Dear Readers,
I am off “holiday-ing” with my family and will return January 5, 2015.
In my absence my guest blogger is Donne Davis. Thank you, Donne!
Wishing everyone wonderful holidays and a Happy New Year.
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With the holiday season here, we grandmas often get caught up in thinking we need to give our grandchildren gifts. But the most precious gifts we can give them are not “things” – it’s ourselves and the unique qualities we bring to the relationship. How do you discover your unique gifts?
Author and coach Laura Berman Fortgang says the #1 way to discover your unique gift is to revisit your childhood. And we all know that just being with our grandchildren is a surefire way to return to our childhood. Our grandchildren remind us of the things we loved when we were their age.
Fortgang suggests you think back as far as you can, to pre-school days if possible. Think back to times when you weren’t influenced by peers or fears. Back to times when your parents’ expectations of you didn’t go beyond you playing and exploring in a safe environment.
- What did you do?
- How did you fill your days?
- What activities or experiences created the greatest memories?
- What was the most fun?
The common thread in there is a message that a little reinterpreting to fit your adult world will propel you down the path toward your unique gifts.
When my granddaughters were little, my daughter paid me a compliment that I will always treasure: “Mom, you don’t have to bring the girls toys. Their favorite thing to play with is YOU!”
Her sweet compliment has helped me become more aware of the “gifts” I bring as a grandma every time I visit – the intangible gifts of my undivided attention, imagination, and patience. These attributes are so much easier to offer as a grandmother than they were when I was a mother.
One of my gifts that I re-discovered after I became a grandma is singing. As a child, I loved to sing – at Sunday school, Girl Scout camp, and later in my college sorority. I never had any voice training, but I could carry a tune and learned melodies easily.
When my first granddaughter was born in 2003, I immediately began singing to her. When the second one arrived, I continued the tradition and recorded personalized CDs for each of them with songs from my childhood. I titled the CDs “Baba Sings.”
During a recent visit to introduce my 11 and 7-year old granddaughters to their new cousin, my most precious moments were rocking two-month old Sophia to sleep while I sang to her. We were having breakfast in the hotel dining room and Sophia was getting a little fussy. Since we were seated at the back of the room behind a large pillar, I could sing without disturbing anyone.
I picked up Sophia in my arms and began singing “Hush Little Baby” while I rocked back and forth from side to side. (It’s a technique I mastered when my first two granddaughters were infants.) I looked right into her eyes and watched as her lids began to close. After a few blinks, she drifted off to sleep. I kept on singing as I gazed down on her precious face. I felt the most powerful surge of joy at that moment knowing I could soothe her into slumber.
I might never have discovered this gift if it hadn’t been for my granddaughters. What “gifts” do you bring to your grandchildren? Start noticing how you spend your time with your grandchildren and maybe you’ll discover some long-hidden talents you may have forgotten you had. That’s also one of the “gifts” our grandchildren give to us – the chance to reconnect to a long-forgotten passion. It will be a blessing for both of you.
Donne Davis and her husband live in the San Francisco Bay Area. They have two grown children and three granddaughters. Ten years ago, after witnessing the birth of her first grandchild, Donne, known to her grandchildren as Baba, founded the GaGa Sisterhood, a social network for enthusiastic grandmas.
Her book, When Being a Grandma Isn’t So Grand, is available on Amazon. You can read her award-winning blog or email her at [email protected].
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