My mother used to give my sons the strangest gifts...For my oldest son's tenth birthday she gave him a box of used makeup...obviously used makeup...she would send them copies of The Law Review Journal to which she had a subscription. One Christmas she asked me what sizes my very tall big teen boys wore...Yeah we could use some new clothes for school....I gave her all the sizes and wants. She sent one pair of worn out woman's canvas shoes in a size eight. Even I don't wear a size eight. I asked her what was her thinking on this and she said she said she thought they could share, so I handed each kid a shoe and said "bon apatite" We all had a good laugh on this one. Now Mom was not poor and her Sib's always got a spendy high class decor gift. My boys were her only grand children too. We came to expect she would send some basically used and unusable gift and always got a good laugh out of it. After a while they becan to look forward to grandma Kathy's gifts, we would open them right away and have a guessing game as to what she was thinking when she chose it. I would always get all her old Christmas cards from the previous year. Now she was not a big re cycler and would often throw out only slightly worn things in order to buy new. Some times she would send me her old clothes, she was very petite and a size two...I am most definitely not. Still it was good fabric. I once made a nice poncho for myself out of one of her old cast off coats. So I guess it all worked out...either we got clothes to upcycle, paper for the wood stove, or a good laugh. My very grown, now they are the grandpa, sons still get a laugh over those strange gifts...