Worst present anyone ever gave your child? And the best?

[GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER]

I’ll start - youngest BiL gave dd1 a book of cartoon strips entitled Cuba for Beginners.

Dd was 2! So luckily too young even to be disappointed.

I did ask BiL why on earth he’d thought a political book for adults was suitable for a 2 year old.
He said, ‘Well, it does say for beginners…’.

Many years later (dd were mid teens) same BiL did redeem himself by giving them each 2 x £50 notes. That was over 20 years ago now, so it was a lot.

My DD got this from oh so hilarious (now ex) MIL. I wasn’t impressed and she knew I wouldn’t be. I’m pretty sure that’s why she bought it.
The presents didn’t get any better when her son and I split.

Ds once did this to me years ago

It had been mothers day but because they where young teens who had very little money,I told them not to buy me anything but if they wanted to,to go to the shop on the Monday as everything was half price

Ds headed to the shop for something and I got a text message 'mum,ive bought you a present!half price at Sainsbury's!'

He walked proudly through the door,chest puffed out and handed me a box of chocolates

Well,it was a box-temptation had got a bit much on the way home and he'd eaten the lot!

Said he didnt think id notice!

This is disturbing as anything, especially the crop top!

Stupidest present I ever gave my kids was when I put kazoos in their stockings. They found them about 5 am.

I was fuming

I threw it at her and she tried the whole 'I didnt have my glasses on when I bought it'

She doesn't wear bloody glasses!

It was bullshit-either i refused to allow dd to have it (tears 'I bought my dgd a present but her nasty mother refused to let her wear it!') or I if did allow her to wear it ('I cant believe she'd allow dgd to wear THAT!It's disgusting')

Honest to god,it was a minefield and I refuse to play the game

the worst was when we lived in a tiny terraced 2 up 2 down house and MIL gave our baby a GINORMOUS Christmas 2021 edition Percy Pig toy. The kind that is hip height.

Any company making kid’s clothes like that deserves to be shut down.

Sorry, should have added her birthday is late October so far too cold and wet for a 3 year old to enjoy outdoors 😂

5 years ago i bought my then 10 year old daughter a calendar of Zac Efron as she had become quite the fan of High-school musical.

Ended up buying one quickly before xmas and not really looking very closely at just how much he'd aged.

Poor girl was clearly unimpressed as the 30+ muscly bloke infront of her. Oh dear whoops.

Can you imagine getting an even more recent one?! Truly terrifying....

An elderly, and lonely, neighbour used to give us all sorts of junk as an excuse to call round (very out of date food mostly) and we'd reluctantly take it, have a chat and then dispose of it without hurting his feelings. Unfortunately he discover ed that our local charity shops were giving away books that they couldn't sell due to poor condition or inappropriate content. He left literally hundreds on our doorstep whenever I went out despite me begging him not to, and them filling my recycling bin for weeks. I was really cross with him when he gave my young daughter a wrapped hardback for Christmas as 'she liked art ' and it turned out to be a 1970's guide to taking porn photos with a Polaroid, complete with very graphic pictures. We avoided him completely after that

Best - a DJ mixing table for my DD. She loved it and it basically taught her to stand up. I still have lots of cute vids of her wiggling in time to the beat. Worst - David Walliams book for my son!!! Not related to what's going on atm... he's just such a godawful writer. We ploughed through it, he didn't laugh once, and then it quietly got donated to a charity shop.

One Christmas my sister got DD1 a box of 4000 stickers. We had stickers fucking everywhere for ages.

Best gift ever was a trampoline for the garden. Hours were spent on that trampoline. When we moved the trampoline was put up before DCs beds.

My ex mil gave terrible presents, think awful precocious too grown up outfits for DD’s when they were primary aged, crop tops etc, fashion toys like styling heads and make up … ick and as for me, they generally were cheap and nasty from the market clothes and mass produced sweets she knew we didn’t like (i really only eat dark chocolate) we suggested no gifts or something like a membership for an attraction which is the same amount of money but it fell on deaf ears. She still buys inappropriate clothes for my DD’s, they drop them at the charity shop on the way home, they are adults and just won’t wear that sort of thing (think leopard prints and tacky fake leather clothing)

Worst - is this cheap slime and play doh from either home bargains or b&ms. (I can't remember which). While making Christmas dinner my daughter managed to open the box's and destroy my new rug and get it all over the sofa and stuck in her hair. I had to cut it out.
Best - her Tonie box. She listens to it every night to go to sleep

My DC’s grandfather on their dads side, used to save newspaper articles he thought would be of interest and wrap them up.

Worst: men’s scented soap on a rope. From MIL. For two year old DS.

Best: DD was given a soft toy giraffe a few months after she was born. Thought she would be indifferent to it (much like DS with his soft toys and soap on a rope) but she LOVES it. Sleeps with it, lugs it about, pets it, “feeds” it.

5yo has just received a 10+ science kit with several poisonous items…

Inline skates for my then 3 year old.

Worst gift? Easy. My sister, who has refused to ever even meet my now secondary school aged son, once sent him a "you matter" affirmation cord bracelet thing as a gift. To the child that doesn't matter enough to take up any of the invitations to meet him 🤷

She, sister, has three sons

This was the point that my son asked not to get future gifts from her/them

To be fair, if I had to make a top 5 worst gifts, they'd all be from the same, completely tone deaf source

When my younger son was 3 months old, his Christmas present was a second hand pair of dr marten boots, with lots of wrinkles and scuffs, in a size 1 (adult) and his older brother got a second hand paint your own mug set. It might have been fun but the paints were so old that they had dried up and were unusable.
They were from DH’s step mother who had plenty of money but none for us! When DH’s father died, we never bothered with her again. Basically, we gave her back what she’d given us.
Best presents for both of them was definitely Lego. They played with it endlessly for years.

None because I couldn't care less what our kids got it's the love and thought behind them so no present is ever bad to us for them

Why was that the worst if she loved them?

Yes, a whole stable full of ponies sounds great.
Hiding half of them seems like a dick move??

My DD was given a plain Boots toothbrush. Must of cost 89p. She was polite and said thank you but as she helped choose the cute Sylvanian family (about £20) she gave to the girl in return she looked at me like ‘what’?!?
I hate to say it but probably the best gifts have been money. My DD got $100 from my sister last time we were in the States and got a HUGE haul from the thrift shop. She bagged a leather blazer, two velvet jackets, a tweed blazer, two skirts, two jumpers and four pairs of boots/shoes - all for $100! We needed an extra suitcase to bring it all back!

When my son was about 5, he was given adult 3d problem solving puzzles. Clearly not intended for a child. Just weird!