The Viral “Don’t Gift My Kids” List Parents Everywhere Can Relate To

The holidays are a time for giving, but as you scramble to place last-minute orders and finish wrapping gifts, it’s worth considering this: the presents that delight little ones might not always thrill their parents. Some gifts can be downright frustrating—or even a source of holiday chaos.

To help you avoid gifting a headache, Kylie Kelce, mom of soon-to-be four and wife of retired NFL star Jason Kelce, shared her now-viral “Don’t Gift My Kids” list on her podcast, Not Gonna Lie. The list highlights some obvious culprits and sneaky annoyances that every parent can relate to.

1. No Toys That Require More Than Five Minutes of Assembly

Picture this: it’s Christmas morning, and your child tears into a box with uncontainable excitement. The problem? It’s packed with 87 pieces, a hefty instruction manual and hours of assembly ahead. Kelce is over it. “Don’t bring them a toy that requires assembly because a kid sees a box and sees the picture of the toy, they immediately want to play with it,” she says. Her advice is simple: “If you’re going to give someone something that requires assembly, either do it yourself or consider something else.”

2. No Glittery Gifts Unless It’s Sealed

Glitter may be magical to kids, but to parents, it’s a never-ending curse. Kelce gets it. “This is coming from a mom of three girls—pretty much everything we got has glitter on it—and it makes their hearts so happy. I can’t veto glitter as a whole, but I need you to get something where the glitter is sealed. I need it attached to that surface. I need it not leaving it.” Because once the glitter gets loose, it’s everywhere—and no amount of vacuuming will ever reclaim your carpets.

3. No Volume Control? Not In My House

Noisy toys without volume control are a no-go. Kelce recalls the year Wyatt received an electric drum set with just two settings—on and off. “I tried taping over the speaker, putting it on a blanket—I couldn’t get it to stop assaulting everyone’s ears,” she says. The drum set lasted one week before being retired to the bottom of a cabinet. The following year, the same well-meaning gift giver brought another drum set, this time with volume control. It stayed, but Kelce admits, “There’s still a deep amount of guilt associated with the fact that I hid a Christmas gift from my child because I couldn’t stand to listen to that damn thing for one more minute.”

4. No Living Creatures

Anything with a heartbeat should be off the table. “Let’s be real—you’re not giving it to the kid; you’re giving the responsibility to the parent,” she points out. “I’m already proud of myself when I can keep three children alive each day. I don’t need to be working on any more pets, especially ones I haven’t chosen to bring into my household.”

5. No Toys With Too Many Pieces

Kelce knows all too well the curse of toys with endless small parts. “Eventually, some pieces will end up under the couch, in the trash, or—honestly—sometimes in the fireplace, which is basically a pit of despair in our house.” And when the inevitable happens and pieces go missing, what’s left is an incomplete set and a disappointed kid.

6. No Toy Weapons

This one should go without saying—but here we are. “We’ve received a couple of toy weapons, and let’s just say, my kids have proven they haven’t earned the trust required for them. They’ll try to take each other out. I don’t want to mediate that kind of chaos again,” Kelce adds. Kelce wraps up by noting that everyone should try to donate to their local toy drives this year and it’s never too late to donate—especially if you receive some of these gifts.

Parents across social media chimed in to share their agreement and their own gifting pet peeves. “No toys without an off switch. My mom got my son a trash truck that doesn’t turn off and has no volume control. I want to throw the damn thing out the window,” one parent vented. Another added, “No gifts that require batteries unless you provide the batteries too. No one wants to listen to a child whine about the toy not working because Mom and Dad didn’t have 8 AAA batteries lying around.”

Some parents even offered creative solutions, like prioritizing experiences over toys. “Our daughter answered the grandparents’ question of ‘What to get?’ with: Experiences, not toys. So, we got them a one-year zoo membership, and their granddad gifted them a trip to Hershey Park,” shared another parent.

This year, consider ditching the glitter, excess pieces, and noise for gifts that parents—and kids—can truly enjoy.