Mee-Maw, Poppy and Nanna

20 posted on July 20, 2009

POSTED IN: Blog Posts, Childhood Memories, Culture

There’s a special joy reserved for the relationship between a grandchild and their grandparents. They can take the grand kids out to a movie, buy them candy and ice cream, and then send them home in time to let mom and dad deal with the sugar rush. I suppose that’s one of many reasons kids love their grandparents so much.

I suppose compared to many, we’re kinda plain when it comes to what our kids call our parents. It’s simply Grandpa and Grandma. Which is fine with me since I can’t see myself answering to anything else when I have grand kids. Of course, I could change my mind my mind the first time my little grandchild calls me a pet name. Except Pappy. I refuse to answer to Grandpappy.

I’ve been around lots of families with names that get handed down from generation to generation like “Papa” or “Poppy.” We have friends whose child calls their Grandma “Mee-Maw.” Some families choose the cultural name based on their nationality like YaYa (Greek for Grandmother), Ye Ye (Chinese for grandfather) or Zeidy – Yiddish for Grandfather.

What unique names do you use for relatives in your family? Do you already know what your grandkids will call you?

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16 Comments

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July 20, 2009

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1 Adam O said:

Karen’s parents are Nana and Pop Pop

My parents are Grammy and Pappy.

I have no idea what I would want my grandkids to call me. Actually it kinda freaks me out to think one day my little girl will someday become a mother. I have a hard enough time dealing with next year she will go to kindergarten.. dang it i promised myself i wouldnt cry typing this comment.
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2 Chad Wright said:

My parents are known as MeeMee and Pops. I wouldn’t mind being a Pops when my kids start having their own.

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3 Rachel Richard said:

My grandparents go/went by “grandma” or “grandpa”. On my husband’s side, his grandfathers were “Pepe” and “Granddaddy” and his grandmothers were “Nana” and “Mama”. My parents/in-laws just go by “Grandma” or “Grandpa” except my mom. She’s gotten into calling herself “Grammy”.

My aunt calls herself “Nan nan” or “Gran-nan”. Her real name is LeAnn. Some of my friends (or their children) call their grandparents:

Mimi
Papoo
Nanny (I can only think of Muppet Babies or Fran Drescher when I hear this one…)

Seems like it’s the grandparents or parents that usually give the name and the kid just picks it up.

I’m not ready to think of what I want to be called. My kids are 6 and 3. I’m just trying to make it through potty training alive!
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4 Cherith said:

my mom wanted to be called nana, but an ex boyfriends mom stole that one. Then it was Meme, but I forget why that went away, and when Lucy came around she wanted it to be Gram, which I am not a huge fan of. She ended up being ::drum roll please:: Gamaw.. haha.. I love it. And my dad is PawPaw. Which we all love.

BJ’s parents on the other hand are Mimi and Papi (i think thats how you spell it) It’s cute. His niece’s have a song and everything for it too.

My Grandparents we’re always Grandma and Grandpa. Every one of them. With their name attached. Like Grandma Becky, or whatever.

Don’t ask me what I want to be called, I have to have the kid first

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5 chris justice said:

My grankids call me Mom-Mom…east coast thing I believe….they call my Mom G-Mom…it’s easier than great grandmom!!!My sister’s granddaughter calls her Hiyammom…it started with hi mom mom which she couldn’t pronounce so….it came out hiyammom and it stuck!!!
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6 Kayla said:

One of my friends son calls one set of grandparents Gumps and Gimmy not sure how that came about
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7 bryan said:

Grammy & PapPap

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8 Jody Blue said:

Grmpa & Grma

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9 Karen said:

My grandmothers were both grandma or Gram. Didn’t know either of my grandfathers, but I’m sure it would have been grandpa or gramp.

Had a friend who’s kids called them bomma and poppa.

If I should ever have grand kids I wouldn’t care what they call me, as long as they visit me in the “home”.

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10 John Richard said:

Just to clarify what my wife Rachel said above – my grandfather on my dad’s side was French Canadian, so we called him “Pepere”, which is an informal French version of “grandfather”. But, since most of my family doesn’t speak French, it ended up sounding like “Peh-PAY”.
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11 Kelly said:

My kids have three sets of grandparents due to my husbands parents divorce. They have a Nana and Papaw, Grandma and Grandpa and Mimi and Pawpaw Gene. My grandparents were Nana and Grandy and Papaw. My husbands always called his Grandma and Grandpa. The hard part comes when cousins use different names. We were having cake for my dad’s birthday and had to stretch out the name part to include-”dear daddy, jerry, d, papaw and grandpa” Yikes

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12 Chelan said:

grandfathers in our fam are: papa rick, papa bob & papa bruce. grandmas are: gigi, ga-maw, and granny.

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13 Stephani said:

We have MeMa & PaPa on my husband’s side and Nana & Pops on mine. Oh and her surrogate granparents are Gramps & Grammy…we’re hoping she’ll have them all figured out by the time she goes to kindergarten:)

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14 Pokinatcha said:

With 7 kids and probably a ton of grandkids in the horizon who knows what they’ll call us. Hopefully, we won’t find out for 10 more years. My 20 yr old is too young to have kids.

I’m thinking it will be Grammy & Pops perhaps.

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15 Lori Wilhite said:

We have NaNa and PaPa and also Mimi and Popsy. We like rhyming names.

Our friends who are new grandparents are Lovie and Pops … which I think is hilariously cute.

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16 jonathan said:

I am so screwed up. I had a Grannee, Neenaw, and Papa…