The relationship between a grandparent and grandchild can be truly special. But when you’re separated by distance or don’t often get to spend time together, it’s not always easy to form strong bonds.
For many grandparents, a key way to connect with their grandchildren is by establishing meaningful family traditions. Whether it’s an annual event or a special heirloom that’s passed down, these rituals become formative memories for everyone in the family.
Here’s a peek into three families’ special traditions between grandparents and grandchildren.
Pieces of Family History
For Fredericksburg resident Nancy Craig, her wedding gown has taken on new life as a family heirloom. When her first grandchild was born, she asked a seamstress who lived nearby to transform the dress into a formal christening gown for her grandchildren. She had the name and the date of her wedding embroidered on the liner of the dress. When each of her seven grandchildren were baptized, their names and the date of the ceremony were embroidered onto the lining as well.
“It’s a piece of that most wonderful day in my life when my husband and I got married,” she says. “To have my grandchildren wear a version of that very same dress — it’s just such a lovely tradition. And I would love to see them pass the tradition on.”
The remainder of the dress wasn’t wasted, either. Pieces of the garment have been preserved and repurposed in several different ways. For each grandchild, she placed a small piece of lace into a picture frame with a photo of them wearing the gown.
“When they wore that dress, they were just babies. They were just a few months old, and they have no memory of wearing it,” she says. “Whenever I’ve shown the framed material to them, they’re just awestruck.”
She also made handkerchiefs for each of her granddaughters to have on their own wedding days, and a small pillow for ring-bearers to carry at weddings. And, on her 50th wedding anniversary, she wore a dress with seven flowers made from the dress’ fabric — one for each grandchild.
“I knew that wedding dress would just be put in a box or something and forgotten in time,” she says. “But by reinventing it and using it for something that will become an heirloom and passed through generations, it’s alive, and it’s a special memory.”
A Special Holiday Tradition
A meaningful grandparent tradition can also come in the form of a shared holiday activity. For Sterling resident Beth Whitehead’s family, one annual ritual is making an American flag cake on the Fourth of July. Her mother, Linda Waysek, makes the same cake with Whitehead’s daughters every year. It’s a simple recipe, with Cool Whip frosting and berries arranged to make the cake look like a flag, but the tradition has become an essential part of their holiday celebrations.
“I think cooking is so special because you’re passing down some family culture,” Whitehead says. “My mom has a number of cooking traditions that she’s done with my two daughters, but this flag cake has really been an enduring one.”
It started with Whitehead and her sister when they were little. Then, after her daughters — Zoe, 15, and Evie, 17 — were born, they started doing it with their grandmother. They would travel to New Jersey every year to visit Waysek for the holiday, and now that she lives in the area, the practice has continued. This year, Zoe told her mom that the cake was her “favorite Grammy tradition.”
This cake in particular works well with young kids because laying the berries is something they were able to help with even when they were little. And as they’ve grown, Whitehead says it’s been fun to see them take on a bigger role in the activity with their grandmother.
“When you see your kids have joy in something, even in a small thing like making a dessert like that, you can envision it being passed down,” she says. “And it’s become part of this Fourth of July celebration. It’s probably even more important than some of the fireworks.”
Seeing the World Together
For Marge Nientimp, traveling has become a way to bond with her grandchildren. She says she got the idea from the movie Auntie Mame, about an eccentric great-aunt who traveled around the globe with her nephew.
Nientimp (who ran a travel agency at the time) decided to bring her six grandchildren on special, one-on-one vacations when they hit certain milestone birthdays. At age 10, they went to New York together to see a musical. At 13, they could choose a destination within the United States. And at 16, they took a European vacation. “I wanted them to love musicals, and I wanted to start early enough the love of travel, because it’s a big world,” she says.
For Nientimp, these trips were a way to get close to her grandchildren by spending time with them individually — something that’s not always easy in a large group or when you live across state lines.
“The result of this is genuine closeness with each child that’s hard to get with a whole gang — but if you’ve got a week one-on-one, you learn so much about that child, and they learn about you,” she says.
The trips also gave Nientimp and her grandkids a chance to see more of the world and make new memories. With her oldest granddaughter, she toured London for a week; with another, they traveled through Italy and visited Venice. When her youngest grandson was 13, they went to Las Vegas to see Michael Jackson.
Eventually, she hopes this is something that will continue to be passed down in the family. “We all talk about how great it was all the time,” she says. “So I’m hoping I passed something along, like Auntie Mame.”
Featured image, new africa/stock.adobe.com
This story originally ran in our September issue. For more stories like this, subscribe to Northern Virginia Magazine.
