My beautiful girls call my mom an unique name. I’m not so sure if she ever thought she would be called this when she was a grandparent, but it warms my heart that my girls came up with this ever so cute name on their own. My girls call my mom Yay-Yay! Yes… you heard me right :). Now, you see how this name came about is very interesting. When M was about 6 months old, my mom would call M on the phone and go yayayayayayayayay over and over to her on the phone. She did this until M was well over a year old because M would just crack up and do the cutest little baby laugh. Mom was over at our house one day and M out of the blue looked at my mom and said plain as day Yay-Yay. Her little mind put two and two together that she was the woman that always did Yay-Yay to her so that must be her name right? Ever since that day, my mom has been known as Yay-Yay to the girls. When L was born and old enough to talk, she naturally just started calling mom Yay-Yay as well. Is that not just the cutest story?
Now let’s just say if you gather a group of young kids today and ask them what they call their grandparents…. you are going to get a different answer from each one. You’re bound to encounter the run-of-the-mill Grandmas and Grandpas, but things really start getting interesting once the Gramies, Lulus, Gagas and Boo-boos start popping up. Where did all these names come from? Are the grandparents planting them? Is it just a matter of young kids butchering the annunciations? Regardless of origin, the nicknaming of grandparents has taken on a life of its own, and as a result BabyCenter has published the top 10 most popular names from grandparents:
Popular Grandmother Names:
Grandma
Nana
Grammy
Granny
Mimi
Gram
Nanny
Oma
Mamaw
Gran
Popular Grandfather Names:
Grandpa
Papa
Granddad
Gramps
Pop-Pop
Poppy
Papaw
Pop
Opa
Pappy
In addition to the top ten, BabyCenter also collected dozens of other sweet, fun and downright odd names while compiling the list that can be found here.
What does your kids call their grandparents? I would love to see if it falls into the top ten from above or is unique to your family :).
