I’ve been very careful about not giving unsolicited advice to my kids about their children, because I think everybody has to make their own mistakes. My favorite thing to tell my children is, ‘Every day I did the best I could, and some days it was better than other days, but it was always the best I could do that day.’
There’s a new study out about grandparents. Some of its findings surprised me.
Many stereotypes about grandparents are wrong.
I asked grandparents around the country what they wish they’d known—but didn’t—when their first grandchild was born. Here are some of my favorite responses.
Many immigrant parents seek to bring their own parents here to help with childcare while they toil in grueling jobs, two sociologists recently wrote in The New York Times. President Trump wants to stop them.
Earlier this year, I published a long story about a grandmother in Houston, Stephanie Johnson, who had lost access to her grandson after her daughter was murdered and who was fighting in court to be reunited with him. Here’s an update on Stephanie’s plight.
Grandparents from all over the country are road-tripping to a Texas border city this weekend to protest the Trump administration’s treatment of migrant children and their families.
“Buddy, don’t forget,” Laura Mellencamp told her grandson daily. “You’re the handsomest, luckiest, most talented boy in the world.”
Trump’s travel ban has torn apart thousands of families. Here is the story of one of them.
Kids are often closer to their maternal grandparents than to their paternal ones, research suggests, perhaps because mothers tend to maintain closer ties with their own parents than fathers do.
Thanks to everyone who read and commented on my in-depth story about a grandmother in Houston, Stephanie Johnson, who lost her daughter to domestic violence and is now fighting for the right to see her grandson. Here’s one comment I think everyone should see.
About 28 million women in the United States have experienced “severe” physical violence at the hands of a partner, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
A grieving mother seeks justice.
Most movies put grandparents on the sidelines, when they put them anywhere at all. Here are some great ones that give them their due.
Because of how their parents are raising them, kids will grow up to be more entitled, less disciplined, and less independent than their elders, an overwhelming majority of Australian grandparents believes.
Many kids in India are growing up far from their grandparents, so a grandma in Bangalore is using her smartphone to tell them bedtime stories.
New research suggests that our ancestors stayed safe at night thanks to the divergent sleep habits of the young and the old.
Proverbs about grandparenting from around the world.
In a rebuke to Trump, a federal judge in Hawaii has ruled that grandparents are “the epitome” of close family and thus cannot be banned from visiting their grandchildren in the United States.
For the most part, we spend time with people close to us in age. Here’s why we should branch out.
Grandparents often suspect autism before parents do, but they sometimes hesitate to voice their concern, a new study reveals.
In the new remake of “One Day at a Time,” Rita Moreno, 85, steals the show as a flamboyant, opinionated, and sometimes overzealous grandmother.
In the first study of its kind, a team of scientists has found that grandparents who provide regular care for their grandchildren have an edge on survival over those who don’t.
You’ve probably heard about the latest blockbuster Disney movie and its teenaged heroine, Moana. But have you heard about her really awesome grandma?
All the Girl Scouts troops in her California town were full, so Kathy Richardson started a new one for her granddaughter and her friends.
The monumental stress of raising a child with autism can be eased by grandparents, who are often “ideally suited” to provide parents with support, scholars say.
Grandparents are healthier, wealthier, and longer-lived than ever before. What does this mean for us all?
When she was six, Simone Biles was adopted by her grandparents. Now, she’s the best gymnast in the world.
For kids, summer means freedom. These books beautifully capture that.
Let’s ditch the stereotypes and start embracing the truth instead.
A picture book about what happens when parents get out of the way.
I love the way Michelle Obama toasted her mom, who moved into the White House to help raise her granddaughters, at a Mother’s Day Tea in 2014.
You’ll need some olive oil, a good butcher, and this recipe for Neapolitan ragù.
I spent the final weeks of winter reading all the picture books I could find about spring. Here are my favorites. They’re simple, they’re deep, and they’re as gorgeous as the season.
Guy and Joanne Sinclair have been raising their granddaughter since their daughter got hooked on heroin.
After her husband died in 1945, Eleanor Roosevelt traveled the world as a diplomat, speaker, and activist. But she was never too busy for her granddaughter.
The legendary anthropologist Margaret Mead was homeschooled for most of her childhood by her grandmother, an iconoclast who rejected rote instruction as “stultifying” and emphasized learning by doing instead.
When her son died in 2012, Denise Villescaz “saw no light,” she says. Then, two years later, her granddaughters were born.
“Having grandchildren expands your heart beyond all boundaries you’ve ever known,” says Elaine Dove of Tustin, California. “It’s like loving your children on steroids.”
Tammi Williams, whose daughter is gay, was “horrified and scared” when she and her wife decided to have a baby with the help of a male friend they barely knew. But then, Tammi says, everything changed.
It’s not important that children know about nature, Rachel Carson believed; what matters is that they delight in it. But they won’t unless they’re shown the way, she warned.
Isn’t it time we discarded the myths and misconceptions about grandparents and started giving them their due?
“Standing at one remove from the new partnership, and all the hue and cry the blending of a family can involve, they have the potential to play a unique role for the stepgrandchild—part grandparent, part wise, trusted confidante.”
