A dear long friend, who is becoming a grandma for the first time, asked me to give her my must reads for new grandmas from my archives. I wanted to give an idea of the varied content, from tips to gifts, to do’s and do not’s. There is a search feature.  I put in “newborn” […]

My mother insists that she toilet trained me at six months. I told her she was trained and could not go anywhere.  My mother demurred. Running the faucet in the sink was the key.  Apparently, running water is now the trigger for me for life.  After reading the article, “ ‘Avatar’ and The Way of […]

Blog.1.22.23. When As a Grandparent, You Are Asked If You Love The First Grandchild the Best Returning to Fort Lauderdale on Jet Blue, our preferred carrier between New York and Florida,  a young father (and they are looking younger and younger to this Grandma) was walking up and down the aisle with an adorable baby […]

When my grandchildren are in the car with me, I always have Pop Hits I on Sirius. I want to relate to them and their music. . . or so I thought.  My fifteen year old grandson and sixteen year old granddaughter were in the car with me when the new Nicki Minaj song, “Super […]

I first started writing this blog because my Judicial Assistant, who became and is a dear long (we never say old) friend, was going to become a grandmother, and she wanted me to share the “grandma lessons” I had learned. It was not long after that, I realized another purpose for the blog was for […]

Instagram taught me to search “Life Hacks” on Google for simple solutions to daily tasks! Instagram is an application (app) that my preteen grandchild insisted I must have on my I Phone. A free social media platform, Instagram is for sharing photos and videos with your “followers” and to view photos and videos posted by […]

“Seasons of Love,” the song from the award winning Broadway play, “Rent,” starts out: “five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes.  How do you measure, measure a year?” Having just lost two friends in as many weeks, at this moment, being very philosophical, I think we grandparents measure a year by one that gives […]

I have addressed this issue before, and seems that it is time to address it again.  Sometimes simple answers do not provide a complete answer to a question. In the May 18, 2021, Washington Post, Ms. Manners answered the following question at the end of her advice column: “Dear Miss Manners: When your child gets […]

You know you are longer (we never say older) when some words your eleven year old grandson introduces you to and tries to explain are the subject of an article more than eight years old from 2014!  “Sneakernomics: Are Sneakerheads important?” by Matt Powell, Forbes Magazine, May 21, 2014. Matt Powell defines sneakerheads: “A formal […]

Our adorable four year old grandson’s teddy bear got eaten by the dog. I know we hear this excuse of “eaten by the dog” but he was so sincere and, of course, wanted this Grandma to replace it. So, no ordinary stuffed animal will do. I wanted to find something special and went on the […]

As a family court judge, I served to dissolve tens of thousands of marriages over twenty years. Ethan Hawke (I had heard of him but knew little of his talents) shows us, in six episodes streaming on HBO Max, “The Last Movie Stars,” a documentary of a real long term marriage of fifty years that […]

COVID has necessarily caused us to be distant. Even now when I bump into someone in public who I have not seen in a while who I normally would have greeted warmly, I instinctively put my hand up if they reach to come closer. I don’t even “air kiss” those I might have before COVID. […]

What is safety in 2022? Safety enough to go to the local supermarket….or a local July 4th parade in a suburb with not a single murder from 2000 to 2020? See, “Highland Park Was Meant to be Chicago’s ‘Mayberry,’” by Ellen Almer Durston, Campbell Robertson and Dan Simmons, New York Times, July 6, 2022. This […]