Dear Cutesicle – a letter to our granddaughter

Dear Cutesicle,

You already know your grandparents, your uncle, your great grandfather and the rest of your Mommy’s relatives very well. They all love you to bits, but you are far too young to realise that you have yet more people who are closely related to you and who love you just as much.

You see, we live far away from you and cannot spend time with you, except on the internet and on the phone. Your Mommy and Dadda send us photos and news of you almost every single day. We’ve been watching you grow from a tiny little baby into a beautiful, smart little girl, but that is not the same as holding you and kissing you and playing with you, which is what we want to do … so much.

You are our granddaughter. Your Dadda is our son. We are your Ouma and Oupa.

Dear Cutesicle, we are so excited! You and your Mommy and Dadda will be spending Christmas with us and your Dadda’s siblings – yes, you have another uncle and an aunt. You will see our home and meet our dog, Genis, and our cat Ponsie, for the first time. We can hardly wait to introduce ourselves and get to know you better.

At the time when your impending birth was announced, we were caught a little off guard. Your Mommy and Dadda had been married for a very long time already and we sort of accepted that there would never be grandchildren in our family. In the beginning, we often wondered how your Dadda would handle the parenting thing. I think that we still thought of him as our little boy, not really as an adult, not really ready to take his place as a responsible parent and to do right by you. In our minds, we still had the picture of the rough and tumble little boy, somewhat careless with his possessions, a little bit irresponsible, impulsive and not above throwing spectacular tantrums.

Parents do that, you know? They never think of their children as grownups, or as smart enough to handle life on their own terms. We keep worrying about them, all the time; you will know what I mean when you grow a little older.

Although your Dadda has always taken his career seriously, and we’ve always known what a hard worker he is and how important his marriage is to him, we were, quite frankly, not sure that he was ready for parenthood. We have known for years that your Dadda loves your diminutive little Mommy to bits and that he would do everything in his power to make her happy (but you know that, don’t you? It is so obvious that you are growing up in a loving environment). Still, we were a little bit afraid, I think, that he would not really be too charmed with taking on the responsibilities that come with taking care of a little one.

However, all those fears and anxieties evaporated immediately when we received this photo of your Dadda holding you right after birth.

Just look at his face! His expression speaks of such joy and such love, a feeling too enormous to contain in one body, even if that body reaches well over 6 ft. tall and weighs in at something over 80 kilos.

Your Mommy tells us that he loves taking care of you, tries never to miss meal times at night and plays with you all the time.

She says that you are crazy about your Dadda and it is true, we can see that on all the pictures that Mommy sends to us so regularly.

Dear Cutesicle, you are so lucky that you have so many people who love you so well. Most of all, you have a Dadda and a Mommy who will look after you, who will bring you up to be a happy and contented little girl, who will love you and teach you how to love in return.

Pssst, when you start growing up, they will drive you crazy, interfering in your life, being nosy about your friends and your interests. Don’t be too hard on them. This is what being parents mean – we are turned into a mass of fears and bad nerves. It gets ten times worse when we have grandchildren to worry about, as well.

Until Christmas then *kissy*

We love you dearly

Ouma and Oupa.