I love my grandkids. I know everybody says that but I think few people mean it and even fewer people know how to love their grandkids in the position they’ve been put in. Most people live fractured lives where the families just don’t get along or where they live hundreds of miles apart and can’t really have personal, meaningful time with the ones they love the most.
I’ve been very fortunate to have my kids close to me. We all live in the same town and see each other almost every day. We are together quite a bit. I don’t see my grandkids every day but I do see them a lot and love the time I get to spend with them.
As the grandkids get older they get more and more independent, and are in more and more activities. We love to go to their different shows and athletic events. We can’t go to all of them but we try to go to as many as possible.
When they were little we saw them more because smaller kids simply need more care and supervision. So they were at our house more often. We would baby-sit while their moms or dads worked, went and got groceries or went on a date.
I was thinking about the grandkids when they were little and remembering some of the things I planned for them. We had several boys, all about the same age which made life exciting. I would plan all kinds of crazy things to show them and do with them.
One thing I did was make a “Bat Cave”. It was really simple and kind of corny but the kids loved it. My mom had a Styrofoam bust that a store would use to put hats on. It was shaped like a human head and shoulders. I took an old batman mask and a cape that she made me, put it on the manikin and hung it down in the crawl space under our house. I hung it far enough away from the door so that the light didn’t hit it very well. Then I talked to my grandkids and told them that the Bat Cave was under my house.
We would go through the hatch in the floor of our utility room into the crawl space to see Batman. The kids couldn’t deny that he was there. They could see him with their own eyes. They would ask me all kinds of questions like, “Where is Robin?” Or “How does he get in and out of here?” And, “Where’s the Bat Mobile?”
A lot of relationship is creating memories. Sometimes you might not have any money, or really can’t go anywhere. But you can take an old mask, some Styrofoam and material to create a memory that will last forever.
My grandkids still talk about that.
photo provided by: jez-timms-139495 - upsplash.com
