Needed.........4...Received.......15

While back East, I questioned MIL (mother-in-law) about having something from The Homeland incorporated into the wedding. She wasn’t very forthcoming. Her first answer was food, which F and I had pretty much ruled out. There really isn’t anything that is uniquely “Homeland”, so I’m still not sure what we are going to do, besides dancing, she did mention some sort of dance. The one thing she DID grip onto like a dog and a bone was the gift registry. She wants me registered, like the day after we got engaged. To me? That is one of the LAST things on my list. I don’t need people sending me shit (gifts) for the next 12 months that I have to keep track of. (I sound bitchy, I know, but really, F and I do not, DO NOT need any more stuff in the house. He FREAKS every time I bring something new in.)Apparently though, people are already questioning her. Or so I thought, at first. She kept telling me things that I needed to put on the registry. An electric tea pot so I can hot water for hours when company comes over. (No one comes over. And unless I’m birthing someone’s baby, they can wait 5 minutes for the water to heat on the stove.) An electric roaster just like the one F’s SIL (sister-in-law) has. The biggest I could find online was this 18 quart one. It cooks a 22 lb turkey. I swear the one she had was bigger, like 30 quarts, but whatever, when would I need that? Seriously? My aunt has one, I’ll borrow hers. Which is what I said to MIL, and she said, “You don’t want to be borrowing that forever, do you? Have one of your own.” The only thing I said we’d need was our good china. OMG, did her eyes light up! I missed the “WARNING! WARNING! DANGER! Will Robinson!” that came with those blazing eyes. As I was home sick recovering from Bronchitis caused by “it’s just an ear infection” pneumonia, MIL called. She was at Macy’s, who was having a sale, and she “found this china set on sale, Did I want it? I could look at it online to see if I liked it!”

Did I not predict this? She’s picking out our good china!?!?!!?!?

“No, NO, NOOOOOO!!!!! “ is what I said to F.

“I told her no. I said you’d go looking with her when we come back next month.”

“WHAT!!!! No NO NOOOOO!!!! I’m not ready to go looking! Jesus! I want to go looking with MY OWN MOTHER!”

He was silent, taken aback by my strong reaction. All my life I listened to my mother complain about her MIL and how often she crossed the line with butting into our lives, telling her how to raise us and what-not. Then as I got older and my friends started to get married I started hearing their horror stories about their MILs butting in and I decided, that if I ever got married, that my MIL would know there would be NO line crossing. My domain is mine, not hers. Stay out!
When we packed the car to come back home we left with a comforter, a frying pan big enough to fry a small child, a cake stand without a lid (“What good is it without a lid?” said Eldest sister when I told her.) a metal fruit dish and 2 sets of bath towels for “company”.

As MIL is loading me up with all these “goodies” she informs me that she buys everything in twos, one for SIL and one, for me.

I wonder how much it would cost to drive a U-Haul over 500 miles?