------------------------------------------
Re: Would you insert your opinion on how your gift was being ope
ned.
By: Hmmm Date: January 15, 2020, 9:59 am
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[quote author=Gellchom link=topic=1585.msg45576#msg45576
date=1579101847]
Here’s what jumped out at me:
“The 3-year-old enjoyed her gift with such delight and was
oblivious to any of the silliness that occurred. She happily
continued “opening” her gifts after the 6-year-old had already
opened them and passed them to her.”
Maybe next year she will care. But this year she didn’t, and it
made her sister happy, so this is not a big deal.
I can understand the aunt wanting the recipient of the gift to
be the one to open it. But the recipient did “open” the gift
herself after her sister removed the gift wrap, so Aunt did get
to see her expression of delight. The removal of the gift wrap
is all we are talking about here (with regard to Aunt’s
feelings), and that just isn’t a big deal.
As to worrying about what the family is teaching these children,
I agree generally about not butting in, but this isn’t a
stranger in a restaurant or something. I think that as an aunt,
it’s not entirely inappropriate for her to give her opinion,
although she should choose her time and place carefully.
I would not call the six-year-old a brat. She’s a little child.
No one has ever told her this was wrong, and her sister doesn’t
seem upset, so it seems awfully harsh to blame her for anything
here.
[/quote]
I would agree with all of this if the letter hadn't started out
with "Ever since I can remember, the 6-year-old has insisted on
“helping” people open their gifts, to the point of opening the
gift and giving it to the recipient."
So this put me in the frame of mind that this isn't behavior
that she does just with a younger sibling. She's been doing this
for a long time and at most if not all gift giving occasions.
The use of "insisting" conjures up yells of "Mom, let me help
you open your gift" and "Granddaddy, I want to open the gift,
let me open it for you." That type of behavior strikes me as a
child not wanting to loose being the center of attention more
than the enjoyment of just unwrapping a gift.
Of course the 3 year old doesn't seem upset. If this behavior is
typical, it's all she's ever known and assumes that older sis
always gets to go first and she gets the left overs.
I do agree that older sibling isn't a brat of her own accord,
but she is being raised to be a brat. I don't fault the child
but the parents and I find the worst behavior to be the mother
and grandmother who didn't put the desire of their guest above
that of the child. Children need to learn that their desires do
not always trump others. And if the child was truly upset that
she wasn't allowed to open one single gift amongst many, then
she really hasn't been taught this at all.
But I do recognize my personal desire to prevent the child from
opening the gift I was giving has more to do with my reaction to
having grown up as the youngest sibling.
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