Today, I learned about a party that Hawaiians have that is called kanikapila. Kanikapila means ‘play music together.’ It is singing that is usually accompanied by a guitar or ukulele. This made me think of an activity that you could do with your grandchildren.

You can go to a local music store and purchase a musical rhythm kit for $30 or less. The nice thing about buying a kit is that you could get things like a tambourine or a triangle.

Or, you could be creative and make your own. To make rhythm sticks, get a dowel stick and cut into 12 inch lengths. Or just use some unsharpened pencils. Children can hit the sticks together to make a rhythmic pattern.

To make an ‘egg shaker’ , get a small plastic container for left over food. Fill it with rice or dried beans and snap on its air tight lid. Your grandchild would then shake it to sound like maracas. I’ve also made an egg shaker by taping one end of the cardboard from an empty toilet paper roll with masking tape, adding some rice inside, and then covering the other end with masking tape. Then, I’ve gotten some fun design paper (paper that had soccer balls, flowers, rainbows, etc. on it) from a scrapbooking store to cover the outside of the cardboard tube to make it look pretty and appeal to little tykes. Here is a picture of some that I’ve made:

With a staple gun, staple a piece of sand paper to two wooden blocks. Rubbing them together makes a nifty sound.

An empty Cool Whip container (with its lid on) can be a drum. Just get more dowel sticks or pencils to use as drumsticks.

A ten-penny nail and a empty glass jar can be used as a triangle by using the nail to tap the jar — gently so the jar doesn’t break!

Go to a craft store and buy some bells. String them on yarn or a shoe string for jingle bells.

A spoon stroked down a cheese grater also makes a fun rhythm instrument.

Be creative and see what delightful instruments you can make! Young grandchildren will probably like almost anything that will make a noise . . . er. . . I mean make a sound.

Once you have your instruments made, invite your grandchildren for a Kanikapila party. Go to a local dollar store and get plastic leis for everyone to wear. Encourage participants to wear Hawaiian clothing. During the Kanikapila, sing songs such as nursery rhymes, Old MacDonald Had a Farm, Bingo, You Are My Sunshine, or any songs that are familiar to your children. (You can even teach them a new song or two to broaden their repertoire!) Use your musical instruments for accompaniment.

Make sure you serve a Hawaiian treat like Hawaiian punch, coconut macaroons, or frappé made out of pineapple sherbet and pineapple juice and Sprite, or chocolate covered macadamia nuts.

There’s something about making music together with a group. Good, wholesome, and fun music uplifts the soul while bonding ‘band’ members together. Remember, the family that makes music together, stays together!

Happy music making!
DigiGram

Diane W. from Irvine, California wrote the following about being a grandmother:

“I look at my mom as the fist example of what one does when grandkids aren’t close. My daughter, Kerilyn, has commented to me how she remembers my mom sending the kids sticks of gum and balloons in her weekly letters to us. The kids looked forward to it. Of course now days stickers are also easy things to slip into an envelope. My own grandson, Jack, enjoys them.

“Thank heavens for cell phones. Jack loves to talk to his “damma”. I can’t understand a lot of what he says over the phone, but that doesn’t matter. I just keep asking questions on things that I know he is interested in. My son, Larry, also puts his son, Creed, on the phone and he will babble away. I love to hear those little voices.

“Emails are also a great way to stay in touch. Jack knew that his mom (my daughter) sent me emails and asked to send me an email. Jack dictated a letter to me through my daughter.

“I think the key to keeping a close relationship to the grandkids is your own child. Your child has to be willing to nurture your relationship with your grandchild for it to work. I’ve tried to let my children know how important it is to me and encouraged them in doing it.”

What great words Diane shares. I was especially touched by her comments of the importance that your own children play in helping you fill your role as a grandmother. This is kinda like a ‘two for the price of one’ deal. As you work at establishing a relationship with your grandchildren, you will be strengthening your relationship with your own children. As your grown child understands how important it is to you, she will hold that phone to her son’s ear so he can chatter away to ‘damma.’ She will make sure she takes time to regularly send e-mails from her son to his grandmother. And, she will (hopefully) have a fun time with her son as she is helping him associate with his beloved grandmother.

The Digi-Gram

When you know that your grandchildren are coming over for a visit, do you ever worry about what to do so that they aren’t bored? It’s always a good idea to have several activities up your sleeve. Then, not only will they be happy, they will also look forward to visiting you again. By doing fun things with your grandchildren, you are strengthening your relationship and building strong family bonds.

Here is a rhythm activity that is fun to do with grandchildren of all ages. (You could even suggest YOUR kids play and have a three generation activity!) I suggest you practice the rhythm so that you know it really well and can then teach it to your grandchildren.

Since our grandson is only one month old, I coerced . . . . er . . . my children and nieces and nephews acquiesced playing the cup rhythm game last Thanksgiving so that I could film it and share it here on my site.

The Rhythm Game
Place a cup upside down on the table in front of you so that the opening is face down on the table. Clap your hands twice. Quickly tap the cup three times — once with your right hand, then your left, and once more with your right hand. Clap your hands. With your right hand, grab the cup and set it to the right side of you on the table.

Clap your hands once. Now comes the tricky part. Grab the cup with your right hand and bring it so the opening is up — facing the ceiling and not the table. Carefully watch the movie so you can see how the right hand is twisted so that the knuckles of the thumb and pointer finger are facing down toward the table. This allows you to grab the cup and bring it with the opening facing up. Slap the cup to the palm of your left hand. Then touch the cup down to the table top. But don’t let go of it!!

Quickly slap the cup to the palm of your left hand and transfer holding the cup to your left hand. Cross your right hand under your left hand and slap your right palm to your left on the table top.

Cross your left hand (that is holding the cup) over your right arm and place the cup upside down on the table in front of the person sitting to your right. Keep repeating the rhythm.

The rhythm should be steady as if you were counting one, two, three, four. Keep repeating the rhythm pattern until someone messes up. When someone makes a mistake, he is ‘out’ of the game. Play proceeds until there is only one person who has not made any mistakes. Then, start all over again and have everybody back in playing.

For older grandchildren, it is fun to start slowly and then gradually speed up the rhythm until they are going really fast – just like at the end of the movie clip.

While this activity might seem difficult at first, a little bit of practice will make it come easily to you. As you play it with your grandchildren, you will be having fun while strengthening your relationships and building memories that last!

(The file is about 5 MB so it might take a minute to load.)

Rhythmically yours,
Digi-Gram (the digital Grandma!)

I gave a baby shower to my daughter-in-law back in February. I thought that as part of the activities in the shower we could tie a baby quilt. When I was shopping for the fabric, I also found some soft, pretty fleece. (I LOVE fleece material!!) The fabric store had a sample blanket made up that had a really unique edging so I decided to make a baby blanket with that edging on it.

The pattern on the fleece was a blue and white checked. I cut the fabric along the lines of the checks all around the edge of the blanket. Then, I fan folded the fabric and used a very small zig-zag stitch in the center through all the thicknesses of the folds. This created a little fan so there were fans all along the edge of the blanket. It was really simple to do and made up really fast. It took me less than an hour to make the blanket.

Click on these two pictures so that you can see a larger image of the fan fold design. This first picture shows a close up view of the edge so you can easily see the fan fold.

I think this edging would be cute to have on pink blankets for little girls, too! In fact, this edge will work on any fleece type of fabric. Just make cuts that are 4 inches apart and 4 inches into the fabric.

This was a VERY easy blanket to make. It is something that anyone can make — even if you have minimal sewing skills. I hope that by seeing pictures of the one I made that other grandmothers will be motivated to try their hand at making a similar blanket.

Happy blanket making
Digi-Gram