With Christmas coming up quite rapidly now, I just wanted to share my favorite tip for dealing with some of the annoying toys kids almost inevitably get. This works best on younger children, who can’t catch you at it.

Ready?

Just don’t install the batteries. Or remove them early on and keep “forgetting” to replace them.

It amazes me how often this works on my kids. My daughter has a pinball game that she was given a few years ago. She has no idea that it makes more noise that what you get from the ball hitting things or moving the paddles. It has never had batteries. The mechanical parts still work, so we didn’t see any point in tormenting ourselves with the music.

We do let some toys have batteries regularly but these are generally the ones that have better sounds to them or really require batteries and we don’t mind the kids using them. We don’t spoil all their fun after all.

The Other Way to Handle Annoying Toys – REVENGE!

Annoying toys don’t appear out of nowhere. If you’re smart, you didn’t inflict them on yourself. Someone probably gave them to your kids.

If that someone was a grandparent you may just be stuck. But if your kids see them often, just see if the kids would like to store it at their house so that they have toys ready and waiting for them when they visit. The noise is then not your problem.

Anyone else, you may have to consider your appropriate revenge. If they have kids, an annoying toy in return is fair game.

If they don’t have kids yet but plan to, bide your time. The time for revenge will come, and you might even save their gifts up as hand-me-downs as your kids will eventually outgrow or tire of them, and some will still work. Then add new ones.

If their kids are too old or they aren’t planning on having any, revenge is more challenging. ThinkGeek.com has plenty of annoying things you can buy for people, such as the Annoy-a-tron. There’s always a way to get back at the person who gives annoying toys, especially if they’re habitual.