Thanks Whynot; this is a young family - the grandmother is actually the same age as my wife - mid 50’s. She drives and lives on her own, only comes around a couple times a week to play with the grandkids. As far as I can see, she does not cook for them or do anything to help around the house while she is there.
Appreciate the ideas, Maastricht, all the folks on this forum are most kind.
My wife already cooks for the three of us and these two toddlers; in addition, she is the designated home care worker for her own 83-year-old mother (who lives with us) and for a disabled woman whom she has to look after two or three times a week. So my wife’s hands are pretty full as it is. I do some cooking and clean up to help out, as well as doing all the driving for the family.
This work with the neighbors started out as simple babysitting for the twins but now my wife is doing more to provide food for the twins several times a day. She prefers doing that in our kitchen, which is organized and squared away.
Taking on cooking for an entire family, whose preferred diet is nothing like our own, is far more than my wife (or I) ever intended upon or have time for. The other family is not really interested it the idea either - they simply want not to have to prepare meals for the toddlers. Everyone else in that family either eats takeout or packaged/frozen foods and that seems to suit them fine.
So this is pretty much just about taking care of the toddlers. That task we can manage, even though you all now know it is a bit frustrating at times for us to see how other people arrange their lives; there is little to be done about it. We’re just happy (as are they) to see the toddlers eating well, not being constipated from junk food and not having colicky stomachs from too much cold milk and sugary sodas.
Are you reading the same forum I am? I appreciate your graciousness but 80% of the replies have been idiotic. You never threatened to turn anyone in and yet they jump like you had. They tell your wife to feed the whole family instead of being grateful for her hard work. They tell you to butt out and other peoples children are not your concern. Mostly they expose thier own nuerosis. The only post completely worth a damn was Ken001-
"Good on your wife, she sounds like a keeper.
I think some of the above reactions/quasi-criticisms about your wife’s concerns, lack generosity of spirit. Too much analysis of a simple situation.
This is a family at the low end, almost neglectful. Lack of education, role models whatever, they don’t understand basic love and nurturing - probably never experienced it themselves. Not bad people, just limited.
Your wife sees this, tries to help, and her efforts disappear into a black hole. The grandmother eating the children’s food exemplifies the hopelessness.
Still, its funny how kindness sows its seeds and over time some of that family are going to absorb good lessons. Sometimes that is the best you can hope for - don’t get mad and don’t give up. "
Other than this post don’t give much consideration. You can pick a nuget or two out of crap but it’s not worth the effort.
Any goodness you show children is not down a black hole. Kids pick up way more than you would think from kindness and selfless effort. Your wife is doing a solid and any grumbling she does is venting at lazy, careless, selfish behavior. I expect she will show them patience in trying to teach them better behavior but I expect her efforts will go for naught. Adults resist learning decency as if it were rotting entrails you were trying to foist on them. Often kids learn it much easier and it sticks with them due to having the bad example close at hand. But I’m sure I don’t have to tell you or your wife to never give up on kids. You are obviously decent people.
I agree with this and mostly with the OP, but being concerned that a 15 month old doesn’t eat soup with a spoon is a bit much.
And if you put soup in front of a 15 month old, don’t be surprised/disappointed/concerned if fingers wind up in the soup. I’d almost worry a little if they didn’t.
True enough. Just keeping it being flung on the cieling is a win at that age.
Wouldn’t even call it a win - if you serve a 15 month old soup and some of it doesn’t wind up on the ceiling, chalk it up to dumb luck (and enjoy scrubbing more of it off the walls and floor).
And that’s why we have a very large dog: because we have a 2-year-old! Dogs love licking the walls clean, and hoovering up the stray Cheerios! 
(Which works okay, until the kid uses said dog as a stepladder to reach treats for the two of them. The dog’s patience with that sort of physicality seems to fall under Enlightened/hopeful self-interest. Sure, this time The Tot only found the magic markers, but next time it might be cookies!)
BTW, I’ve never heard of cold milk causing colicky tummies. Is that common knowledge I’ve missed, or something else I’ve missed? (Maybe I haven’t heard it because I nursed mine.)
Not cold, but milk can. Some little kids can’t have cow milk (many grow out of it, some don’t), and since nowadays most people who have a fridge drink milk cold, “cold milk” becomes almost a single word.
It’s a common (but incorrect) belief in many cultures. ETA: Traditional Chinese Medicine (which has influenced most of Asia, not just China) considers pretty much anything cold to be detrimental to growing bodies; Ayurvedic medicine likewise. Many Western European grandmothers have an almost pathological fear of children being cold inside and out, hence the emphasis on bundled layers, hats “in any month with an R in it” and warm milk… My hypothesis is that it has to do with lack of consistent availability of refrigeration until fairly recently. Warm milk is either fresh from the cow or been heated to kill bacteria.
At 15 months, there really is no reason to still be warming milk. We stopped warming the milk for my daughter as soon as she began using a cup full time and stopped getting breast milk, which was around 15 months.
Both parents work, they have twins, and have taken in not one but two relatives in addition? And your wife is faulting them for having dust bunnies in the house? Seriously? Has she ever raised kids AND worked outside the house at the same time?
The twins are not going to clean up after themselves. They’re too young. NOT too young to be guided in picking up after themselves, and indeed initial clean-up training should start that young, but they’re going to generate more mess than they fix. On top of which, it’s likely the teen isn’t helping (even if he should). You’ve got more people making messes than cleaning up. The house just isn’t going to be spotless. Personally, I’d worry more about health hazards like rotting food than dust - if there’s discarded food and such it’s a problem. If it’s just clutter and dust it’s annoying but not a hazard and not something to speak about.
Your wife is a saint and probably exactly the sort of help this family needs. Question is, does your wife want to be a nanny and housekeeper or not? Because that’s the role your wife has taken on. These people obviously would rather pay someone else to do this work in their life than do it themselves. It’s not a “wrong” option as long as nothing illegal or unethical is going on, at least not in US culture.
How long are the mother’s working hours? How long is her commute? If she’s gone 10-12 hours a day (not that uncommon) she really might not have the time to do that AND spend any time with her kids and/or relaxing or taking care of herself.
If the parents aren’t cooking (and you seem to assume it’s solely the women’s duty to cook - why can’t the husband help out with that?) then it’s probably better there isn’t a lot of food in the fridge, because rotting food is a health hazard. Better a scanty larder than one grown fuzzy with mold and stinky with rotting. Filling the fridge with food that never gets used is worse than having just a little bit in there.
Don’t know about the grandmother, but how old is she? Is she suffering from any sort of disability? Would you even know if her vision is bad or she has numbness in her hands that would make food preparation hazardous (the latter is why my spouse doesn’t cook - he could burn or cut himself badly without realizing it but you can’t see that so he looks lazy).
It is NOT your wife’s place to educate these people. She can offer to help with the cooking while taking care of the kids, perhaps offer to help with shopping, but it is not her place to teach these people to cook. If, and only if, they ask to be taught is it appropriate for her to do that.
Goodness, toddlers playing in the mud! That is actually perfectly normal for toddlers. They’re washable. They might acquire pinworms from ingesting mud but it’s unlikely to kill them, or even make them ill (mostly, it makes their butts itchy). Different people have different tolerance for temperatures, and people tend to overprotect young children. Toddlers running around and being energetic will throw off a lot of body heat. If the kids aren’t complaining or turning blue they’re fine, and actually exposure to something other than perfect climate control will probably do them good.
As for supervision - I don’t know the exact circumstance. However, kids don’t require 24/7 intensive scrutiny to survive. When I was a young child I was allowed to play unsupervised in the home or backyard for lengthy periods, with mom occasionally glancing out the window or sticking her head out the door. By modern standards I was dangerously neglected, as were nearly all of my peers.
Your wife prepared food for only PART of the family? Seriously? She doesn’t see how rude that is? If someone came over with stew and I asked if it was for me and she said “no, it’s just for the toddlers” I’d assume she was joking because it wouldn’t occur to me that she’d feed some family members in that manner and not all.
If she’s going to prepare food like that and take it over she either needs to bring enough for everyone or simply not do it. Does it occur to her that maybe there are reasons Grandma doesn’t cook and she needs/appreciates a hot meal, too? Or maybe the neighbors are rude twits, I don’t know.
Maybe in your wife’s culture it would be appropriate for a neighbor to just feed the twins and ignore the adults and teen/older children but in MY culture it would be quite rude.
I think your wife is making some assumptions here that might or might not be valid. These points have probably been brought up before, but she can:
- Wash her hands of the whole thing and just withdraw from the situation
- Accept that she can’t change these people and continue to offer what support/aid she can
- Maintain the status quo and continue to be miserable.
Note: I hadn’t read the bit about the arrangements regarding the toddler’s meals and the grandmother being a frequent visitor and not resident. Could it be the grandmother wasn’t aware of your wife cooking for just the twins on a regular basis and really did think the stew was intended for everyone? I wouldn’t assume the parents are telling grandma about all the arrangements they might have with your wife.
And most people in the world grow out of the ability to drink milk. About 75% of people, worldwide, are lactose intolerant (incidence varies by ethnic group). Lactose intolerant people get gastrointestinal symptoms that could be described as colicky if they consume lactose. If you get that kind of symptoms from drinking milk, and your baby cries after drinking milk, you’re going to connect the dots and assume that your baby is having the same problems you do after you drink milk. That could be true even if it’s a one-time occurrence and the baby is crying for some reason totally unrelated to milk (kind of like a food aversion by proxy). Or your baby might cry regularly after drinking milk because he or she is losing the ability to digest lactose.
Eastern European, too. You should have seen the look my Polish grandfather gave me when I asked for a glass of water to drink. (This was in the summertime, mind you.) He sighed, and politely boiled me a glass of water.
I was given … a glass of hot water.
Cultural clashes can be, ah, interesting. Sounds like this OP is one.
:smack: Which is what I meant. I’m dyslexic when it comes to the Europes, I swear.
Yep, my old Polish landlady was horrified when I’d drink iced tea. Perfectly good tea, and I here I was pouring it over ICE? Ayiyiyiyiyi…going to make myself sick, I was.
It sounds like your wife is parenting more than the neighbors are!
… and nobody likes a saint, not while they’re alive.
Seriously, she volunteered for this. She doesn’t have to do it, and she shouldn’t if she can’t do it happily. Honestly, it sounds like she gets more pleasure out of judging the parents then she does out of caring for the babies. I suspect that the family wouldn’t want her help if they were aware of the heaping helping of contempt that comes along with it.
She needs to go work at a daycare or something.
Those of you commenting about the Eastern Europeans and cold water thing are right on. My wife and her mom are from Ukraine. Cold anything except ice cream is a no-no, and even that is only for the hottest of days.
My wife was a mother in Ukraine too, which country has its own unique (and often serious) issues with consistent product refrigeration and environmental cleanliness. Where an American family might well let their kids wallow in the neighborhood mud, in Ukrainian cities that could mean inviting a major intestinal or skin infection…not to mention the lasting effects of Chernobyl. Parents over there are aware that milk, groundwater and topsoil all were tainted to some degree by radiation in that incident and they are wary to this day.
So yes, most posters here are have kind intentions and if they have not read this thread all the way through, they might have missed some detail explaining aspects of this situation. This was more a way for me to express my own frustrations - my wife actually has shown more patience than I am readily capable of!
Actually… she getting paid for it, per the OP
I’ve volunteered for every job I’ve ever had. They can only draft you into the military. And regardless, I’m pretty sure they’re not paying her to bring food or spy on what they’re doing after hours.