National Grandparents Day – September 10

National Grandparents Day is celebrated on the first Sunday of September after Labor Day in the United States—this year that will be September 10th.

Many people honor their grandparents through a range of activities such as gift-giving, card-giving, and for children to invite their grandparents to school for a day where they participate in special lessons or special assembly programs. Many school students take part in story-telling activities that relate to their grandparents, as well as art or poster competitions where children often use a story about their grandparents in their artwork.

The official flower to commemorate this day is the “forget-me-not.”

What Is A Grandparent?

(Taken from papers written by a class of 8-year-olds)

• Grandparents are a lady and a man who have no little children of their own. They like other people’s.

• A grandfather is a man, and a grandmother is a lady!

• Grandparents don’t have to do anything except be there when we come to see them. They are so old they shouldn’t play hard or run.

• When they take us for walks, they slow down past things like pretty leaves and caterpillars.

They show us and talk to us about the colors of the flowers and also why we shouldn’t step on ‘cracks.’

• They don’t say, ‘Hurry up.’

• Grandparents don’t have to be smart. They have to answer questions like ‘Why isn’t God married?’ and ‘How come dogs chase cats?’

• When they read to us, they don’t skip. They don’t mind if we ask for the same story over again.

• Everybody should try to have a grandmother, especially if you don’t have television because they are the only grownups who like to spend time with us.

• They know we should have a snack time before bed time, and they say prayers with us and kiss us even when we’ve been naughty.

Quotations about Grandparents
Source: Grandparents.com

“A grandmother pretends she doesn’t know who you are on Halloween.” (Erma Bombeck)

“One of life’s greatest mysteries is how the boy who wasn’t good enough to marry your daughter can be the father of the smartest grandchild in the world.” (Traditional Jewish Saying)

“To forget one’s ancestors is to be a brook without a source, a tree without a root.” (Chinese Proverb)

“If your baby is ‘beautiful and perfect, never cries or fusses, sleeps on schedule and burps on demand, an angel all the time,’ you’re the grandma.” (Teresa Bloomingdale)

“If you would civilize a man, begin with his grandmother.” (Victor Hugo)

“The simplest toy, one which even the youngest child can operate, is called a grandparent.” (Sam Levenson)

Grandparents make the world … a little softer, a little kinder, a little warmer. (Anonymous)

“A garden of Love grows in a Grandmother’s heart.” (Unknown)

“Grandpas always have time for you when everyone else is too busy.” (Unknown)