Whew - I just spent a few days skimming through this thread like sitting down with a good book and hot tea by the fire (I clicked on it because my MIL married last year though I didn’t end up having any helpful experience to share with regard to Bobgate)! I was really saddened to read that MIL seemed a little lost at your tea though, I hope she is able to quickly find her own friends and activities at the CCRC without Bob if he doesn’t want to do anything with her. I do have a lot of empathy for SIL though and hope she too finds new companionship and purpose as the dust settles from this, that was a lot of changing course in a short amount of time!
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Need some thoughts/advice. Good grief - I am so long-winded!! Long-worded??
As I wrote above somewhere, dh is driving his mother to her town/home on Friday. The purpose is to go through her belongings and identify what she wants to keep that will be moved to the CCRC, what of the remaining items either dh or sil (or her son, my nephew) wants, and what will be sold. Bob is not going. I am not going.
Dh is only interested in his father’s memorabilia from his football-playing and college football officiating days. Sil has identified an antique secretary she wants and a chair. The struggle I am realizing is that sil will eventually want some things that mil is bringing to the CCRC. Sil has concerns that if mil passes first those things will be forever lost in Bob’s the home or difficult to reclaim. As you all know, there is a pre-nup, but it only lists financial assets. Not individual, personal property.
There is nothing in that category we would ever want either now or in the future. The only thing of financial value is mil’s engagement ring. It probably has about a .75 carat diamond. There have been hypothetical discussions in the past (long before Bob) about where that ring should go. I emphatically stated that jewelry goes to the daughter! Especially when the daughter has a daughter. That was the case when this discussion took place, though my sil’s daughter has now transitioned and is a son. It was also discussed in the past that it could be given to our ds (before my niece was my nephew) to use as an engagement ring when he got married. I said, “No. Jewelry goes to daughters.” I can’t remember if mil ever directly asked ds or not, but I know he would also say that he did not want her ring.
Sil has said to me recently that she wishes mil would give the engagement and wedding rings to either her or dh. I again said, “Oh, you should have those.” She fears they will get lost. I think mil should either give them to her now or repurpose the stones in something for herself.
Among the things mil is taking to the CCRC, there are some prints and a small oak table sil eventually wants. I think sil is really unhappy about the oak table because it belonged to my fil’s parents. However, I learned that fil’s dad gave that to mil while he was still living because mil admired it. So, the oak table did NOT come into mil and fil’s home via an inheritance. I can’t even remember mil not having that table, so fil’s dad gave it to her a long time ago. It has sentimental value to sil because it was her grandfather’s but mil wants to use it at the CCRC.
I told sil she needed to tell mil to tell Bob what items of personal property sil would want should mil predecease Bob. Sil says it will do no good. She’ll be taking the pre-nup and the police to Bob’s should mil die first. 
I didn’t say that would do no good since personal property isn’t enumerated in the pre-nup. If this were a will, I’d be telling mil to create a holographic codicil of her personal property, but I don’t think that will work here.
If you’re still reading along…what do you think should be said (if anything) about the rings and the small oak table?
Your sil’s issues are not yours to solve. If she wants to hold a grudge, let her. She’s looking for things to be mad about now.
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Omg I’m SO tired from all that reading!!! 
I have 3 comments:
- These are things. SIL is going to have to let go of worrying about this and hope some or all of those important things land in her lap eventuallly. Bigger fish to fry in terms of relationships.
- While “we” don’t love Bob, there isn’t anything really to indicate he’s a jerk or taking true advantage of MIL/her things. He is just an old geezer who isn’t super personable and who clearly isn’t the most easy person to live with (multiple marriages). He at his age is probably not thinking about MIL’s things per say. Especially if you can find a neutral spot in a relationship with him.
- Just ask MIL straight out now to have these things. See what she says.
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My in-laws added an addendum to their will with the personal property they wanted to be sure went to their own family. Their attorneys have that and we have a copy as well.
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I agree but this bridge doesn’t have to be crossed this week.
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Yes, that is allowed with a will. It doesn’t apply to a pre-nup. It is unfortunate that this wasn’t thought of sooner.
This is why I am so thankful I am a person who has very little sentimentality and who doesn’t like, “stuff,” in general.
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Ugh. I know you’re right. I’m a, “fixer,” by nature.
I just shared this info with dh. I think he thinks that the discussion about these items can occur rather organically while they are going through the stuff in her house. But, I had not previously made him aware of what his sister was thinking.
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OP- hugs. It never ends, does it?
I think this is a fantastic opportunity for your SIL to have an open conversation with her mom than perhaps she’s had in the past. Not to grind her teeth over what may, might, could happen. But an adult conversation. “mom, I’m so thrilled you are taking the oak table with you. I’ve always loved it and am excited it will be part of the new life you are building with Bob. Would it upset you if I asked that it somehow be included in your will so that it will eventually end up in MY home or in MY son’s home? It has so many happy memories attached to it”.
And then a deep breath- “what do you plan to do with your engagement ring? Do you want me to take you to a jewelers to have it reset, are you planning to sell it, do you want to keep it to pass down?”
These are normal conversations that people have with their parents ALL THE TIME. This is not some weird boundary. And although 3/4 of a carat is a nice sized stone, the ring is likely not worth anything what you think it is if you go to sell it. So it’s not as though Bob’s kids are going to smother your MIL in her sleep in order to get the ring.
BTW- you may decide to rethink your stance on “only daughters get the jewelry”. My siblings and I really cherish the pieces that were my mom’s that she had inherited from her MIL. There is one bracelet that we rotate… you get it on a family occasion, you give it to the next person the next time we get together. It’s neither that attractive nor particularly valuable but our mother LOVED IT.
My grandmother had two sons and two daughters- it would have been sad if our cousins (daughters of the daughters) had the pieces with sentimental value since we were ALL close to our grandmother.
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I agree that it will be easiest to nudge these conversations along organically while they’re in her house, and to add casually something along the lines of: you know, I was just thinking - if something happens to you first (god forbid, but I have these conversations with Wife because we have to do it!), one thing we can do that would make things easier for Bob is we just jot these pieces down as we go, that you’re taking to the CCRC. I’ll pop it into a letter after we’ve got this wrapped up, and that way he wouldn’t need to remember or think about or handle any of this during a hard time.
MIL may already have a note in her will about generic personal property or a letter to heirs. Casually itemizing stuff as you go to “make things easier for Bob” is a non adversarial way to document these things, and it’s also true: it would make it easier for Bob, because he wouldn’t need to think about and try and remember everything she brought.
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Because of the higher risk of theft in the CCRC vs a SFH, husband could offer to take the ring for an updated appraisal - presumably home insurance is changing anyway so that would be the opportunity to see if it needs a rider or if it would be covered under standard insurance. That could lead to an inheritance discussion.
But it may not be worth a great deal. I inherited my mother’s diamond ring (I never had an engagement ring). It had sat in a safety deposit box for ages. It has last been appraised for insurance at $10,000. I took it to my jeweler for a new appraisal and he said that due to a chip under the bezel, it became less than one carat and was maybe worth $1000 at most. He said not worth paying for an appraisal and he let our insurance agent know there wouldn’t be an appraisal needed.
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I only have sons. Each son used an inherited ring to propose, and both DILs wear them everyday. FWIW.
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The main issue with sons getting the jewelry is in the event of divorce that heirloom is lost to the family in most cases. I don’t know what happened to my grandmother’s ring when my brother divorced. Hopefully my niece or nephew got it when they married, but I think it’s just as likely it was sold (which for the record no one in my family would resent or think that she should have given the ring back. But if the ring is meaningful to a family be aware if it goes to a son it may not stay in the family).
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My younger sister has ALL the jewelry & other items that were in mom’s safety deposit box. She says we will be all able to view it and take turns choosing among it sometimes soon. I honestly don’t care as mom lost her engagement ring eons ago and bought a series of zircon replacements. Dad bought a bunch of jewelry and mom was given quite a few pieces but there is no sentimental attachment for me to any of the pieces.
We were allowed to go to their home and request anything there that we wanted. We ended up with a carved trunk (that is currently in H’s shed that we just built). My nephew-in-law painstakingly scanned ALL the photos that were in the chest and made piles for each of us of photos of us. It was definitely a labor of love.
In this case, I think having a conversation like the one scripted above in an “organic” way might work with MIL or perhaps SIL will just have to let things go, if she’s able to. I’m glad neither you nor your H are interested in anything, @Hoggirl .
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If it goes to a daughter it may not stay in the family either.
In my own family- a daughter sold the ring (which ANY cousin would have happily paid appraised value for) to pay for a car after her divorce. A daughter let the ex-H keep her grandmother’s ring (to pass down? to sell? to give to his next wife?) in exchange for a larger percentage of the interest in the marital home. And a daughter in a perfectly intact marriage sold her engagement ring (which had been passed down to her as the eldest cousin) to pay for a “babymoon” (I’d never heard the term) since they '“only” had a modest honeymoon to Cape Cod when they got married.
There are NO GUARANTEES!
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Agree with @deb922 that this isn’t your problem to solve. SIL needs to be her own advocate.
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I’m also in agreement with @deb922 . This is not your fight you don’t need to get involved in this. It’s between a mother and daughter. I’d advise you to seriously stay out of this one
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I imagine that this is one of those situations where @Hoggirl feels like “monkey in the middle” - wanting to stay out of it, is not one of the sibs but also sees SIL hurting and maybe losing one of her closest allies (MIL) - so @Hoggirl feels she should problem solve a bit with her.
While I agree it’s SIL’s to work through, it’s easy for us to say that because we don’t have the good, emotional relationship (and I think from what we read) with SIL - it’s hard to not offer her some support.
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SIL is hurting and my goodness, it sounds as if she has been through a lot! Correct me if I’m wrong, but she is a widow, with a child who has transitioned and now her close relationship with her mother is changing due to this new marriage and relocation. I understand about the “stuff”. They are meaningful items with symbolic meaning. I don’t think she’s holding a grudge - I think she’s holding memories.
I never mentioned items I wanted to have to Mom as I was afraid of it appearing self-serving. SIL may feel the same.
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Yes, but help should be offered very cautiously. If she must, my recommendation would just to tell her SIL to tell her mother what she wants eventually in case MIL goes first. I wouldn’t do more than that.
But, has SIL asked for help specifically? Hoggirl doesn’t want to get into “well, hoggirl said this and that”.
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