Three servings of spaghetti, five pieces of bread, several slices of cantaloupe, a cheese sandwich and some chocolate pudding rounded out the evening food intake between two boys tonight.  I had forgotten how boys of this age are just bottomless pits.

What followed were a couple of showers, one boy vehemently telling me that they only brushed their teeth in the morning, only to go back and brush his teeth later anyway.  Grandma has been through this kind of thing before.  Then tucking them in with yet another blanket, another pillow and water bottles, making sure the fish tank was enough of a night light and that the door was closed just enough.

In 12 hours, I feed them three meals, played two games, watched cartoons, walked to the comic book store, took one of them to a movie in a blizzard and kept them from fighting each other and I’m exhausted.  It was all I could do NOT to take a nap at home and I’ll admit I dozed off in those comfy seats at the movie a few times, only to be woken up by my grandson sharing an interesting tidbit about the Lego Movie 2.  I don’t think he noticed.

I did this with one, two and then three boys for a total of 25 years and survived and honestly  I’m not sure how.  This is certainly a young person’s game, keeping up with boys but I supposed you do what you’ve gotta do.  I often wonder what it would be like with girls.  Do they sit quietly and play with dolls and color and read?  I know I did.  I think I could actually handle that now, but having deja vu with grandsons, even as infrequently as it is is very eye opening and tends to require a day to recoup.

In case you’re wondering I LOVE my grandsons but I was never that hand-on mom and as much as I would love to be, I’m not a great hands on grandma – yet.  I’m working on it. I have a great example in my mother-in-law who even at her age will get on the floor with the boys and play tinker toys and Lincoln logs.  They love her and I want to be like her SO badly, but I’m not sure I’m very good at this kind of thing.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve often wondered what being a grandparent was going to be like and how I would develop a relationship with my grandkids.  I observed my own children’s relationships with their grandparents and I learned over the years that their relationships were very different.  One grandparent was described as the one who bought them things and the other one was the grandparent who spent time with them.  As they’ve gotten older, you can imagine the one they think of most fondly.

I found myself becoming a bit stressed today, mainly because I never thought of myself as a very good parent, although I will admit I got a little better as I got older, and I don’t want to screw things up with my grandchildren.  Can I spoil without being too lenient, can I have expectations for behavior and still have them like me?  I feel like part of my responsibly as a grandparent is to honor the wishes of their parents.  Am I worrying too much?  These kids have already had a tough beginning to their lives and I want to make things wonderful for them now, but I also want them to grow up to be great people.

So now, an hour after we put them to bed, after spilling their water and fighting over pillows and setting up a fort, grandpa is sitting in the room with them because fighting and whining is what tends to happen when you put two boys in the same room who are used to having their own rooms.  He’s a great guy and much more patient than I am, thank goodness.  Now it’s time to crash.