Worst gift you've ever GIVEN?

[JennsPeeps]

The related thread got me thinking about the worst gift you've ever given.

Be it white elephant or in sincerity, dish on yourself!

Every year I have a fun get-together with girlfriends. It's mostly white elephant. I had found a Santa candy dish at the Goodwill, still in its box, which was destined for the party. Santa Claus had glowing red LED eyes and a motion sensor that turned them on. Better yet, when you moved, Santa's eyes flashed and he cackled, "Ho ho ho... Mewwy Cwistmas" (think of the priest in "Princess Bride"). It was h-i-d-e-o-u-s!! My friends were both repulsed by and morbidly attracted to it.

 

[Rosalind]

White Elephant thing. I was invited by a friend who was involved in the planning, but who gave me sort of minimal information about what exactly was expected, other than you had to show up in costume and bring a gift. I asked what was the spending limit, she said, "it's whatever you can afford, it doesn't matter." Well, I was in college, so I could afford a $10 set of assorted teas. Got there, put the gift on the table, and when the gift-trading started, people were unwrapping $50 gift boxes of spendy liquor. Someone opened my box of tea, and kinda did this

and then left it at the party.

Also am fond of giving especially noisy toys to young children. After a while, their parents tell me that socks and mittens are just fine.

 

[JayBird+16]

I like to think I give pretty good gifts, but every year my Dad gives my Mom something silly like tools for the grill or Rangers Tickets, his fav. team. She smiles throught it and it has become a family joke.

 

[BayCityBabe]

I once bought an acrylic sweater for a boyfriend who had a tendency to overheat. A sweater for a sweater! He never wore it...

 

[Redfeathers]

Like some families, there is a gift that gets stuck in a stocking or in a huge box to disguise it, but it is given (as a joke) every year to every male member of the family. Our family tradition has been going on for over twenty years. It's a roll of black electricians tape. How it started, nobody knows. We will never have to buy the stuff again in this lifetime.

 

[luvmychicknkids]

Alright, I am guilty here.

One year I was headed to my mom's (on Christmas day so nothing was open) and realized I had forgotten a present for my brother! I ran in a gas station and grabbed a mesh stocking filled with little, hard, stale looking, dusty, candy.

It was all they had!!! I felt AWFUL!!!!!

I give my Dad rubber ducks all the time. Several years ago (when I was a kid) a neighbor came over and started yelling at my Dad that he had stolen his granddaughter's rubber duck and he wanted it back. LOL It has long been one of the running jokes in the family so we buy my poor Dad lots of rubber duckies so he won't have to steal them from little girls.

 

[Chicabee19]

Probably some people would say a recently re-gifted unopened box of medium-quality chocolates.

They were nice, I just can't eat a lot of sugar anymore and don't like to waste. If I'm going to eat sugar, it's got to be very high-quality chocolate.

Our surrogate grandma loved them, and she needs to gain some weight, which is why I gave them to her ... but I imagine someone younger would have rolled their eyes.

 

[Promiselandfarm]

My mom does a joke gift every year to my nephews and neices. They were an uptight bunch of better than you group. So as a gag one year she sent skimpy very sexy underwear to everyone. Even sent the son-n-law glow in the dark bikini ones. IT now has become a tradition with her as she finds it so funny.
My personal one was at an orniment swap they all had very expensive collector ones and I got one from Walmart that was filled with candy, I thought it was cute. Needless to say I felt like a heel as I had never been with that group of women before that...and was not invited back either ...so I guess that was the worst gift ever.

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

OK one year I saw these earrings at a store. They honestly looked like something made in a sheltered workshop! They were knitted black yarn with balls of something that looked like dried playdough. They put new territory on the term hideous!

So of course I HAD to have them and I wrapped them very nicely and gave them to my sister. Her face when she opened the box!

I could see her dithering over what she could possibly say!

Until I finally fell apart laughing!

Now every year we have the ugly ear ring exchange. They can't have cost more than a dollar and we hang them on the tree of the person who got them. It is fun and silly and has been going on for ten years now......

 

[redoak]

My father-in-law really enjoys wine. So one year I found a cool label called Fat B------d. That didn't go over so well, so the next year I got him Fat B------d's Wife.