Not being able to cuddle my grandchildren is hard – I can’t wait to get hold of
them and smother them with kisses!
But as with most things if you try hard enough you can find a silver lining.
For me it has been FaceTimes with my grandchildren. I now actually SEE them more than I did before. My grandson is three and not into FaceTime yet so I have to content myself with watching him play.
But my granddaughter loves it. Our relationship has blossomed and we chat for ages about everything and anything – three or four times a day.
Here are some of the things we have been doing together:
1. Sitting and colouring together – we have the same colouring book and are doing the same picture – chatting all the time.
2. Designing our dream house, mine was a castle – hers a vets! Then a garden to go with them.
3. We are carrying out a pea germination experiment to find out which conditions are the best. I planted the seeds and we check them every day and write our observations on a chart we both have copies of.
4. We sing silly songs and sing them in different voices – like a goat, like a baby, giant .........
5. We are pen pals and send each other letters – taking it in turns of course – I don’t send another one until she has replied to me.
6. And today she was teaching me a Tick Toc dance!
This is just a few of the activities we have shared. As with most things the more we do the more we think of to do.
Soon we are going to cook a cake together, her in her kitchen me in mine.
Sometimes she just likes to have company while her mum is working from home, so we stay on line while she does her thing and I do mine – obviously chatting all the while.
We talk about the weather, covid-19, the buffet she and I will make when we can all get together again etc.
I do help her with some of her schoolwork, however everything we do has an educational element. Because she is the only pupil in the school of Mum and Grandma we can give her more help and attention. She can learn in her own way and at a pace that suits her. She is coming on leaps and bounds. And beginning to see the relevance of why she needs to read and know her maths and that makes such a difference to her motivation.
So as difficult as lockdown is, and I hope it will be over very soon, there have been some positives. And I have memories I will cherish forever.
