Christmas Vacation<\/b><\/p>\n
After Christmas vacation, a teacher asked her small pupils to write an account of how they spent their holidays. One youngster wrote about a visit to his grandparents in a life-care community for retired folks:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe always spend Christmas with Grandma and Grandpa,\u201d he said. They used to live here in a big red house, but Grandpa got retarded and they moved to Florida.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey live in a place with a lot of retarded people. They live in tin huts. They ride big three wheel tricycles. They go to a big building they call a wrecked hall but it is fixed now. They play games there and do exercises, but they don\u2019t do them very good. There is a swimming pool and they go to it and just stand there in the water with their hats on. I guess they don\u2019t know how to swim.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy grandma used to bake cookies and stuff. But I guess she forgot how. Nobody cooks\u2014they all go out to fast food restaurants.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs you come into the park, there is a doll house with a man sitting in it. He watches all day, so they can\u2019t get out without him seeing them. They wear badges with their names on them. I guess they don\u2019t know who they are.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy Grandpa and Grandma worked hard all their lives and earned their retardment. I wish they would move back home but I guess the man in the doll house won\u2019t let them out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eric W. Johnson, Humorous Stories About the Human Condition (Prometheus Books), quoted in Bits & Pieces, January 5, 1995, pp. 5-6<\/p>\n
A Grandpa is\u2026<\/b><\/p>\n
A grandpa is a lot like a dad Except he always spoils you And never spanks you. He has whiter hair than a dad, But not as much of it.<\/p>\n
A grandpa asks me questions About me. He wants to know What other people don\u2019t even care about, And what makes me such a good boy.<\/p>\n
A grandpa likes to say yes And hates to say no. When I\u2019m with Grandpa, I\u2019m the most important person In the world.<\/p>\n
A king or prince Would not get more of Grandpa\u2019s attention Than I do. When I go to bed at night, I know that Grandpa prays for me.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m glad you\u2019re my grandpa. There\u2019s no one quite like you In all the world. Thanks, Grandpa, for being my grandpa.<\/p>\n
Source unknown<\/p>\n
A Grandma is\u2026<\/b><\/p>\n
A grandma is a lot like a mom, Except her lap is a little softer And maybe\u2014 there\u2019s a little more of it.<\/p>\n
She always has a cookie for me In her cookie jar, And a quarter for me In her purse.<\/p>\n
Grandma likes to sing to me And read to me, Almost as much as she Likes to play with me.<\/p>\n
When I have breakfast At Grandma\u2019s house, She always asks me, \u201cWhat would you like to eat?\u201d And that\u2019s what we eat!<\/p>\n
Grandma likes to shop with me And I like to shop with her Because she almost always Buys me something I want.<\/p>\n
My mother says Grandma spoils me. But I think she just loves me.<\/p>\n
When I go to bed at night, I know that Grandma prays for me. I\u2019m glad you\u2019re my grandma.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s no one quite like you In all the world. Thanks, Grandma, for being my grandma.<\/p>\n
Source unknown<\/p>\n
Children Need <\/p>\n
Now there\u2019s evidence based on interviews with children and grandparents that children need their grandparents and vice-versa. The study shows that the bond between grandparents and grandchildren is second in emotional power and influence only to the relationship between parents and children. Grandparents affect the lives of their grandchildren, for good or ill, simply because they exist. Unfortunately, a lot of grandparents ignore the fact, to the emotional deprivation of the young.<\/p>\n
Of the children studied, only five percent reported close, regular contact with at least one grandparent. The vast majority see their grandparents only infrequently, not because they live too far away, but because the grandparents have chosen to remain emotionally distant. These children appear to be hurt, angry, and very perceptive about their grandparents. One of them said, \u201cI\u2019m just a charm on grandma\u2019s bracelet.\u201d<\/p>\n
Positive roles that grandparents play are caretaker, storyteller, family historian, mentor, wizard, confidant, negotiator between child and parent, and model for the child\u2019s own old age. When a child has a strong emotional tie to a grandparent, he enjoys a kind of immunity\u2014he doesn\u2019t have to perform for grandparents the way he must for his parents, peers and teacher. The love of grandparents comes with no behavioral strings attached. The emotional conflicts that often occur naturally between children and parents do not exist between grandparents and grandchildren.<\/p>\n
Youthletter, September, 1981<\/p>\n
What Is a Grandmother?<\/b><\/p>\n
An 8-year-old wrote,<\/p>\n
\u201cA grandmother is a lady who has no children of her own, so she likes other people\u2019s boys and girls. Grandmas don\u2019t have anything to do except be there. If they take us for walks, they slow down past pretty leaves and caterpillars. They never say \u2018Hurry up.\u2019 Usually they are fat but not too fat to tie shoes. They wear glasses, and sometimes they can take their teeth out. They can answer questions like why dogs hate cats and why God isn\u2019t married. They don\u2019t talk like visitors do which is hard to understand. When they read to us, they don\u2019t skip words or mind if it is the same story again. Everybody should try to have a grandma, especially if you don\u2019t have television, because grandmas are the only grownups who always have time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Source unknown<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Christmas Vacation After Christmas vacation, a teacher asked her small pupils to write an account of how they spent their holidays. One youngster wrote about a visit to his grandparents in a life-care community for retired folks: \u201cWe always spend Christmas with Grandma and Grandpa,\u201d he said. They used to live here in a big … Continue reading “Grandparents”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=711"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}