to wish my mum would stop buying DS toys from car boots/charity shops?

[cupcakesandbunting]

Without wanting to sound really ungrateful, I'm starting to get a little miffed with my mum buying DS stuff from car boots/charity shops. Not because there's anything up with shopping at these places but I think that some things you buy from them, some you don't.

For instance, today she brought him round a Roary the Racing car race track (bit like a mini Scalextric set. She bought it and thought it was good cos she got it for £2 and it was newish-looking and they're £25 in the shops. She totally doesn't get the concept that it's being sold brand-new in box for £2 for a reason Anyway, we spend ages setting it up for DS and without being mean, it's shit. The cars don't stay on the tracks, the wires to the controllers keep coming detached from the battery box etc. It takes forever to set up and DS loves it. He wants to play with it all the bloody time and I don't have 30 minutes to set it up each time he wants to play with it. It's alright her buying it then swanning off and leaving me to deal with this very impractical toy. Sorry, I know I sound like a cow

Aside from this, she takes no notice of whether there is a kitemark on the box with a lot of things or whether bits can easily come off when DS plays with it. DS has plenty of toys without having loads of junk toys piled on top. Today I snapped a bit and said "maybe we can keep this track at nanna's to play with?" and she wouldn't let me send it back with her because she didn;t want to spend ages setting it up at hers! Ha!

I know I sound ungrateful and I expect I'll get told as much but just needed to vent...

Like this one?

YANBU.

Whilst we were away my BIL and some mates came to stay in our flat.

And she sent over two bin bags of old sheets and towels as her friend June was having a clear out.

I lugged it all straight to textile recycling, where it should have gone in the first place.

She buys the girls, ages 4 and 6, tatt with tiny parts that break and it's like DS, 18 months, is just waiting to pick up or find the bits and try to eat them.

I agree about the kite mark, too, particularly due to lead poisining risk (especially in a baby DS's age).

Ah, no, but thanks

I'm after one of those old fashioned soft toy dogs that they can push along- sort of like www.ragtail.co.uk/photogallery/nelsononwheels.jpgthis

If anyone (including the OP's mum) sees one reasonably priced, let me know.

Ooops www.ragtail.co.uk/photogallery/nelsononwheels.jpgthis

Tethersend, you can have my bloody dog on wheels. MIL bought it and the damn thing is indestructible...and god knows I've tried

Will even take my weight

Oh for the love of all that is holy

www.ragtail.co.uk/photogallery/nelsononwheels.jpg

Ooooh, KnottyLocks- I'll bite your arm off you know, I've been looking for one for ages.

pronoia i never tell my MIL the gift is unwanted. i try to look happy and let DS play with it, as he clearly likes bits of tiny plastic, until all the bits come off, after MIL has left but usually within 3 days, then i moan to DH and throw it out without telling anyone.

That's my modus operandi as well, Concordia.

Some cute dogs on wheels here

Much nicer than the bizarrely much loved felt-tipped mutt in our house.

Embrace the Bring and Take, or Dump and Run, that we have locally - nice people book the community centre, somebody there to PAT test the electrical stuff, somebody else making hot drinks, tables labelled by category and everyone brings all their stuff... oddly enough you frequently find some great things in among the trashed Etch-a-Sketches and random lumps of varnished wood. Then said nice people sort out the remainder and recycle whatever they can. The idea is to avoid landfill with it.

Or have an actual jumble sale and raise some money for the Children All Say Hi fund, I mean a proper charity?

I used to have one of those tethersend - my Mum got it for me for my 1st birthday...Back when she bought nice, quality toys instead of the mountains of ugly/cheap/pointless rubbish she buys for my two DC now

She certainly of the quantity not quality mindset these days (or alternatively the 'bigger is better' attitude - You'd swear she'd never seen how small our house is!)

OP you are nuts

At least the junk your mum brings is second hand... so low environmental cost. My MIL brings heaps of cheap plastic tat every visit and it is all new and in excessive packaging (but still falls apart at first use / doesn't work / wrong size etc). I give the best of it to charity, but as for the rest - it grieves me to chuck it all away when she leaves. What a waste of resources.

bit harsh?
I totally love it that my mother finds fabulous bits and pieces in the jumble sales of Kent for dd; I have neither time nor inclination to go seeking out jigsaws and Disney tat, yet I think it is fabulous that she finds these bargainous items.
DD is 3, it's all good to her - I would spend a fortune on equivalent rubbish in the shops and am so grateful.
I mean, what's not to like?

Like I said Lionsarescary I have no problem with second hand stuff like books/clothes/bric-a-brac but I don't think that toys for LOs are a good idea.

YAB(a bit)U...but I sympathise. My MIL buys mountains of tat for the kids (new, she wouldn't dream of setting foot in a charity shop ) and it's usually noisy or comes in a million pieces. Or horribly frou-frou frocks for DD. I used to get highly pissed off with it (actually if I'm honest I still do), but the kids love her for it, they're only little for such a short time so it won't last & it gives her great pleasure to waste her money on crap that makes them happy. Try to go with the flow

I think you've touched a nerve with me tonight cupcakes, as I've just been sorting out the latest collection of junk left here at the weekend. Sorry if I was a bit jumpy!

It just occurred to me that maybe the low quality toys your mum is buying second hand are the same ones I gave away to charity after my MIL's last visit?!

No, seriously, I try very hard to only give good quality stuff to charity shops (after watching Mary Portas series last year).

lmao at tethersend.

YANBU - but if it doesn't work aren't you close enough to explain that it's no good and it needs to be donated to a charity shop or recycled?
It may help her understand what's a good toy or not - why not say, mum, if you're heading to a boot sale can you look out for a such and such, it's the only thing we need, we are just about ok with other stuff?
OR Sorry mum, he loved that toy but it broke, sadly it didn't have the kitemark, but if you see such and such that would be a great find...give her a Car Boot Challenge lol!

My son has no grandparents, my mum won't even acknowlege her grandkids existence and it breaks my heart on a daily basis, I would love him to be lavished upon, and any gift is a gift after all. She won't mind you binning rubbish stuff if it cost two quid surely???
Do you want to loan her out to me? After tethersend of course

Tethersend - I've often wondered who buys weird stuff like that - why would you want a dog on wheels when you can get dogs that walk (toys not real of course - can quite see the difference there!!!)?? (genuinely perplexed...)

cupcakesandbunting - I feel your pain. However, really, just grin & bear/bare it... he'll only be little and love it for a while then it will be over, he'll show no interest in it and he'll ask Granny if she's seen x cos it's really, really cool....(hint hint) They are both getting pleasure out of it. If it's genuinely broken/too small/fucking annoying just bin it and tell him you can't find it - he'll soon forget it. Try to remember that as annoying as she is - she means well.

It is true, most of us only really value our parents when we no longer have them - try to ignore the bits that drive you up the fucking pole!!

My Mum does this, and I think it's brilliant. We treat charity shop toys like a toy library; she buys them for 50p each or wahtever, and when our daughter outgrows them we wash 'em and donate them to another charity shop. So it's more like a hiring fee, and since it was secondhand to start with none of us really care what condition they end up in.

I prefer this to my MIL, who buys new expensive horrible loud things which we therefore can't give away.

YABU OP and need to get a bit of a grip IMO

YABU - toys that are a pain to set up are a menace, let alone having to play car races all day.

I would, oh no, 'lose' a vital piece so it no longer works and then 'lo and behold' find it again at the back of a cupboard on a wet, cold winter's afternoon.

Oooops, I meant YANBU!