worst x-mas present ever recieved

[mayhew]

[QUOTE=sprucie;2054841]

My husband is just downright clueless about what a good gift is, and for our first x-mas together, he got me a broom. :eek: Most years he just hasn’t bothered to get me anything. :rolleyes: This year I got smart, got the gift for myself and told him it was his gift to me. :winkgrin:[/QUOTE]

Ha! My boss and BO got us a broom for mother’s day (we’re both evil stepmothers, so don’t get a lot of acknowledgement from the kids). Mine didn’t do anything for me, which I guess I’m used to. Hers got her something for the first time ever–a pair of work gloves for the barn. Her husband came by and mentioned that they had gotten them for her, and that she was so pleased because it was the first time that they had done anything. My DH popped up with “Oh, I didn’t know stepmothers counted.”

[caffeinated]

My ex got me a paper shredder for christmas once.

:dead:

I think things now are MUCH better… this one is a brilliant gift buyer- last year for christmas he sponsored a pony at DEFHR as a gift to me. Made me feel more than idiotic that the video game I’d gotten him, thinking it was new, had actually been out since september and he already had it.

[Czar]

@Kestrel;2055014

I make sure to provide Mr. Kestrel with my Wish List, complete with web sites or photos of requested items. He usually gets something that isn’t on the list.

I too draw up a very detailed list but inevitably receive random items that were definitely NOT on the list :lol:

Last year it was a horse shaped pen with these little buttons that you push to make the horse “box”…our dog thought it was the coolest gift ever :yes:

To date, the worst present ever received was from my “Oma” (god bless her, she buys for EVERYONE in our very,very large family including SO’s)…the gift was a white lunch pail with a standardbred racing on the front :lol: I ride hunters but it was a nice thought!

[archieflies]

[QUOTE=Mirakel;2054692]
My grandmother used to give us soap for Christmas…bars of soap, literally. Every year from ages 3-7, soap.[/QUOTE]

Aww… I have no clue why, but one of my most precious possessions when I was young was a box of decorative, very smelly, Christmas soaps my grandmother gave me when I was maybe 3 or 4. I was never close to her, but smelling those soaps always made me feel close. After she died when I was 12 I took them out to look and smell all the time. My dad’s mom always tried to get us good gifts, despite being very old and poor… the best ever being a Trapper Keeper with a purple butterfly on it when I was 8… but my grandfather just gave me a $5 bill every year…

I didn’t think I had gotten any terrible gifts, but this thread has sparked some memories…

When I was 10 or 11 an older cousin gave me a bracelet of head-to-tail lined up pewter zebras. Guess she thought they were horses… now her kids are into horses and I think I may have passed it on to them. Not a bad gift, just always struck me as funny.

My other grandmother (mom’s mom) used to give great gifts (my very first riding lessons were a Christmas gift from her and my much older brother, and I got a $100 check from each of them every year thereafter to pay for lessons), but she’ll be 89 on Christmas Day this year, and her shopping has become questionable. On a trip to New England a few years ago, she brought back underwear from an outlet mall for all the women in the family…

She went to China in January this year (the old lady travels like crazy- its amazing) and brought back a bunch of mini Terra Cotta soldiers and jeweled elaphants for everyone. I missed the “handing out of the gifts” party, but somehow, while the rest of my family got weird gifts, I ended up getting a STUNNING pearl drop necklace (and a $1 streetcorner fake Rolex she bought for fun!)… and despite all the close family that was there when she was handing out gifts, the other pearl drop necklace went to my drug-addict cousin’s live-in druggy girlfriend. ??? There were some hurt feelings for a while, but I don’t think she noticed.

She just came back from New Mexico (really, she didn’t have to bring us anything- we’ve all been to NM many times…) but everyone ended up with these awful adobe-looking southwest design bells that still have the gas station gift shop tags on them.

And once, when I was little she went to Australia, and brought me a very pretty (for a 6 year old) opal kangaroo necklace, My brother (who was 8) got a sweater that she bought at the airport in Houston because she forgot about him. He was 22 when I broke it to him that the sweater was not from Australia after alll… he was crushed…

Bless her heart, my dear grandmother needs to just stop bringing back gifts from her travels. We love her like crazy, and she’s a very generous woman… but her decision making skills have taken a dive lately.

[archieflies]

Had to add one more thing, still not horsey at all…

My Dad NEVER buys my mom gifts. She gets him gifts for every ocassion, and I have only once in my life seen him buy her something. After 40 years of marriage and at least 20 of no gifts, he went out and bought her this insanely expensive professional juicer for Christmas a few years ago… so she could make him fresh orange juice every morning. She took it back and didn’t talk to him for a while.

Now my husband jokes about getting me a juicer. I just tell him I’m gonna give him cash.

[Trixie]

My Dad NEVER buys my mom gifts. She gets him gifts for every ocassion, and I have only once in my life seen him buy her something. After 40 years of marriage and at least 20 of no gifts, he went out and bought her this insanely expensive professional juicer for Christmas a few years ago… so she could make him fresh orange juice every morning. She took it back and didn’t talk to him for a while.

My mother and I have the holidays down. She tells me what she wants, my father gives me his credit card. I buy it, whatever it is, in whatever color and size she wants, and have it wrapped, then give it to dad with credit card back. That way, she gets what she wants and he doesn’t buy her another stupid perfume gift set. When he was guessing, it was just disasterous for all.

[MeredithTX]

This thread is hysterical!!! :lol:

I can’t remember any specific gifts, but I know every year it’s a fight for my sister and I to not crack up laughing when we open the gifts from our maternal grandmother. She buys the weirdest stuff! Our other granpartens just give us cash now that we’re older.

I did get a cherry pitter as a wedding gift recently, and that was the oddest thing I’ve ever received. I tried to take it back to a million stores, but I can’t figure out where it’s from! Who seriously needs a cherry pitter?

[mayhew]

You can also pit olives with them, you know.

[classicsporthorses]

Okay first I think llsc’s was the funniest post. Reminds me of my husband’s aunt and my mom. One year my mom got all of us those different sized stretchy bowl covers-they look like clear shower caps.

My DH is very good about gifts, sometimes going way overboard, but he knows to ASK first, BUY second and always keep the receipt if I need to return it.

Last night he wanted to show me what he wanted to get for me. Basically one of those tanks with bra’s in them, you know the exercise kind.

I wear them all the time on the farm as the longer tanks keeps me, and "the girls, much more toasty warm BUT I need at least a built in bra being as well endowed that I am.

His worst fault in all of this is that he can’t wait for Chrismas, or any gift giving ocassion for me to actually open a wrapped gift so I always get mine weeks early and/or know every gift I am getting.

[Sabovee]

@classicsporthorses;2055610

Okay first I think llsc’s was the funniest post. Reminds me of my husband’s aunt and my mom. One year my mom got all of us those different sized stretchy bowl covers-they look like clear shower caps.

I call those “Hats for food”

[Mtn_trails]

“My worst Christmas was when my husband and I exchanged our gifts before we went out of town. On Christmas a.m. everyone in the extended family opened the stockings I had filled, opened presents from my husband and me and exchanged presents with each other. I didn’t even have a candy cane or a new chap stick in my stocking. No gifts under the tree. Guess that told me where I stood.”

That is so sad.

My worst was when my ex and I were out Christmas shopping and were looking at watches and I picked out one I really liked and showed it to him. What do I get? A different watch that I hated but he thought it was the one “I should have” because it was more “business-like.” The watch I really liked? He bought and gave to his mother. I returned the watch “I should have” and bought my own gift. Loser.

My current DH is gift challenged but he does try - - sometimes. The first year he gave me a hideous pair of horse earrings. They were horse heads with a dropped red stone. Blech! Couldn’t lose them fast enough. Then there was the ID bracelet. Didn’t those go out about 30 years ago? A couple of years ago he gave me this ultra-feminine watch, the kind that has the miniscule dial and very dainty. I took it back and the store clerk remembered him and said he told her I’d probably return it and get one I liked. The reason he gave that watch to me was so I would return it and know what price range I was looking at.

[mcm7780]

@caffeinated;2055326

My ex got me a paper shredder for christmas once.

:dead:

I actually asked my boyfriend for a paper shredder this year! :lol: BUT, it’s one thing to get one if you ask for it – it’s a pretty bad present to just randomly get!

[caffeinated]

@mcm7780;2055742

I actually asked my boyfriend for a paper shredder this year! :lol: BUT, it’s one thing to get one if you ask for it – it’s a pretty bad present to just randomly get!

The year before he got me a blender.

That blender is now over four years old, and has never been used. heh.

[Teach]

Ah, my people!

My paternal Nana totally OWNED this thread; despite getting a list from my mom & liberal consultation every year, she never could keep us separated by likes/dislikes & never really hit the nail. Biggest problem was that she would always get us stuff that she thought we SHOULD like ie: pink & frilly girly-girl clothes for Sis (a tomboy who raised & showed cows) or ultra-trendoid Britney Spears-type stuff for me (shy, serious, bookish). As if buying us this unsuitable stuff would change us into the grandchildren she wished she had. Her last Christmas was truly a masterpiece–very large, ornate gold pinkie ring with big (fake) stone for Brother, who is a farrier who won’t even wear his wedding ring for fear of catching it on a nail & tearing up his finger (he always got “fancier” stuff than us girls, as he is the only boy & very important, don’tcha know :yes: ); Dolly Parton style shiny nylon western shirt complete with 2 inch fringe for Sis, who is a classical dressage freak who believes that color begins with black & ends with white, because “it’s for you to wear at horse shows”; and for me, the actual western rider, a loverly cranberry colored sweatshirt appliqued with kittens (I am well-known far & wide for my general dislike of cats, barn variety excepted–my Sis is the one who actually likes them).

My entire childhood was punctuated by choruses of “Thank your Nana–it was nice of her to think (a very, very little bit) of you!” :lol:

[2DogsFarm]

Merry Freakin’ Christmas!!!

Oh boy - you guys have got me beat by a mile!

My worst horse-related gifts came from my across-the-road neighbor (horseless herself) who horse-sits for me.
The first 2’ tall plastic horse with “real” mane & tail was kinda cute - she even painted him brown to match my bays. He sits on a window ledge in the barn now that the barn cat is not scared by him anymore.
Then he was joined by 3 smaller plastic palominos - they had glitter in their coats and sparkly eyelashes for crissake! They “fell” and had to be disposed of.
When she brought over the near-toddler sized doll dressed in a red hunt coat I had to draw the line - telling her too much clutter was not a good idea in a place so dusty.
Just in time - she had a Western-themed bunkbed (wagon wheel headboards/footboards) she thought I could use in the barn :eek:

She also haunts resale shops for horse-related books and I now have a collection of circa 1950-something books on horsecare and riding.
My, things have - ahem - changed some since then…

[GrayTbred]

Let me preface this by saying that I adore my (non-horsey) sis and appreciate every moment I spend with her, but …

She gifted me with a jen-yew-wine Texas cowgirl shirt complete with fringe, buckin’ bronc stencils and other frightening accoutrement.

Just the thing for a nice Jewish girl dressage girl from Detroit to wear next time she’s honky-tonkin’ in Austin. I ooh’ed and aah’ed over the shirt appropriately, then into the closet it went for perpetuity.

[Mozart]

My MIL, bless her heart tries to give me horsey gifts. At least she acknowledges that I have interests that are separate from the rest of her family.

Sometimes they work, sometimes…not so…
The year she happened to go to the Scottdale Arabian show, (why, I have no idea. It was supposed to be in tribute to me…somehow) she bought a very very handy hay bag that I still use in the horse trailer. Totally lucked out.

Another year, after another trip, I got a metal Amish carriage and horse garden ornament. It does look rather fetching among the perennials.

But then came the year of the disfigured leather horse hand made in India. God knows it might have been actual horse hide. YECCHH. If a real horse was that misshapen it would have been humanely detroyed. I gave it to another horsie friend who weirdly collects tacky horse things to display in her barn. To each their own.

Wonder what it will be this year? Good or bad?

[_r.oo_and_l.ulu]

I love this thread. :lol:

I’ve always gotten pretty good gifts, but one year my dad bought me barbie stamps. It’s funny now, but at the time I cried for 2 weeks because I was afraid I’d hurt his feelings if I told him I didn’t like them and/or I didn’t use them.

I’m older, but I still have those guilty tendencies. I’m always afraid I’ll hurt the other person’s feelings.

[archieflies]

[QUOTE=mcm7780;2055742]
I actually asked my boyfriend for a paper shredder this year! :lol: BUT, it’s one thing to get one if you ask for it – it’s a pretty bad present to just randomly get![/QUOTE]

Wierd… my husband just called me and said thats what he wanted, but he felt bad asking me for a paper shredder, so he asked his brother instead.

On the downside of being given explicit instructions for gift-buying, my SIL always mandates who buys what for her, my bro, and their children. I got “assigned” a particular Barbie this year for one of the kids… and I waited and waited… I saw it in several stores and ignored it. And now I have looked at Wal-Marts and Targets in three different cities, and sent out other people looking too, and even searched online. It no longer exists. And I need it by Saturday for the gift exchange. Poo. Luckily, the kid probably doesn’t even know that she “wanted” it anyways.

[tullio]

My grandmother used to get me long underwear to wear while out riding my pony around Christmas. I don’t know why or who told her this was a good idea, but that’s what she always got. Long underwear is nice but giving a kid long underwear EVERY year? That’s a whole lotta longjohns.

My worst non-horsey gift would be… a crate of computer paper. My dad thought I “used a lot of paper” so he got me a box. I was around 14 at the time. I did not appreciate the paper. I think the box is still in my old room at my parents’ home… 3/4 full.

I honestly can’t complain about my DH (the BEST gift giver, EVER) or my in-laws. We all make a big deal out of choosing great Christmas gifts and most of the family is easy to shop for. It takes forever to shop but there’s nothing like seeing someone be truly delighted with their gift!