Saturday, May 28, 2016

Long Distance Granny-Virtual Holidays

Birthdays can be especially hard for grandparents with toddlers overseas. When my daughter’s family lived in Paris, I sent gifts through Amazon.fr. It worked as seamlessly as sending an Amazon gift in the U.S. However, then they up and moved to Tunisia! Amazon doesn’t have a local delivery service there and sending a gift through UPS or the Post Office can be prohibitively expensive ( as defined by spending more on postage than the gift cost!). As well, delivery can take weeks.

So, for the last birthday for my two-year old granddaughter in Tunisia, I sent a children’s Kindle book with an audio version of the song “You Are My Sunshine” from Audible.com. It was reasonably priced, easy to order, and delivered immediately. Not to mention, it was a hit! It became the bedtime book of choice, available on Mom’s computer, both the pictures and the audio.

Now, I have to start the hunt for the next favorite gift!

Keepin in Touch, Chris

Monday, May 23, 2016

Confessions of a Long Distance Grandmother

Learning To Be a Virtual Grandmother

I am a grandmother. My grandson is ten months old and his family lives 20 miles away. I babysit for him twice a week. He babbles single syllables, and I keep up my end of the conversation. We roll on the floor, play percussion on a muffin tin, and practice crawling up the stairs. He’s very happy and affectionate. We snuggle and touch a lot, and he trusts me.

My granddaughter is 28 months old and her family lives in La Marsa, Tunisia, 5,734 miles away. I see her three or four times a year for a week or two. We go for walks, play at the playground, read books, and stack blocks. What we don’t do is snuggle or touch at all. She shies away from strangers, and I’m still in that category. She babbles incoherently (at least to me), but she responds correctly to directions in English, French, and Arabic. She trusts me at arm’s length.

One grandchild is a child of my world--one whom I can access easily both physically and emotionally.

The other is a child of the wide world--one whom I must learn to access, perhaps not physically, perhaps not in her every-day language, but certainly virtually.

It sounds like an uphill battle but when I hear my granddaughter’s voice calling “Nana” as I answer a Skype call, my grandmotherly heart swells to the same degree as a hug from my grandson. Her unlikely yet enthusiastic blend of sounds is music to my ears.

Long Distance Grandma