Ah family.... As the saying goes,
"You can pick yer clothes, and you can pick yer nose, but you can't pick yer relatives..."
We have been on both sides of the family fence. When my sis bought DVC, DH and I thought she was certifiable -- what was she thinking? Wasn't that like a timeshare? Perish the thought. Then she let us stay at an OKW studio for 2 nights one spring when we were traveling through Fla. on SPring Break -- oooo, well this is nice! Later she invited the whole clan for xmas as a gift to my mom (18 of us, to be exact, with some very extreme ingrates among the crew). DH and I would at least always chip in for all the food, take sis and BIL and their kids out for a dinner, etc. HOWEVER -- I admit it -- we were still DVC-morons all the while. I could NOT, for the life of me, understand why my sister was making such a big deal out of what size rooms to get, and whether or not she should keep the room past xmas day (xmas was a Friday that year). Friday night -- what's the big deal, I thought. ANd why get studios? Get the 2 brs, let folks stretch out. Oh me of little knowledge. And this was before I had my 3rd child, so I'd like to think I had SOME brain function still left... but maybe not.
It was on our next trip with DVC sister that DH and I looked at each other and said, "Hmmm. Maybe we should do this?" We liked it well enough to want it for our own -- without having to wait for the invitation. And that's when we "went to school" and suddenly learned how the whole thing works. (I have since apologized profusely to my sister about my ignorance of the Friday night stays and points!)
So we joined. We have since taken my mom on a trip with us (DH's folks can never seem to go). And we took DH's brother, SIL, and their son for over a week a few yrs ago. Imagine my face when I casually said last summer, "We're planning a WDW trip for 2004" and the next thing I knew, they were coming with us? I tried to convince them out of it (after all, they were expecting a baby, and I just couldn't fathom a baby at WDW in August). They in turn offered to pay for "more points" (thinking we could buy just a few, I guess?) I tried to explain how purchased pts and rental pts worked, and to give them a watered down "DVC-101", but I could see their eyes glazing over -- they didn't "get it". Hey, I know that look -- I may have even invented that look -- I've certainly worn it before. I could just see them thinking, "And WHAT was all that mumbo-jumbo about Friday nights, for Pete's sake?" You say banking, borrowing, points and dues -- they say, "Zzzzzzz..."
In the end, we struck a compromise. We had them pay for a room for a Sat night and we gave them in return 8 nights in a BWV std view 2 br with us. (A great deal for them, I'd say...) We could have stayed at AS or PC or such, but we went instead to a DVC resort (BCV) and got a studio and 1BR. I strongly advocate doing this -- make sure folks know, somehow, some way, at some point, what that rack rate is. It then sparked the conversation of "well how much does a room like this cost YOU?" We were then in a better position to explain that it certainly wasn't "free" and "limitless". DVC was not like winning the WDW lottery. We had our own costs, some initial (pts puchase), some continuous (fees). We explained that we had invested in the act of taking a vacation, as opposed to making it sound like we had "purchased" a piece of a WDW resort that was always there at our ready disposal, as much and how ever often we wanted. We don't "own" a villa -- we own a vacation, wherein vacation time is inversely proportional to room size. Longer vacation -- get by with less space. Need more space for more folks? Will have to take a shorter vacation or vacation less frequently (perhaps skip a year altogether). With this initial knowledge now registering, they were soon asking the necessary deep and meaningful questions about DVC that would give them a much better grasp on what it is we actually own. We knew we had hit paydirt when SIL said that BIL had commiserated to her, "We will probably have to buy into this or something like it soon... we can't ride on my brother's coattails and generosity forever!"
I therefore like to give most folks the benefit of the doubt and assume they simply don't understand DVC and hence, make poor assumptions. These assumptions, in turn, may lead them to say or believe something that as a generous, DVC-savvy person, I might then misconstrue as selfish or rude. Ignorance truly is bliss.
I have found, too, that sometimes, the LESS I say about DVC, the better... some pearls should just remain in the oyster! I have already told DH that until we are practically headed out the door, I'm not telling family about my plans for our HHI trip! (Heck, I'm not even telling our own kids much about it, for fear they'll "leak" it!) Some things you have to hold as sacred, I guess!
And we are extremely close and love being around each other - or so I thought 
I had reserved a Grand Villa for our sons third birthday, and no takers really except Gram who had helped us buy in anyway and was planning to vacataion with us just to help with the boys. She actually doesn't like vacations, but that is another story...
Love that, Colleen!
