One day, an elementary school teacher started saying, “Humpty Dumpty sat on a _______.” She paused, looking expectantly to her students, waiting for them to fill in the missing word. After a long pause, a little girl timidly said, “A chair?”

How sad it is that we are losing the tradition of handing down nursery rhymes from one generation to the next! Nursery rhymes provide rich opportunities for children to hear the rhythm of spoken language, to hear ’short stories’, and to be introduced into the wonderful world of reading.

It has been said that reading is to the mind as exercise is to the body.  (Boy howdy! Then my brain is svelte and comely!)  The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization says that literacy “enables individuals to achieve their goals, to develop their knowledge and potential, and to participate fully in their community and wider society.”

I like the part where it says ‘develop their knowledge and potential.”  As a mother and grandmother, that opportunity resonates with me and makes me want to read, read, read to my children and grandchildren.

Research shows that we should continue reading aloud to children even after they can read themselves.  When our children were in junior high, they thought that they were too grown up for bedtime stories.  Plus, their evenings were so full of activities and homework, it was hard to find family reading time. But, I didn’t want to let go of that special reading time together.  So, I read to them while they ate breakfast.  I found that they (and my husband!) lingered longer over their meal so they could hear ‘what happened next!’

Research also claims that children need to hear a thousand stories before they can begin to learn to read.  Grandparents can relieve parents from some of that burden by reading, reading, and reading to their grandchildren! So, make sure you take every opportunity to read to your grandchildren.

I recently learned how readers are 300% more likely than non-readers to visit museums, attend plays or concerts, and create artworks of their own.  They are also more likely to volunteer, exercise, play sports, attend sporting events, or do outdoor activities.  What a wide impact reading has!  (And you thought that reading to your grandchildren just helped them develop a love of reading!)

I have two reading ideas to share with you.  First, create a reading center in your home.  We all know how expensive books are.  Get cheaper books at thrift stores or used bookstores or even your local library that might occasionally sell books for a small fee. Have Grandpa build some shelves for your books.  Buy some child sized chairs — banana chairs or bean bag chairs — or have big over-sized pillows and make it an inviting reading place.

You could allow your grandchildren to ‘check out’ a book that interests them — making sure that they return it to your lending library.  Or, you could even let them keep the book (these cheap books from the thrift store).

Second, sponsor a read-a-thon.  Get lots of pillows, wear your pajamas, and have cozy blankets to lay on or wrap up in to give it a festive flair.

A read-a-thon could be tricky for really young grandchildren.  Maybe the read-a-thon only lasts for half an hour where Grandma reads nursery rhymes, fairy tales, or other age appropriate books.  And then end it with a pizza party or simply cookies and milk.

If your grandchildren can read, they can bring their favorite book (a short one) and read it to everybody. Or they could read one of the books from your book collection. Or, have everybody read silently for half an hour then take a break for 5 minutes and then read for another half an hour.  You’ll have to adjust the amount of reading time to the age level of your grandchildren.

There are many, many fine books that you can share with your grandchildren. Here are some of my favorites that have crossed my path recently.

Books for young children:

• the Llama, Llama series
• the Olivia series
• the Scaredy Squirrel series
• The Incredible Book Eating Boy
• the Flat Stanley series
• Duck on a Bile
• No David and David Goes to School
• Too Many Toys
  

For middle aged readers:

• The Ranger’s Apprentice
• The Pictures of Hollis Woods
• Walk Two Moons
• Holes
• The Whipping Boy
• Mississippi Trial
  
• Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
  

For young adult readers:

• The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau (love, love, love this book and ditto for the next one!)
  
• The Eyre Affair (but you need to read Jane Eyre first to really appreciate this book)
• The Thirteenth Tale
• The Life of Pi
• The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing
• The Book Thief
• Goodnight, Mister Tom
  

What are some of your favorite books to read to your grandchildren?  What fun reading activities have you done with them?

This post is part of a blog carnival on About.com:Grandparents. Check it out.  There are TONS of great information and links to follow!

Have you gone bungee jumping? Could you fly a rescue helicopter? Have you given a 2-ton elephant a bath?

No?

Well, maybe your grandchild (who idolizes you) thinks you can do these spectacular things!  Just maybe. . .

Rick Dilz has created a series of delightful little books that puts grandma in some pretty wild situations.  In My Grandma Could Do Anything, a grandchild is saying that her grandma doesn’t drive tractors, bungee jump, race cars, or fly jets — but she could.  (Hey! Wait a minute!  I’ve driven a tractor.  Not that hard at all . . .)  At the end, the grandchild says that she is happy with the one thing that grandma does best: love me. (Awwww, how sweet!)

I can imagine how fun it would be to snuggle with a grandchild to read one of these books, laugh over the crazy things that grandma COULD do, and end with hugs and kisses when you read the ending.  (I say imagine because when I tried reading one book to my grandson, he just didn’t want to sit still . . .)

In My Grandma Could Do Anything in the Rocky Mountains, the grandchild imagines that grandma could fly a rescue helicopter, ski black diamonds, hang glide, water ski, or sing around the campfire.  (Hey!  Wait a  minute!  I’ve water skied, skied black diamonds, and sang around the campfire.  While I haven’t done any hang gliding, I have gone sky diving.  Does that count?)

In My Grandma Could Do Anything in Hawaii the grandchild says that grandma could lead a hula show, surf a 20-foot wave, or windsurf with whales.   (Mmmmm . . . haven’t done anything like that.  But I’ve been there three times!)

In My Grandma Could Do Anything at the Zoo, the grandchild imagines grandma giving a 2-ton elephant a bath, swinging with monkeys, herding zebras, and feeding a 15-foot high giraffe.

There are pictures of critters that grandchildren can find throughout the books and fun animal facts which add an element of learning to reading the books. They are the perfect size to tuck into grandma’s purse when visiting grandchildren — or sending in the mail to those far away grandchildren.

You can check out these books here on Ric’s site. Thanks, Ric, for sharing your books with me!

(I was poking around his site and saw some of the sayings he offers on little onesies.  I love the one:  Party. 3:00 a.m. My crib.  What a hoot!  You might want to spend time browsing what he offers in addition to his books.)

Let’s take this idea and personalize it.  Why not have your grandchildren create their own book about themselves?  You could simply use a small spiral notebook — or be extravagant and get a nice bound book with blank pages. You could gather up crayons, markers, or colored pencils so your grandchild could write the book and then illustrate it.

Title your book Spencer Could Do Anything (or whatever your grandchild’s name is).  Then the two of you could come up with wacky things that he could do (but doesn’t) and end with something like ‘I’m so happy with the one thing he does best — love Grandma.’

Another twist on this would be for you to create your own variation for each of your grandchildren.  Then, when you visit them,  you could read the book to them and gift it to them.  Of course giving lots of snuggles and kisses along the way.

Happy reading and book making!

I just finished reading a great book for grandmas.  It’s GrandLoving: Making Memories with Your Grandchildren by Sue Johnson, Julie Carlson, and Elizabeth Bower.  I love the design of the title on the cover where the ‘O’ in the word loving is a red heart.  Clever design!

This book is brimming with sage advice and a plethora of activities that you can do with your grandchildren to strengthen your relationship – and that’s what my site here is all about!  These activities will be a breeze to do because they are not expensive nor do they require much effort to prepare for.

At the beginning of the book, they quote If I Had My Child to Raise Over Again by Diane Loormans.  Here are two lines that spoke to my heart.  Read them slowly and ponder them.

(If I had my child to raise over again…)
I would do less correcting and more connecting.
I’d do more hugging and less tugging.

Profound!

I think this poetically explains what grandparents can easily do since they don’t have the direct responsibility for their grandchildren (assuming that they aren’t the legal guardian).  Connect more.  Hug more.  Sound words of advice.

Since my little ‘grandloves’ are so tiny right now, I can’t do very many of the suggested activities.  However, here are two of their ideas that I can start this very minute:

• A grandchild’s journal.  Keep a journal of your feelings about your grandchild.  Write your feelings about when the grandchild’s parents told you they were expecting.  About your feelings of your grandchild’s birth.  About your visits and activities.  Then, on occasion, pull out the journal and share it with your grandchild.  It will be a valuable keepsake when you finally decide to give it to your grandchild to keep.

Like, duh, why didn’t I think of this idea since it was one I had done with my children?  As our children were growing up, I kept a journal in a simple spiral notebook of the things they did or the funny things they said.  Occasionally while our youngest son was in grade school, he liked me to read his journal to him for his bedtime story.  Now, I’m going to keep one for each of my grandchildren so that I can read it to them when they visit.

• Hand tracing.  Trace a grandchild’s hand on a piece of paper.  Place your hand over the tracing of your grandchild’s hand and trace around your hand.  (Boy howdy, that’s a lot of hands here.  Got ‘em all straight?  Good.  Give yourself a hand.)  You will end up with a tracing of a small hand (your grandchild’s) within a larger hand (your hand).  It will be fun to compare sizes of the hands.  Do this activity as your grandchild grows up (maybe around their birthday time).  Keep these drawings alongside the journal so you can pull them both out and share with your grandchild.

When my grandchildren get a wee bit older, I plan on using these two ideas that I got from the book.

• Questions on the stair.  Have the grandchildren sit on the bottom stair.  Ask fun questions.  For each correct answer, grandchildren move up a step.   The first one to reach the top stair is the winner.

• Chase-less Catch. Sew a six-foot long string through a sponge rubber ball (like a Nerf ball).  Thumbtack the end of the string to the top of a door frame.  (You will have a ball hanging on the end of a string.)  Put your grandchild on one side of the ball and you on the other and toss the ball back and forth.  If you miss, no problem.  You don’t have to run and catch it.  (This is good.  Grandmas tire out quickly if they have to chase a ball very much . . .) This is a good activity for grandchildren 18 months to three years old.

Here are other ideas that I really liked: springtime nested treats on page 176, hug tag on page 179, flashlight faces p. 199, and straw symphony p. 216.  (I have tons of stars, exclamation points, and underlined sentences throughout this book to help me quickly locate my favorite ideas.)

I hope this whets your appetite to read the book.  Go now to Amazon.com to get your very own copy!  Or go to Barnes and Noble if you’re so inclined.

A little while after our daughter told us she was expecting a little girl, the perfect name for my little granddaughter came into my head.  Instantly.  Just like that.  Without any conscious pre-thinking, pondering, mulling it over, or really giving it any attention.  Let me explain how the name came about.

I vaguely remember my paternal great-grandfather.    However, I never knew my paternal great-grandmother because they divorced long before I was born.  Her name was Ada.

My name is Nina (pronounced with a long ‘I’ sound like the number 9).

In the late 1960s, Johnny Carson did a monologue on his TV show where he talked about inflation and in particular about inflation of words.  Instead of everyone, it would be everytwo.  Anyone was anytwo.  Wonderful would be twoderful.  My older sister decided that my name should reflect word inflection and she started calling me Tena (as in the number ten with an ‘uh’ at the end).  That nickname stuck with me for several years.

I tell you all of these names because in my moment of wild inspiration, I came up with the most adorable, most unique, most . . . most . . .  most unusual name for our granddaughter-to-be:  Aida-Nina-Tena.

Isn’t that the most spectacular inspiration for a name — in all of it’s hyphenated glory?  I was so pleased with myself for being so spontaneously creative.  (I don’t think I would have been able to come up with that name in a million years if I were intentionally trying to be so cutesy and clever!)

I couldn’t wait to tell my daughter my suggestion.

She didn’t like it.  I don’t understand why.

She named her daughter Natalie.  Natalie is a nice name.  But it is so, so, so uncreative!  (Isn’t the above picture of her cute?)

Names are so important.  And that brings me to today’s topic:  my first give-away!!!

Here’s the deal.  Make a comment here on my site about one of the following options:

1.  An interesting ‘baby naming experience’ like I had with my daughter   (I knew a young lady whose husband’s family had a tradition that the first male baby of that level of generation absolutely HAD to name the son a specific name.  She was expecting that first male baby of that level of generation, and she HATED the name she was expected to name her son!  Such a dilemma.  She moved before her baby was born so I never knew what she did about that situation.)

2.  Or, tell about a special name that was given to one of your grandchildren.

I will use Random.org to select a winner of my give-away.

And what is my give-away?  The winner will receive a 25% off discount on a legacy name document from Baby Names Research©.  This beautiful site is run by Maura Hanrahan.  She will research the origin, meaning, and history of your grandchild’s name, write a 400 word essay about the name, and print it on archival paper. The end product is beautiful and ready for framing if you so desire.  You can select from a variety of colors, patterns, and fonts.

This legacy document would make a very special, unique gift that will last a lifetime for that special grandchild in your life.  It could be given to the baby when it is born, christened, on a significant birthday, for Christmas, or any other special occasion.

The give-away will close at midnight Mountain Daylight Time on Friday April 2.  I will announce the winner on Saturday April 3.

You don’t have to make a long comment.  The purpose is just to make a comment so that your name to be entered in the drawing.

So, quick!  Make a comment — you just might be the lucky winner!