Her Sister-in-Law Wants Her To Stop Putting Extra Flourishes On The Meals She Prepares, But She Likes It and Won’t Stop
by Matthew Gilligan
As the old saying goes…beggars can’t be choosers…
But some people like to do it anyway and they like to complain about EVERYTHING.
Check out this story from Reddit’s “Am I the *******?” page and see if you think the woman who wrote it did anything wrong.
AITA for refusing to cook meals with less flourishes for my sister-in-law?
“I (F28) make meals every day for me and my husband (M31) to take to work.
I enjoy adding my own personal flourish to the meals, usually something like putting toppings in the shape of a heart or drawing a cute face on a snack.
It’s a fun hobby of mine, and it brings me joy later in the day to open my lunch and see it nicely arranged.
She was helping her out.
A few years ago, my sister-in-law (F33) had to take a lower-paying job after an accident left her unable to work at her previous one.
I began making her meals like I did for my husband and myself as I knew she was struggling both financially and emotionally.
She lives very close to us, so my husband always just dropped them off on his commute to work.
I always added my extra touch to her meals as well, as I enjoy cooking and figured it would be a nice thing to do.
Say what?
However she called me a few months ago and asked if I could stop making her lunches so bourgeois.
I legitimately thought she was joking calling a heart-shaped piece of seaweed bourgeois, but according to her, none of her colleagues at work have such elaborate lunches, and it makes her feel as if she is flaunting her status.
She is not paying me for the lunches and it takes me an extra ten minutes maximum to add a fun touch to them, so I was confused on her train of thought.
I thought that maybe her coworkers were taking her lunch and she didn’t want to tell me, but I agreed to make the lunches less fancy because I wanted her to feel comfortable.
Since I make the exact same meals for all three of us, now I just don’t put effort into the presentation of one of them.
Since my husband drops off the lunch on his way to work, there has been one or two times where he has accidentally given her the wrong box.
This is pretty ridiculous…
I have labelled which lunch is not flourished, but in the rush of the commute there is still the occasional instance of taking the wrong box.
My sister-in-law asked me a few days ago if I could just stop making both me and my husband’s lunches “fancy” due to the risk of her being given the wrong one.
I refused, as it makes me happy to see the extra touch of personality in the food and told her that she wouldn’t pass away from one accidental “fancy” meal, which she was furious at and hung up on me.
She has been refusing to talk to me over the past few days and when I tried to call her to reason she kept hanging up.
She has told my husband that she will only talk to me if I agree to stop making all of our lunches so “bourgeois”.
I am still making her lunches every day and my husband dropping them off, and while my husband agrees with me that her demand was out of order, he has now said that maybe I should just make all the food less flourished just so that she will not be angry if there is an accidental swap of lunches.
I know it would be easy on me to just not flourish the food, but I don’t want to give up my hobby for a theoretical chance of her receiving the wrong box.
AITA for refusing?”
Reddit users shared their thoughts.
This individual said she’s NTA.
Another reader agreed.
This person shared their thoughts.
Another reader spoke up.
And this Reddit user had a lot to say.
She made a mountain out of a molehill.
Who doesn’t love a fun lunch?
If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.

Sign up to get our BEST stories of the week straight to your inbox.