MIL gave children gifts from a homeless charity for christmas!

I wish they’d got in touch with us as we would have happily taken their excess stock off their hands and made sure it got to a family who genuinely needed it! As I posted up thread, it’s worth spending a couple of minutes investigating any charity that you are going to donate money (or gifts) to.

Are you in Canada, @Jellyworms?

Asking because there’s an almost identical situation on https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5466166-aibu-to-ask-my-mom-to-stop-gifting-our-kids-donated-toys & I wondered if it was the same charity.

Think you need to talk to her about her behaviour - there's no point in talking just to this one specific charity - even if they 'barred' her from receiving such gifts next year, it wouldn't prevent her from picking up things from a different one. And for many community food projects & pantries you don't need an official 'referral'.

Noticed another poster earlier ( @CanadaGoose84 ) who's been suffering a very similar problem - but their mother is possibly even crazier than your MIL (as that OP works for the actual toy company that donates the stuff to the refuge in the first place):
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5466166-aibu-to-ask-my-mom-to-stop-gifting-our-kids-donated-toys

I’m NW …I work in the community…we donated kids gifts every year…this year we got loads more than usual….still loads left over….tomorrow will be deciding what to do with the surplus

@TattiePants yup, they couldn't give it away round here...

Please don’t be put off donating to such a scheme, they are an absolute lifeline for some families who wouldn’t be able to provide even a basic Christmas for their children. If you are unsure of where the gifts go to, contact the charity and ask. The charity that I work for works on a professional referral basis only. I’m sure there are the occasional family who benefits from our Christmas appeal that doesn’t need it but the vast majority of families we support are living in deep poverty.

I’m really surprised to hear that. I’m also in the NE and manage such a scheme and we, alongside other charities such as Mission Christmas / Cash for Kids, have really struggled to maintain sufficient stocks this year. It’s not that people aren’t donating, they absolutely are, but so many families are struggling that demand is outstripping supply.

But why didn't you buy her a present last year?

That's crazy.

I'm put off by Christmas toy collections for various reasons, and things like that don't exactly fill me with confidence that my money couldn't be better spent.

The company who donated 2000 toys, thats a heck of a lot of stuff and must have cost thousands. I can't help think it would might have made more sense to talk to the charity and say we have say £10k to donate, whats the best way to do it, do kids need bikes, scooters, consoles or other bigger ticket items.
It must be hard for older kids and tweens who end up in shelters when the get what they are given rather than 1 or 2 things they really want.

Ive been in 2 refuges. In the 2 we have been in, any wrapped presents were opened first by the refuge.

Any extra donations they get are then given to children who arrive at the refuge, often with nothing. They are also given to children when they get rehoused, often again they are rehomed with not a lot. When we were given our first flat we had air beds i had bought, donated clothes and toys my daughter had been given. No curtains, no flooring etc. So refuges help a lot with what they can.

Locally to me we used to have a shoebox charity appeal where you packed a shoebox with gifts for children and adults in need.

But it closed down a few years ago because they were inundated with scammers who pretended to be in need to steal or resell the gifts.

I would be contacting the charity, explaining that these gifts had your children's names on them and that you feel that children in actual need have been deprived of these gifts and that you'd like them to check their processes as their charity had been defrauded.

As for MIL - I'd be telling her exactly how low I thought she was, and bugger the consequences.

Where I live, North East England, there were a few organisations/charities who were desperately trying to give away children's gifts on local fb pages, right up to Christmas eve. They kept posting saying 'we still have toys for...' then say boys and girls ages and ask for anyone who needed presents get in touch with them on messenger or let them know of anyone who could do with some help.

Basically, the bar is pretty low and supply exceeds demand for charities at Xmas.

It’s quite a curious tale isn’t it 🤔.

I think it is relevant if they are ages where they wouldn't understand why presents are being returned- eg. preschool and young primary vs pre-teens/ teens
.

Surely it means the kids will get a few things each rather than just one.

But that is an incredibly generous donation

I think you need to tell the charity. Otherwise she will do it again next year.

I think they had to because a lot of families were on the bones of their arses while waiting for a referral.

I suppose sometimes people don't get paid on time and if they're living hand to mouth, being able to skip the referral would really help immediately.

Things have clearly changed from when I used to go then

But still agree it’s an embarrassing thing to do when you have the means.

At this time of year, they are overflowing with donations of gifts, likely they had actually encouraged your MIL to do this. One of our local DV charities collected 2000 gift bags from 1 local company alone, I highly doubt there are 2000 individuals who are fleeing DV in our city. I wonder what they do with the items they haven’t gifted on, as they are all wrapped for Christmas particularly.

Yes, this has already been said.

But the OP has given so many details that her MIL would instantly recognise, she'd be much better off name changing rather than changing their ages.

Not that the ages were relevant really anyway.

Added risk involves MNHQ reposting this thread on Facebook.

Lots of foodbanks don't need referrals.

Or community pantries/kitchens.

And many of them do a Christmas gift giving scheme.