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.

A frigging harmonica!!!

A pet

When our kids were little my pet hate was cheap, badly written kids' books where the rhymes don't even scan. This was before AI so I bet this problem has got exponentially worse now.

Technology... but no one listens to me.

My kid had their first bloody tablet before they where 6 months old as a suprise xmas present from a family member and everyone else (including DH) insisted it harmless and just let granny buy it.

Nearly every fight my kids have is over tablets somehow, despite having a dozen they will both want the same one at the same time or more commonly they can't work it (especially my toddler) so constantly moan its not doing what they want but they don't know how too but also moan if you take it off them so theres no winning.

I'm not a an old school 'you must only have a stick and a rock coz that what I had' type but I just don't understand why a BABY/TODDLER needs advanced technology. I would have got it more around age 5/6 year old. They have like 3-4 tablets each because different family member insisted on buying them one.

Same with smart watches, Alexa's, phones and a bunch of other random tech most of which is expensive (and makes me uncomfortable accepting) and which my kids have never asked for or looked at. They have more than they could ever use and they none of us know how to use half of it (I'm completely techno-challanged so I can't set this stuff up).

My younger kids would be happy with a pack of crayons (honestly it when they play nice and are quietest) and my teen has everything he needs already (just 1 game console that he uses and 1 computer for school work, doesn't use anything else, doesn't even like phones) and hates having too much 'stuff' lol.

Toy electric guitar (thanks DB).

A Vtech toy that seemed to have no off switch and came to life noisily when anyone moved near it. DH took the batteries out.

But Lego - love it! We’ve got loads of it, and it brought so much joy. Both of ours could sit patiently on Christmas afternoon building a set. I was sad when the Lego years ended.

We love craft stuff, lego, play doh etc and play with those for years, the worst thing ever was a microphone and wee speaker set he can carry around. Cue attempting to rap, telling really random jokes as a comedy routine and just talking normally into it just making it mega loud 😅

Oh and my mother in law in her infinite wisdom getting our at the time 3 year old a tablet

Slime/playdoh. When she was was younger Peppa Pig was banned.

When mine were babies/toddlers - electronic noisy toys that only had one purpose (to annoy adults).

Anything made of the cheap plastic that breaks as soon as a child touches it.

Replica board games or puzzles where the pieces are flimsy.

I don't mind slime, my daughter has for an extensive collection that clutters up my dining table daily along with forty million different kinds of bracelet beads, but glitter is the one big no in this house.

Apart from that, 'letterbox' gifts that are 1/3 leaflets and 2/3 tat.

Tiny bouncy balls. Kids can fit them in their mouth and choke on them. Yet I found them in every party bag she got!

The pile of cheap craft sets I know I'll be 'assisting' DD to make, then they will sit gathering dust on her shelf for 100 years.

When they were younger, really noisy toys or musical instruments. My IL's had form for this until I made them keep those toys at their house.

Our worse ones from memory- recorder (yikes to the screechy noise, a harmonica (ditto), a hideous purple caterpillar that made noises when you pressed buttons on it but had no volume control. Craft kits. Anything sequinny- a relative bought my dd a sequin cushion...?

On the other end of the scale for balance some toys we had our moneys worth out of - a Fisher price Noahs ark with little figures, my girls played and played with that. Barbies of course. Lego. Swing set in the garden.

A French knitting dolly. Fiddly, tiresome, and you can't actually make anything worthwhile anyway.

I was looking on Amazon when I saw that Stephen Mangan was writing books with his sister - all of them seemed to be based on toilet humour. WTF is he doing?

Depends how much you like the parent/child! For close friends I always ask what their kid would like/ need as would rather that than buy stuff for the sake of buying stuff.
For parents you don't like...give a glittery/slimey/fake Lego kit! Lol

OMG I think I just be the worlds most relaxed mum as the only thing I have issue with is bunchems, my 4yo got them tangled in her hair within minutes of opening them once, we narrowly avoided cutting big chunks of her hair off. Everything else I don’t mind, if it’s something we have lots of and I can get away with it, I secretly pushed to one side for regifting, otherwise they just play with it.

i made the decision a long time ago that my house was going to be overrun my kids crap for many years and wasn’t going to fight it.

Lots of teeny tiny things that your hoover will just love!
Tbf depends on the age of the child. When my dd was little she loved Lego, Hamma beads, colouring books, drawing etc but you do need to know if the child will have the patience to sit and enjoy them.

Anything noisy (think toy drum kids, squeaky toys, toys that utter phrases when you squeeze / press a button)
Anything messy (slime, glitter, paints, etc)

Toys that come In a million tiny bits
slime
lollipops

See things like kinetic sand and noisy toys don't bother me. Half my life is getting out the dustpan and brush or listening to them making a bloody racket anyway.

Soft toys. We have about 200 already.

My brother has bought almost ALL of these for my kids... had his own child and asked for only tastefully coloured wooden toys (sad beige childhood style). My kids take great pride in buying the loudest, most obnoxiously coloured things we can for him cos he shouldn't have dished out the pain if he couldn't take it back.

Nephew loves this stuff - and we're talking things like Playmobil here so good quality plastic stuff - hurts less when they go through the throwing stage than wooden toys and has resale value when outgrown.

Crafty/engineering kits that require an adult with an undergrad degree to sit and assist with. That's nothing other than a demand on the parent's time. Come on. Get my child something they can enjoy/complete autonomously or don't bother.

And anything with bits. We're a Lose The Bits kind of family. If I know you well enough to invite you to a birthday, I know you well enough for you to tell we're a Lose The Bits kind of family.

Yes! A friend’s mum is like this - to the point where my friend said (on having her child receive an absolutely massive toy) “How lovely! It can live here so he can play with it when we come over”. When her mum said that she didn’t have room for Absolutely Massive Thing she said she didn’t either (she really didn’t - they lived in a small two bedroom flat).