How To Choose Your Grandparent Name

Sometimes you pick your name. Sometimes it picks you.

It takes nine months to have a baby, and that may be a good thing because many couples need at least that long to ponder, discuss, debate, argue, agonize, and finally, agree on their child's name.

What moms- and dads-to-be may not realize is that similar, equally weighty debates are going on in the homes of their parents, about what the future grandparents want their grandchildren to call them. "This generation of grandparents takes the whole naming process more seriously than ever," notes Lin Wellford, coauthor of the forthcoming The New Grandparents Name Book: A Lighthearted Guide to Picking the Perfect Grandparent Name (ArtStone). After all, she asks, "How many times in your life do you get to name yourself?"

New grandparents today are also younger than ever — according to the U.S. Census, first-time grandparents are, on average, 47 — and many don't want names that make them feel old. "I wanted a name that sounded as young as I feel," says Wellford, 57, of Ozark, Ark. She's known as Mimi to her two grandchildren.

Grandma or Gaba?

Certainly, some choose an old standby like Grandma or Grandpa, Papa or Nana. Others take a name from their cultural heritage. And others, when their children ask, agree to let kids call them whatever their own parents were called. On the other hand, "You can choose a name and lobby for it, but there's no guarantee that you’re going to end up with it," Wellford says. "I've heard more stories where the grandchild comes up with a name that may be a mangled, funny version of what he or she hears — nothing that the grandparent would have ever thought of in a million years — but they fall in love with it and that's that."

That's how Deana Barr, 65, of North Fort Myers, Fla., came to be Gabadoo to her four grandsons. "When my grandson, Aaron, was younger he had trouble saying Grandma and he pronounced it Gaba," she says. "One day we were cuddling and I asked him, 'Who loves you?' and he answered, 'Gaba do!' So I became Gabadoo or just Gaba. I love it because it's different and it sets me apart."

Similarly, when Anita Bryce's first grandchild, Megan, was little, she sometimes got confused between her two Grannies. The girl's mother tried to simplify things. One Christmas, as Megan opened her gifts, she was told, "This gift is from your grandma with the curly hair," says Bryce, 58, now a grandmother of seven in Vernon, Fla. "It was probably because I had Dolly Parton hair at that time." Sure enough, she says, "a couple of hours later I walked into the house and was greeted with a big hug and salutation of Curly Grandma! Read More.