Bad habits, mistakes and other lessons from being a grandparent

There is just something about the relationship between grandparents and their grandchildren no matter how old the grandchildren are. When they are young, we take advantage of our role as grandma/grandpa, and we use any excuse to spoil them.

When they are grown up with children of their own, we love when they ask our advice, even when they don’t take it. We just love them anyway, unconditionally.

I have always felt blessed to be the grandmother of girls. I am the mother of sons, which makes me doubly blessed. My sons and I spent many wonderful days together. And I have many wonderful stories about their growing up years.

But you can’t sew frilly dresses for little boys. Or sew lace on their socks. Or make hair bows for them. Being a grandmother of girls afforded me those opportunities.

Recently I was blessed to have a few days in Tampa with my youngest granddaughter, Jamie, who is in the U. S. Air Force and is stationed there. Being with her brought back a flood of memories.

Jamie always seemed older than her years. She always forged her own way along whatever path she chose. She always seemed to know what she wanted, and would reach her goal on her own schedule.

Take the time, for example, when she was about 5, and still sucked the two middle fingers of her right hand. Jamie started sucking her fingers while still in her mother’s womb. We know because the sonagram showed her with her tiny legs crossed.

And she was sucking her fingers.

No amount of shaming could make Jamie give up her favorite pastime. She simply found pleasure in sucking her fingers. One day while babysitting her, I was sewing a garment and I ran out of an item I needed to finish it. Jamie and I set out for the fabric store, where she delighted in picking up the brightly colored notions, examining them before putting them back.

I thought this was my opportunity to get her to stop the finger-sucking habit. So, I said, “Jamie, look at you —picking up things that many other hands have touched. And soon you will have your fingers in your mouth. That’s just plain nasty.”

Jamie looked at me and then at her fingers. She didn’t say a word. But I noticed that she held her two favorite fingers out when she picked up an item to examine it, careful not to get the fingers soiled. I smiled. Even then she was such a little clean freak.

Maybe calling her attention the germs she was picking up as she touched things that many other hands had touched would be the way to break the habit.

On the way home, Jamie didn’t put her fingers in her mouth at all. When I pulled into my driveway, I had hardly put the car in park, when she jumped out and ran into the house as soon as I unlocked the door. As I passed the bathroom, there she was, scrubbing her hands like she was a surgeon getting ready to operate on someone. She looked up from the basin when she saw me watching, held up her two favorite fingers and announced: “I’m gonna suck these fingers!”

It was a declaration. Jamie was going to suck her fingers until she was ready to stop. She stopped a short time later, when she was good and ready.

And that’s how it has been with my “baby” granddaughter throughout her life. Like every one of us, she hasn’t always made the right choices, but she never wallowed in the aftermath of a mistake. She simply picked herself up and forged on, doing it her way.

This week, as we sit around the island in the kitchen of her new house she shares with my great-granddaughter Halle, 11, (my great-grandson Tavaris, 18, is in college), I can still see some of the 5-year-old Jamie in her. She still is a bit of a clean freak. And she still does things her way and on her own terms.

Five years ago, when she resigned from her teaching job and announced she was signing up for the Air Force, some in the family questioned her decision. She was divorced and was the mother of two children. How was that going tom work? Jamie just let the naysayers talk while she kept on working on her plan.

It turned out to be the best move for her and her children, who lived with her and got exposed to other countries and cultures while she was stationed in England.

It was good for me to be in Tampa with my granddaughter, to talk recipes and family history. And just to bond.

The beauty of it all is that I have four more beautiful granddaughters — Priscilla Rasheed, Nykeve, LaQuonia and Afra — I am waiting to have some one-on-one grandma/granddaughter time with. I have stories to tell them and things to learn about and from them.

Another funny thing about being a grandma: Uou never run out of love. There is always enough to go around. I am one thankful grandma.

Around the community

Ignite the Vote: The Dade County Alumnae Chapter of the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority will sponsor the “Ignite the Vote,” a simulation of the voting process for youth ages 10-17 from 9 a.m. to noon March 14 at The Miami Gardens Senior Center, 18330 NW 12th Ave. The event is designed to teach youths how the voting process works, and its impact on everyday life. In addition to learning about the voting process the program will feature a Continental breakfast and guest speakers from the NAACP. Participants will be able to earn service hours. It’s free and open to the public.

This story was originally published March 5, 2026 at 10:36 AM.