The Birth of "Grandma Jo" and "POPS"

I've been talking about blogging for a long time now and I finally "bit the bullet." I've been inspired by Tyson and Tracy Smith's "RAM"page and now by Bonnie and Aaron's blog, "The Drake Duo." What a fun way to share news and just to keep up with friends and family.

As you can tell by my title, this blog will primarily be about the blessings of "Grandparenthood" - the greatest gift of growing older! We became instant grandparents to five-year-old Dylan when our oldest son, Ryan, married his beautiful wife, Lallania on 4/29/06. We actually fell in love with Dylan before that when we first met him in 2005. What a precious little boy God brought into our lives - full of love and hugs and fun. And we continue to be amazed and blessed by him.

Without the experience of babyhood with Dylan we needed to quickly come up with grandparent names that would work for all of us. Up to that point Dylan didn't really have a name for me except for "Ryan's mom." I still remember that conversation with Dyl when I asked if I could be his "grandma." He promptly said, "No, I already have a grandma." "OK," I said, "can I be Nana?" Again Dylan said, "No, I already have a Nana." "Well," I replied, "I'm not going to be 'Ryan's mom' forever, so we need to come up with something else." Don't think we decided on anything for sure that day, but later Ryan, Lainey and Dylan came up with "Grandma Jo" and "POPS" which has been perfect . . . . until now . . . .