Please don’t ever buy my kids..?

[Kibble19]

Lighthearted, before anyone gets upset about people being ungrateful.

What gifts would you stick on the banned list?

For me, it’s the classic glitter and slime-based toys. Special mention to toys with 4000 loose parts too.

I loved it when Dd got Lego, especially before she was able to build the kits herself and I had to help (read: do it myself!). I adore building Lego kits.
Most of the people who buy for my dd know what she likes and will use and those who don’t tend to ask for ideas which I’m always happy to give.
But yeah, slime and kinetic sand suck.

We love Playmobil!

My mum brought my then 3 year old a microphone 🙄 this kid does not draw breath, she even talks in her sleep 😆 so that was fun.

Makeup, slime/anything that could ruin carpets and clothes with cringey sayings on them.

Rubbish sweets full of E numbers. Check out the ingredients on Skittles. These aren’t the worst!

Anything that makes an electronic noise.

Had to look them up as don't have young kids any more. Pretty scary about the kids getting them stuck in their hair.

When my daughter was at primary school, I always banned any kind of make up, nail varnish etc. But people still bought her things like that, so they went straight to the charity shop.

I only clicked on this thread as I thought someone was trying to actually buy your children. I was most confused.

it’s obvious now 😂🤦🏻‍♀️

My contribution would be that DS has dyspraxia and inevitably he would get given lovely gifts that needed fine motor skills. He’d want to try, wouldn’t be able to do it - cue lots of tears and frustration.

I’m afraid I have to disagree - the sound of a very badly played violin is much worse! I had to threaten my mother in law with very dire consequences when she wanted to buy one for my daughter for Christmas one year.

Glitter and any musical instrument especially a harmonica ( looking at you DF)
I think I had more fun with the play dough.
I wasn’t bothered about clothes if weren’t to my taste they worn them for messy play.

My sister came up with plastic. Put in all baptism, birthday etc invites. I bought them a tin whistle and a drum (twins) for
their first birthday. Nearly broke her but didn’t ruin the aesthetic 🤦🏻‍♀️

My son bought one in a souvenir shop when he was about eight. He's nearly 20 now and I think it still on his dresser half done. Lol

Oooh I’m trying to think as MIL bought my kids a toy shop’s worth of toys. Probably the toys that required adults to participate as it always led to arguments and screaming as my youngest wanted to be independent or couldn’t cope with losing. So as long as they could play with the thing without help, I didn’t mind.

This is why I always ask my grown up children what their children would like.

i promise I will never buy kinetic sand again!

ps what can I buy? Ages 3, 5 and 6

Anything loud - and yes, that includes kindly relatives who think that a recorder will foster a love of music.

Ohhhh i have found my people. I’m a single parent and my exh and his parents love buying shit to clutter up my house.

For me, it’s:
Slime
Anything with a remote control that I have to keep track of which controller goes with which vehicle
Anything that has its own charger, again I have to keep track of what charges what
Any musical instrument
Kinetic sand, get in the bin
Anything massive
Mini Lego
Fake/ rip off Lego
Anything that is easily breakable
Anything that requires a huge amount of adult supervision
Large amounts of cheap crap. Spend the same amount of money and get something smaller that is decent quality.

I have read this thread and the only conclusion I can come to, other than “don’t buy cheap tat” is that it’s very individual, what different children and households like and don’t like - my DGC love Lego and Playmobil (but it tends to be aeroplanes and boats rather than people with absurdly small accessories - as a child, my DS’s best ever present was a Playmobil pirate ship, but I did glue it together!) - but don’t people ask before buying things? Sweets are something many parents don’t like their children to have, so why would you get them? A previous poster mentioned Haribo - my DD would have them straight in the bin! And my lot were always quite arty, so endless reams of paper and paint and glitter and glue were used in our house - but I did always buy art shop paintbrushes - why would you expect a young person who can’t paint very well to use those awful stiff things that would challenge an adult? So really, it’s just horses for courses - your nightmare present might be what my children would have loved!

Can everyone give their unwanted kinetic sand to me. I love it!

A recorder

Anything that comes with far too many pieces to no extra value.

Like the bath boats set that came with 9 boats. Nine! He's only got two hands.

250 blocks - piss off, they'll get everywhere.

Oh, a set of 48 match the pairs cards - why?!

Agree with noisy toys ,paint/glitter anything with lots of bits .DC are older now .Usually buy vouchers .Amazon or similar .go down well for nieces .Maybe some chocolate or similar so something to open

Even more scary when the kids think it's fun to put them in the adult's hair (me). Spent a Sat evening and Sunday getting them out. Needless to say they got binned!!

Personally I don't understand why anyone would buy young children things that lots of families will have rules about, unless you know for a fact that particular family is ok with it. I've had to bin/hide/get rid of makeup, nail varnish, hideous stripper outfits (angry that the shops even sell them for kids so young tbh), some of the more rubbish sweets/candy (like candy floss, and those tubes of liquid that they lick. Why???). Check with the family or buy something uncontroversial!

My own hated ones (albeit I let the kids keep these 😂) are the "paint your own X" sets. They contain a porcelain thingamabob and a set of about 5 tiny plastic pots of paint with a thimbleful in each - they're attached in a line so they're a nightmare to open without tipping the rest over, and then the kid inevitably insists we have to keep them afterwards, so we have a tub full of the blighters.

Moon (kinetic) sand and Gelli baff...... grade a banned substances in our house.