Having been in two heavily blended families, I have ended up with several names as a grandmother.
I never ever wanted to be called Granny – made me think of someone ancient. (Okay, so I’m approaching that age…) The simplest was Nana, the same as I called both my grandmothers and that sufficed for my own blood-related grandkids.
My step-grandkids from my late husband have drifted to Grandma. My newer grandkids with Stu call me Nonna. That was my choice since they all had a Nana or Mimi (hubby’s late wife) already. I’m continuing the Nonna with the great-grandkids for the same reason, they typically already have a Nana, Mimi, or Mom-Mom from other relations. Isn’t it funny how that happens?
Growing up in New England in the 50s, Nana and Grampa were the standard. The more formal might have been Grandmother and Grandfather, but I rarely heard those, but I did hear Grandma and Grampa. My paternal grandfather was Bumpa. I wish I knew where that came from, I was the first-born, so I must have had something to do with it. It’s only in recent years that I’ve seen it used in other families, but it’s still rare. Both my grandmothers were Nana with the surname added to differentiate when talking to others. My maternal grandfather was Grampa.
Wondering what future names will be held by grandparents – what did you call yours?
Grandma and Grandpa.
We do Nana and Papa. Ken started out as PawPaw, but quickly switched to Papa. Growing up, my grandparents were Nana and Grampa on both sides but we had to distinguish between them so we went with the first letter of their last names. So, essentially we had Nana and Grampa B and Nana and Grandpa S.
Funny how things evolve. In Stu’s family, it was Mom-Mom and Pop-Pop but his late wife became Mi-Mi.
Mine were Oma and Oma. My grandkids call us Grammy and Grampy.