My son is turning 4, and my MIL has sent a toy steam train engine made of metal with many sharp, uncovered edges and corners. I think it is obviously just intended to be a decorative piece and is not a child's toy at all (it hasn't come in any manufacturer's packaging, no idea where it is from). My husband thinks the boy will love it (which is true, he's obsessed with trains) and that we can just file down the sharp edges and it will be fine. But I count at least 50 sharp corners/edges on that thing. Good luck making it safe, I say.
I'm resolved that my son will never see it, because why frustrate him by letting him see a toy that I can't allow him to play with? But do I tell my MIL that I'm not giving it to him, or just say "thanks" and leave it at that. She lives in the US and seldom visits, so she may never know that the boy isn't playing with it. Moreover, my son has a twin sister who has received several nice gifts from MIL, so do I buy him a replacement gift and tell him it's from his grandmother so that he won't notice how imbalanced the number of gifts from Grandmother are? I really think it's my husband's job to tell his own mother that she needs to pay attention to basic safety standards when selecting gifts for young children, but he refuses to acknowledge that the toy is unsafe in the first place and he hates criticizing his mother.
Finally, my son has a twin sister who is getting several nice birthday gifts from MIL, so do I buy him a replacement gift for the train and tell him it's from his grandmother so that he won't notice how imbalanced the number of gifts from Grandmother are?