Reading through these posts reminded me of my grandparents I was lucky enough to know all 4 of them and also one great grandmother, all lived within 8 miles of us, My Maternal grandparents spoilt me rotten, I was their first grandchild and the sun shone from my back****, as far as they were concerned, my gran taught me to knit, bake, sew, and play tiddlewinks, and my Grandad how to sweep a chimmney (getting filthy into the process), and how to grow things, he was a bundle of fun and used to play cricket or rounders with all of us (I was one of 7) and any of our friends that wanted to join in. my paternal parents had a farm (mixed) and worked very hard, so when ever we went to see them (as often as possible) and were always welcome, but were always given a task, collecting eggs, 'helping' with milking, or haymaking, or picking up potatoes, but my favorite job was rounding up the cows for milking, we used to ride the horse, a very gentle old cob, who I am sure saw looking after us as his main duty, he put up with an awful lot poor thing. I'm sure Health and safety would have gone mad to have seen 3 or 4 kids all piled on to the back of that horse, no saddle or bridle just a head collar and not a riding hat to be seen, but no matter how tired she was my gran always found time for us and to go to church on a sunday night.
I think my grandchildren really miss out on the type of fun we used to have, but not on the affection