The Joys of Grandchildren

[Xenophon PCDGS]

My young grand-daughter Olivia (aged 10) seems to take after me by becoming a folk-singer, helped by the fact that she plays guitar very well for her age. The last time she visited me, she said that she had a song to sing that I might not have heard before, accompanied with her guitar. I had not heard of the song, which I understand was "Heather on the Hill" that is known to be sung by Nathan Evans, a singer that I know is well known in sea-shanty circles. I have sung in recent times at charity events with old friends all in their 70s now and the last time we sang together, we sang two of the sea-shanty songs that Nathan Evans has recorded, "The Wellerman" and "Santiano".


Olivia is currently learning the words of "The Wellerman" and wants to sing it with some other songs at a concert being held for the residents of a care home near to where she lives.

 

[dangie]

I’ve often said that the benefit of having children is that they give you grandchildren

 

[Ken X]

I’ve often said that the benefit of having children is that they give you grandchildren

And the benefit of grandchildren is that you can hand them back.

 

[3141]

And the benefit of grandchildren is that you can hand them back.

Depends on the grandchildren, and probably on your children too. My daughter was living within four miles of us when her first child was born. Later we moved to within half of mile of where she is. Consequently we've had a lot to do with the two granddaughters, now aged 15 and 13. For several years we collected them from a nursery at midday on three days a week and looked after them till their parents came home from work. Then we were collecting them from primary school at the end of the afternoon. Now we're feeding them after school two days a week, and on one day we take them to instrumental lessons about seven miles away. At least once a year we go on holiday with them. Their parents have brought them up well and they are a pleasure to be with. They appear to enjoy being with us. Our lives have been constrained in certain respects while doing these things but we've greatly enjoyed looking after them and seeing them develop. it may have helped us to retain a more youthful outlook on things generally. Other people would have other priorities, but we're very happy with what we've been doing.

 

[dangie]

Depends on the grandchildren, and probably on your children too. My daughter was living within four miles of us when her first child was born. Later we moved to within half of mile of where she is. Consequently we've had a lot to do with the two granddaughters, now aged 15 and 13. For several years we collected them from a nursery at midday on three days a week and looked after them till their parents came home from work. Then we were collecting them from primary school at the end of the afternoon. Now we're feeding them after school two days a week, and on one day we take them to instrumental lessons about seven miles away. At least once a year we go on holiday with them. Their parents have brought them up well and they are a pleasure to be with. They appear to enjoy being with us. Our lives have been constrained in certain respects while doing these things but we've greatly enjoyed looking after them and seeing them develop. it may have helped us to retain a more youthful outlook on things generally. Other people would have other priorities, but we're very happy with what we've been doing.

This pretty much follows our experience with our three grandchildren aged 18, 16 and 8. The two older ones are now ‘self sufficient’ but still come to see us regularly. We are still involved quite a bit with the 8 year old, school run etc, and frankly, although it does affect our lives a little, we wouldn’t change anything.