I hope that you have a wonderful Thanksgiving, even with the added stress that your MIL will bring into your home.
Whenever she starts in with the nattering, picture to yourself all of us listening in and topping each other with smartass remarks…
There’s your problem.
Is it possible you can “redecorate”? Either move all/most of their furnishings&linens to different rooms, give them back to your parents, or toss them, and put all new stuff into the MBR. Once your MIL ceases to associate the guest room with “where all her stuff is”, she’ll stop complaining when stuff gets moved.
Thank you all so much for your input! Seeing as how they’ll be here tomorrow, here’s the strategy I’ve decided upon:
- Make the bed nicely, with some of her bedding, but also some nice flannel sheets a friend gave me. I’ll explain that it’s colder here in western Maryland than it is in the Baltimore area, and I thought they might appreciate the flannels!
- Explain to them that since oldest daughter and bf moved in, and hubby set up an office over there, some stuff has been boxed and stored, and I’ll look for anything “missing”, ASAP. (I’ve filled hubby in on this plan; he’s good with it).
- When/if (OK, ‘when’) she starts griping, smile, sympathize briefly, change the subject, fill the wine glass!
- Try to occupy her by involving her in the prep that her advanced age/arthritic hips will still let her do.
At this point, excessive alcohol consumption, Xanax consumption, and hacking her to bits with a kitchen knife, seem pretty unlikely.
However, I’ll check in tomorrow night and let you all know how it’s going! 
I’m not so sure about hearing snappy answers. How about just hearing a single violin playing a familiar tune solo? The song might end with “…we’ll keep the light on for ya.” 
So, my in-laws got here yesterday. Here’s what’s happened so far:
FIL asked last night if they were “on their own” for breakfast for Thursday morning, and I said yes. I explained I was going to be very busy and would not have time to feed them. I took this opportunity to tell my MIL “some stuff has been moved while the kids were moving back in and hubby was setting up his office next door; if there’s something you think is missing, please write it down for me, as I won’t have time to deal with it on Thanksgiving!”
First thing this morning, MIL was complaining to my oldest daughter that someone had taken the ‘ties’ off her drapes, in her room, and who would do such a thing, and why? Then, later this morning, MIL was complaining to the same daughter that someone had put a microwave in ‘their’ bedroom!
Daughter was bitching to me about MIL’s bitching, but I told her yesterday not to do that! I told her “If you need to bitch to someone, bitch to your bf, but don’t bitch to me! I’ve got enough to deal with!”
So right after dinner, MIL started bitching at me (I swear I don’t even remember about what. While she’s whining, my brain goes “la la la la la, not listening!”)
and finally, I kind of snapped. I said “You know, Betty, I don’t know what happened to your stuff exactly. I don’t know why people want to change things around over there. What I do know is I don’t micro-manage what goes on in that room. I don’t go over there every time someone goes in the door to your room. What I do know is that you’ve been very argumentative and confrontational about the stuff in that room, and I’ve always loved and respected you, and this is not the kind of relationship I wanted to have with you”
FIL backed me up that she’s been argumentative and confrontational. She said she didn’t realize she’s been like that, and promised to knock it off.
So, we’ll see what happens now.
Mid-80s? Have you considered that she may just be getting senile? Especially if she’s “getting. . .cantankerous”, and she wasn’t that way before. This may be something you’re just going to have to accept and adjust to.
This thread has been very educational; don’t do unreasonable things and expect reasonable results (unreasonable from both sides). You can’t let someone have a room in your house, and expect to look after it to their satisfaction. You can’t have a room in someone else’s house and expect them to look after it to your satisfaction. This is a situation that is set up to fail. If this were me and my house, I’d give them all their stuff back, furnish the room myself, and let whoever wanted to be a guest be a guest. If they didn’t like it, they would be more than welcome to rent a hotel room. I hope the heart-to-heart did the trick, though.
Caveat - I am not an extremely hospitable person in my own home. I’m very territorial.
She’s always been very, well, blunt. In fact, it’s one of the things I’ve always loved about her. But yes, it’s occurred to me that maybe she’s just getting senile. In fact, if that’s it, I’m pretty sure she may realize her mind isn’t what it used to be, and that probably makes things worse for her.
featherlou, I, too, hope the heart-to-heart did the trick. If she is going senile, I may have to remind her from time-to-time.
featherlou are you reading my mind? I would be tempted to do the very same thing, as I am also very territorial. Hallgirl1 has some clothing in a drawer in the guest room, as she comes about every other weekend to visit, however, I wouldn’t hesitate to dump her clothing in a box and cart it to the basement if I needed the drawer space (and did do something similiar when Hallgirl2 and the Newbaby came to visit a few months ago).
Territorial? You betcha. I work hard at my home and it’s my safe haven from the rest of the nutcase situations out there in the Big Bad World.