They Make Every Day “GRAND”!

Sunday, September 8th was “Grandparents Day”, an informal holiday that is always the Sunday after Labor Day.  And it’s a sweet sentiment and one that my Mom always enjoyed celebrating with her grandkids and great-grandkids.

Steve and I have hit the jackpot with our grandkids and they truly make each and every day that we spend with them GRAND!  Since moving to the Homestead almost 2 years ago, we finally have the space both inside the house and a very large backyard that we can host frequent sleepovers with the grandkids.  In fact, they are usually here about every Friday night-Saturday afternoon from May to October, with lots more sleepovers occurring in between.

They keep us active and young-at-heart.  There’s walks with the grandpups through the woods and cookouts either on the back deck or up at the Secret Hideout.  Trout fishing on an incredibly cold and rainy Saturday. Catching toads and creating a mini Koi and goldfish pond habitat. Drives in the Mule looking for Bigfoot (spoiler alert – we found him living in our woods!).  Pap Steve overindulges them with late night snow cones and popsicles and makes them “Pap eggs” in the morning for breakfast.

We have backyard carnivals, water balloon battles, 5 minute dance-offs, bubble machines and mini fireworks shows.  We dance with abandon in the rain.  In the fall, Pap Steve rakes the leaves into gigantic piles and they shriek and jump over and over. In cooler weather, we gather around the living room fireplace where they use their imaginations and creativity with branch blocks.  We play games and the almost 6 year makes up the rules and they don’t make sense and I am totally confused but we have so much fun!

We go to Truck Shows and the grandkids pick out their favorite Big Rigs and pose for photos with their choice.  We go to the movie theater –and in the summer, we watch the latest release under the stars at the drive-in.  We got to animal parks, waterparks, and the aviary. Sometimes we spend the night in a hotel and it’s a chaotic scene of bed swaps and the consuming of contraband candy. 

We gaze up at the sky and yell out what animals we see in the clouds. When the sun sets, we chase fireflies and then come indoors and arrange the Nuggets and sleeping bags, sometimes upstairs, other times downstairs.

When our children were teens, I bought a magnet during a particularly frustrating time and hung it on my refrigerator.  It’s still there, although we’ve had a few different models over the years.  The saying?  “The promise of Grandchildren is the best reason to let your teenagers live.”  I stuck in on there as kind of a joke but I am beyond thankful for not only our daughter and son – but now for the 4 grandkids who truly make our golden years so GRAND!