This week Twitter had several links of interest for us in the Sandwich Generation :

Caregivers:

As the economy continues to struggle, elder abuse cases are on the rise. If your aging parent is being cared for by an outside party, it’s always vital to monitor the situation closely.

Encouragement – Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever!

Grandparents:

“You acquire much of the thinking, mannerisms, and characteristics of people you are around.” Zig Ziglar. What a great reminder to us grandparents of the importance of the examples we set . Each day we have new opportunities to help build that very vital spiritual heritage in our grandkids.

Of course, a heritage of good memories is also great. Here is a recipe for some wonderfully awesome gooey fun for you and your grandkids . I’ve enjoyed playing with this goop when helping with my grandkids at vacation Bible school and it is really neat. Very easy too.

Janice and Susan of 5 Minutes for Mom have an interesting post about Janice’s article that was recently published in Guideposts . “Did your journey of building a family take tears, tantrums and begging? Ours did…”

If any of your grandkids are homeschooled, Heart of Wisdom’s home school book store is having a sale and you can save up to 50%!

Sandwich Generation/Baby Boomers:

I really enjoyed the “tongue-in-cheek” article,  This Old House , about growing older, by Lynn Mosher. I hope you do, too.

With fire season getting closer, we can never have too many reminders to pay extra attention to fire prevention – for your own home, your aging parents’ homes, and don’t forget to share the info with your kids and grandkids as well.

Elizabeth Blake (whose blog had the wonderfully gooey recipe above) shared some great links for sunscreen clothing . If you or an aging parent suffer from skin cancer, or if you are trying to protect your grandkids tender skin, you might want to check out Sun-Togs and Coolibar for extra protection from the summer sun.

Questions and concerns about 401k and IRAs? Pop over to ChristianPF and read up on 401K Questions Answered and Retirement Plans. It’s never too early or too late for those of us in the Sandwich Generation to start saving smartly.

Need a fun break from caregiving and grandparenting? Moomette has some fun contest and giveaway links. A couple have expired but most are still available for you to enter to win all sorts of fun goodies.

Just wanted to remind you that SandwichINK will be hosting the Boomer & Senior Blog Carnival on May 27. There’s still plenty of time to submit a post for it.

With the downturn in the economy, we in the Sandwich Generation are getting more and more company.

Encouragement – Blessed is he who trusts in the Lord.

If you are one of the growing number of Baby Boomers and Caregivers on Facebook, check out Seniors For Living’s brand new Facebook page.

That’s it for today. Enjoy your Sandwich Generation surfing!

School is finishing up and summer holidays are almost upon us! Have you thought of any special plans for you and your grandkids? This is the time to do so because the city park and recreation groups around the country are getting out their catalogs, churches are already starting to ask for helpers for Vacation Bible School, with sign-up for our grandkids coming soon! Softball and soccer are vying with swimming. With so many great choices, what’s a grandparent to do? In my case, I’ll be helping with quite a bit, but I’m especially excited about two favorite activities.

I am blessed to be close to half my grandkids, including a set of twins, some with special needs, and all GREAT! We’d be plenty busy normally, but with doctor and therapy appointments thrown in, we’re always jamming! That means I get to have fun with a lot of the summer activities and I LOVE that. I take turns chauffeuring and supervising for swim lessons, which has always been one of my top priorities, first with my kids, and now with my grandkids. Taking the whole crew swimming together is a bit intimidating for me due to their younger ages, but I love to pop over to the local pool with one or two at a time. And yes, this baby boomer grandma dons a swimsuit and plays in the water with them, as long as it is heated! It’s never warm enough for me, but come June or July I’ll do ok. I get to have fun and I love the fact that I am able to help my kids with all the juggling they do so well.

As often as my schedule permits, I love to volunteer for our church’s Vacation Bible School. There are never enough helpers and it’s such a great blessing to so many kids. Whether your church is large or small, the VBS has probably gotten easier than it used to be. I’ve been teaching for various VBS’ for over 30 years and it’s been interesting to see the positive changes that have taken place. But some things haven’t changed. They have always been great places for kids and grandkids to hear about God’s love for them. There are always a wide mix of kids at them and it’s a tremendously important ministry to help with. If you don’t want to work in the classroom, there are usually plenty of needs in other areas such has helping with the snack or preparing the crafts. I loved it when I used to take my kids to VBS and a mom and her mom both helped out each summer. I used to look forward to that when my kids grew up and now I’m actually getting to live that out! What fun! Not only that, it’s another chance to show our grandkids how important God is to us and how important they are to God and to us!

For the other half of my adorable grandkids who live on the other coast, it’s a little trickier. Sometimes I get to visit in the summer, though, and then we have fun swimming at the local swim park. They love getting to show off their great swimming skills and their parents love getting a chance to both go swimming for a bit while grandma supervises. Even if I can’t get out there during the summer season, I have fun hearing about special activities, sending an occasional summer toy or five to play with and watching the pictures of their fun summer activities on our computer slide show!

So many kids today have so much in the way of clothes and toys, and that often includes our grandkids. Instead of birthday toys, I often like to give creative family gifts, along with something tiny on the actual day. A family membership to the Y or a community pool or a session or two of swim lessons is a great way to give a fun present and a fun summer to all our grandkids. With all the talk about childhood obesity, it’s also a terrific way to give them the gift of better health!

How about you? Do you help with Vacation Bible School or swim lessons? Have you got some other great ideas to share with us for fun summer holidays? We’d love to hear about them In the meantime, here’s a bit of early summer fun to give you even more fun ideas.  TwinHappy.com is having a carnival! Just click on the cute pix and find more fun summer stories, articles, and ideas!