I love gift shopping & try to put a lot of consideration into the individual(s)/event involved. It just makes me happy when I see their faces light up when I hit it just right. I've had a few misses but, fortunately, not many. Christmas '09, my DDIL was tired & stressed. She'd had a difficult year with both her mother seriously ill & I had also contributed to the family's health concerns during '09. They had moved twice with 3 kids in one year, had a job relocation, & their car's engine blew up. For Christmas (and with lots of physical help from DH), I put together a "Here's A Few of My Favorite Things" basket for her including philosophy Hope In A Jar, Micro-Delivery Peel, Purity, a Godiva chocolate candle, a terry cloth wrap to hold her hair up when she gave herself a facial, etc., good quality nail files & clippers, Ojon Swa shampoo & conditioner, spent a few hours making her a hand-painted "Do Not Disturb" sign for the bathroom door, & tucked a package of cookies in with the other stuff. I wrapped the items in a set of new extra fluffy white towels & put everything in a Peterborough picnic basket. I had fun & she must have called me 6 times just to say what a great gift it was & that every time she hung that sign on the door & turned on the shower she knew she had to call again to say, "thanks". But, I have the time to fuss putting things together & because we don't have to buy for dozens of people I can comfortably spend a bit more per person. And, I also don't adhere to the rule of doing for everybody equally at the same time. So, I can spread out the expense over time so everybody gets something special...just not at the same time. About 10 years ago when our kids reached the age where they were starting their own families, taking on mortgages, & working long hours getting their careers established I wrote them each a letter explaining to them that it was my preference that instead of giving me gifts they each send me a hand written note telling me what had gone right during their week or share a funny story of something they'd recently experienced. Now, a decade later, I've got a wonderful collection of my kids' memories that someday when I'm gone they'll get to re-read. Each holiday they share, in these letters, personal things that don't get talked about when we're together. I don't respond to their letters, per se. I find a way to acknowledge something they've written if it's appropriate & always thank them repeating how much it means to me. But, it's lead to an unspoken closeness with my kids that I love & can tell that they feel the same by the words they write. I think responding to their letters would be embarrassing for them. It's just this little "secret" I have with all 3 of them. They tell me their fears but also what they've accomplished. I've learned more about each of them through these letters than in any conversation. I can't tell you how much I love getting their Christmas & birthday letters. Sometimes though they surprise ME! Once I received a cooking class gift certificate at Johnson & Wales from one of my kids as a gift tucked into his letter to me on my birthday. Along those same lines, I also told each of them when they had their own families I expected them to spend Mother's Day with THEIR family & NOT come to visit me. I had my time. Now, it's THEIR turn. I think it helped by giving them permission from me for what I knew they all would want...to spend Mother's Day with their own family. They each call me around Mother's Day but not always on the day itself. Gift giving/receiving can take so many different forms. It means something different to each of us. Problems come in when two people have different expectations. My deceased MIL was a tough one around gifts...I never was able to understand her expectations. As a result, I believe I failed to live up to her desires. I tried everything from handmade items to 18k gold...just couldn't get it right. I finally decided it wasn't my gift choices that were wrong. She just had some type of personal thing in her head around gifts that she didn't share so nobody could please her...maybe, that was the whole point. She wanted to believe we "couldn't get it right". Who knows??? I don't like gift cards although have been known to use them. On my grandson's 16th birthday I gave him a gift certificate for a year's gasoline. (It was an gasoline credit card I allowed him to use for a year.) He'd just gotten his driver's license & it seemed appropriate. Another time one of our kids was taking a get-away weekend to celebrate their wedding anniversary. I asked some innocent questions about their plans & then tracked down a nearby good restaurant, purchased a gift card, & made arrangements to have it placed on their pillow at the hotel. To this day they do not know how they ended up with that dinner. :) Anyway, I love giving gifts. Trying to fit the gift to the event/person is fun for me. I would hate gift shopping if I felt it was an obligation or that I had to somehow keep each present similar to what I got others. Nobody knows what to expect from me, nor when. Sometimes, they might receive an inconsequential Christmas present & then unexpectedly get a mystery package in February. Other times, they might get an elaborate Christmas present & just a book of Dunkin' Donuts certificates for a birthday. They all know though that as the world goes around and time passes their number comes up. Because I try to put a lot of personal thought into each gift I just am not able (mentally or physically) to come up with something just right for everybody just because the calender says it's a certain date. For those presents that are sorta obligatory like weddings of not too close friends, baby showers for the daughter of a second cousin...that kind of stuff...I stick to tradition. I've even given wedding present gift certificates...a gift certificate to a picture framing shop near where that person lived comes to mind. I didn't know the people at all...had never even met them. We used to receive lots of, IMO, inappropriate invitations to weddings of DH's staff's family members. Hard gifts. For a baby shower where the Mom to be isn't somebody I know well, I like to give a high quality blanket. Hard to go too far wrong, IMO. I usually buy white. I don't care if it gets dirty! I just make sure it's washable. lol Oh, also once I give a gift I forget about it. I don't care if somebody gives it away. If I were to care one way or another it would, IMO only, no longer be a gift. Gifts are not supposed to have strings attached to them. My Mom told me that gifts with strings were not really gifts...they were salaries. If my DDIL would have chucked last year's Christmas present I would have thought, "Well Tricia, guess you got it wrong that she was stressed, needed some alone time, and something to pamper herself in the process of being alone would be good. Think harder next time her number comes up!" :) This is a fun thread & in answer to the original question...it would not hurt my feelings if you returned a gift I'd given. I would probably feel badly that I'd failed to hit the right chord but that would be my fault...not yours. I never buy anything from a registry. I don't even look at registries. /tricia

I have not sold back any BOOKS, but I DID sell back an XBOX 360.. It was in PRISTINE condition amd had been purchased FROM them (which is why they solicited me to ask if I wanted to sell it back) and I had all parts, instructions, etc.. They quoted me a price, but when the system arrived at their facility, they sent me a revised price MUCH MUCH MUCH lower.. I am a HUGE HUGE HUGE fan of Amazon...am a Prime member and have been buying from them since the early years when they often included a little gift in the box (lile a pack of Post-It notes or similar) but I was extremely disappointed in this transaction.

I just received a gift today, a pet supplement that seems to be some kind of practical joke that I have not taken well! I thought it might be a random promotion gone wrong, but Amazon told me it was sent by a person and not a company. They would not give any more details. The only option left that I can see is to deactivate my Amazon account and return any future Amazon deliveries to me unopened, with 'not known at this address' on them, because I will know that they are not something I have ordered. I asked the Amazon chat help person to send this comment to the sender so they don't bother sending me anything else via Amazon. I also asked them to share it with Amazon management but they didn't say anything about that. There is no option to block gifts, i.e. to only received deliveries from Amazon that you have ordered. They need this option in case someone is being harassed, which, in this case, I believe I am. It should be relatively easy to block orders not from your own account, but they said they can't do this.

@party_music50 Yes, you still get your CC cash back bonus. Like others, I donate directly to numerous charities each year. If I am shopping on Amazon (and I have cut back lately since several S&S prices have skyrocketed on many items, so I'm finding them for less locally), why not have "pennies" go to (currently) two of our grandchildren's school? My charities (both have been schools) have received almost $300 from my purchases. I am happy to do this effortless giving. @Tina Marie I don't usually buy from my phone either, but now and then I have wanted to, so I'll just save to my list, then purchase on my laptop.