The worst Christmas gift!

My friend received a 2011 diary!

Ha-ha greatnan I also received a foot spa but must confess it is the one with the foot massager so I am very pleased with my gift,my friend helped me decorate not long ago and helped me change the soft furnishings from burgundy to red throughout,so what does she buy me a burgundy table place mat set and she know's I don't have a dining table,she is blonde as well so she has an excuse I think.

That was a perfect present for you then glamma

My sister, who works in Waitrose, gave us a hamper............ full of reduced stuff with the price tags left on! She also told me she wanted the box back that she had put the gifts in........it had the name of an hotel in Brussels on it!!

When I was a teenager, every years without fail, some friends of my parents would by me a peticoat for xmas. This for the girl who hadn't worn anything else but jeans/trousers since she was 10!Were they trying to reform me? or was it a hint to my parents that maybe they should insist that I 'd wear proper clothes? I will never know. My mum didn't mind, she found them useful.

My parents used to get a tin of biscuits every year from a great aunt and uncle. One year they gave them one back and the tins of biscuits stopped. I actually think it was unkind of them - I would love a big tin of biscuits! My sister who clearly does not know me well once gave me a cross-stitch kit. She lives in Canada so there was no need to pretend it was just what I wanted!
I usually try to give consumables - either smellies for girl friends, alcohol for men (and women) This year we gave bottles of (homemade) "Hedgerow" (bullace and damson) gin which went down amazingly well with both sexes!

Chocolate - it takes all my self control not to consume Chocolate and every year I request "no chocolate please" - I am an addict and like an addict of anything have to keep away from it: after all you would not give an alcoholic booze. I know I should use self control but!!!!!

I do a lot of crafting and would love to receive anything in that line, which I have mentioned more than once.

I am addicted to chocolate as well, Pennysue! I cannot have a box in the house without having to finish off the whole lot - usually at a sitting! I've been given a large box of Black Magic and I've had to put it in the cupboard, so I can't see it...my husband doesn't like plain chocolate, so I'll have to give it away!
Our worst present this year 'happened' because 'someone' thought that we were cutting-back present-wise, and didn't want to embarrass us by giving us too much. We received a bag which contained a woolly hat - (the sort you can buy in the Spar shop) for my husband, (I think it was for him...though the person who gave it knows he doesn't wear hats)...a bag of Mars sweeties, an obvious raffle-prize of rather battered toiletries - oh, and 2 cans of Aldi's beer! I was then told off quite heartily by the giver of these delights because I bought her more than I should have done! Maybe that sounds a bit ungrateful, but whenever someone says, "It's the thought that counts", it does make you wonder what they thought of you in the first place!

I keep requesting no chocolate and this year only received a small M and S box with a bottle of cava. 8 chocolates isn't going to do me much harm. But....this morning, a box of fortified wine and spirits Hotel Chocolat chocs came through my letter box - I had ordered one a few months ago and forgotten to cancel so no more would be sent. They're looking at me now..........

Carol it's the way chocolates almost wave and smile at you that always weakens my not very strong defences

Yes, that's what these blighters are doing - I haven't given in yet!

So appealing, aren't they! As I won a box in a raffle I felt duty bound to lead the charge. DIL and GC also helped. DS very smug about abstaining!

If I get any chocs I just open the box when the SIL is about and he clears the lot, saves me eating them

Am I the only member who does not like chocolates very much? I like chocolate coated brazil nuts, but it has to be expensive chocolate, not that powdery stuff. Even then, I could not eat more than about four in a day.
Otherwise, I eat one square of very dark chocolate (at least 80% cocoa solids) every day, but it has to be flavoured with orange or mint.
I don't like biscuits, either, apart from ginger thins, and I hate cake, sugary cereals or sweetened yoghurts. I remember having a 'sweet tooth' as a child, but I was rarely able to indulge it, because of rationing. I don't know when or why I lost it, but now I much prefer fruit, nuts and plain yoghurt if I want a snack.
One daughter was well aware that I did not eat most chocolates, and made sure she bought me a large tin of Roses every Christmas - guess who ate them!

When I was a little girl my aunt bought my sister and me two padded sateen coat hangers each - at a time when we didn't have a wardrobe or more than one dress each!!

I hate mobile phones with a passion, only have one to keep in touch with eldest daughter when we`re on holiday, so a couple of years ago, when hubby started to drop hints about which phone I liked the best, I made it plain (or I thought I did) that I didn`t want a new mobile phone. So come Christmas Day, what had he bought me? 3 guesses!

Every Christmas for about 5 years DH bought me the same pair of Bally boots and every year I took them back, by the end I think he was just buying them to annoy me and still this year he did ask would I like a pair of Bally boots, wont tell you what I said.

When I was a teenager, every pair of nylons was very precious and my aunt always gave me a couple of pairs for Christmas. This was in the days when they came in foot sizes and she always gave me at least one size too big.

Do you remember those gift boxes of handkerchiefs? I vividly remember one Christmas, when I was about twelve, that I received about six of them. I was so disappointed, but I suppose there wasn't much to buy a pre- teenager back then.

Mmmm I loved Bally shoes and boots - pity we weren't on Gransnet in those days, we could have set up a Swapshop!
Was it actually the same pair? Did he have an arrangement with the shop - he bought them/you returned them/he bought them back (in the sales)?
Or, were they very kinky thigh high black patent leather perhaps?

grace they were black leather with tan trim around top and they turned up every year like a bad penny! He must have really liked them or had seen someone who looked good in them and I would return to the shop and exchange them for something else and lo and behold next Christmas morning they were back again, think they had been crossed with a homing pigeon.

My worst present from MIL was 3 stainless steel steak knives and forks to match. Very sharp and expensive. This was followed by the other three to make up a set of six the next Christmas. I was so disappointed as I wanted so many personal things at that time. A bit of jewellery perhaps.

40 years have now passed and my Mil passed away some years ago but every Christmas what pleases me so much when laying the table? The beautiful, sharp, elegant steak knives and forks!

As to chocolates and bisuits etc I bin them! Too much sugar and/or wine gives me migraine.

Mine was being told not to go to my Grand daughters nativity play by my Son and DiL...

hollybubbles