Grandma Advice: Capture Time with Grandkids Now

We tell new parents to cherish the moments because time flies and kids grow up fast. It’s good grandma advice for new grandparents, too, as I’ve discovered.

Recently, I noticed that Little N was not playing with his firehouse play set. And when was the last time he built anything with Duplos?

Miss T had long abandoned dolls. And it dawned on me that no one had been using the kitchen set to “cook” anything.

The grandkids are growing up! When did that happen?

Grandma Advice: How to Capture Time

Time with your grandkids will go faster than you think. One minute a toddler, next minute entering preteen-hood.

Here’s my grandma’s advice on how to navigate those early years.

A State of Mind

• Enjoy the moments–even the hard ones. Infant Miss T cried inconsolably whenever I babysat. No amount of singing, classical music, or walking about helped. A frustration then, today, they’re amusing memories. And how I’d love to cradle another baby in my arms.
• Look ahead. The day may come when kids make fewer visits to grandma. So, make the most of the time you have. Loosely plan out a calendar of activities each quarter to ensure the days don’t just slip by.
• Keep track of their play. If I’d paid better attention, I would have encouraged kids to play with all their toys before they outgrew them. Some giveaways were hardly touched.

Seek out Opportunities

• Try to have a regular schedule for family gatherings. Our Friday night family dinners ensure a get-together at least once a week. The kids and parents are busy with activities and playdates. Without a perpetual day saved to everyone’s calendar, we might not see the family for weeks!
• Encourage sleepovers. We didn’t do enough of this, partly due to the pandemic. There’s nothing sweeter than tucking the grandkids in after a bedtime story, and having them crawl into your bed to snuggle in the morning.
• When you get together, do things together instead of setting the kids down to an iPad or TV. You’ll find great craft ideas, fun activities , and yummy things to cook on this site. You can find more good ideas on Pinterest.

• For long-distance grandparents, find ways to interact by making crafts together, reading a story, or playing a game via zoom. While I live close to my grandkids, the pandemic forced me to think of new ways to stay connected.

Capture their World for Posterity

• In addition special occasions, take pictures of everyday life. I have thousands of photos of Miss T and Little N on my phone and in the cloud.
• Make sure the children’s parents have access to your photos by sharing your password or enabling partner sharing.
• Don’t forget to include photos of yourself, too. I get so busy recording their life, that often, I forget to have someone document my life with them.

• To take good pictures of kids, drop down to their level for a more intimate and better composed shot.

Grandma Advice: What to do with the Toys?

First, I checked with the children to make sure they were okay with giving the toys away. A child may have outgrown a toy, but still have a sentimental attachment to it. This was not the case.

Once I gathered all the outgrown toys, the next step was to distribute them.

Goodwill Donation

Some toys are self-contained (no extra parts or small pieces) and had good resale value, such as a Little N’s shopping cart and Miss T’s doll stroller. These went to Goodwill, so they could generate some income for the greater good.

Giving to Friends

Other toys are parts of play sets and I was concerned the sets might get mixed up or broken up in ways that detract from their play value. These we gave to our daughter-in-law’s friend, to ensure that the sets stayed intact.

Family Shelter

Other toys were given to a family shelter–smaller, stand-alone toys including food sets, Play-Doh cutters, and blocks that would be easy to play with, without much supervision.

The Toy with Special Memories

The most difficult toy to part with was our beloved Fisher-Price kitchen set. In excellent condition, even the bubbling boiling water sound for the stove still worked.

It was special because the green phone from that kitchen was tied to a sweet story about Miss T, then four, and how she used the phone to “talk” to me during an extended vacation overseas. It was the first time we were separated for such a long period.

It was also the source of our pretend businesses–cookie store and restaurant–that all began by “making” things for sale on the stove or in the oven.

In the end, I found the perfect solution: I gave the kitchen set to a grandmother friend, a food professional like me. She would appreciate the kitchen and would use it to create many precious moments for her toddler grandchild as I had with mine. I also gave her the stainless steel cookware set to help her granddaughter cook with “professional” equipment.

Knowing the story of the green phone, my friend asked if I would like to save it. But I thought it best to keep the kitchen set intact. We will always have the memory.

Saved for Me

I put Lucy, Miss T’s Bitty Baby; Emerson, her Wellie Wisher doll; and their clothes in shoe boxes in my closet to pass down to the next generation.

I also kept a set of wooden grocery items bought for N’s shopping cart. I’m using them as pop art in my kitchen window, interspersed with a couple of metal red ants bought at a gallery.

The last thing I saved was a small Fisher-Price cooktop that we bought my grandchildren’s dad for Christmas when he was three; now, two generations have played with it.

The Future

No longer a playroom, our space is looking more like a family room again. We kept the little table and chairs, and the painter’s easel because they’re still used by N. We’ve stocked the shelf with games and some building toys, such as K’NEX and LEGO bricks for him.

Miss T would rather read a book or do a craft project with me when she comes over; she no longer has any interest in toys.

In some ways, I’m sad the kids are losing that vivid childhood imagination from pretend play. Pretending to cook, pretending to drive a car, pretending to go grocery shopping, pretending to be a mom or dad….

But they continue to do creative things that I’ll document here on my blog. So, bring on the next stage of life!

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