Grandpa, grampa, paw paw.

29 comments

1. After ascending happily (but reluctantly, who wants to be old) to a grandfather I was assigned the name Pa by my daughter for her 2 kids. I was given no choice in the decision. My one grandfather was just grandpa, the other was poppy.

2. Also grandpa, pronounced ‘grampa’. New Jersey.

3. I only ever knew one of my grandfathers and we always called him Pop.

4. I called one grandfather grandfather. I called the other one papaw. (The first a is short like in apple.)

5. My grandpa name is “Pops”.

   It was assigned to me by my kids, I got no choice in the matter. The other grandfather tried to choose his grandpa name, but the grands couldn’t pronounce it and he ended up with “Gigi”, so I consider myself lucky.

6. Mine was Granddaddy.

7. Spelled grandpa pronounced granpah. But it was always “Grandpa Joe” or “Grandma Suzy” instead of just grandpa/grandma

   In my experience this is more a family thing than a regional one. You ask three different people from the same street and it’s grandpa, peepaw, and pop pop.

8. West coast- poppy and nanee. Both of which are adapted from what they called their grandparents (pop and nana)

9. Generally, just Grandmom and Granddad.

   That said, when my nephew was born, there was a conversation between the sets of grandparents to decide proper nicknames for each of them. It sounds like it was almost conference levels of discussion.

10. It was “Granddaddy” at our house.

11. I was born and raised in Michigan, but both sides of my family lived in Appalachia for hundreds of years before that, so this isn’t norm in Michigan. On my mom’s side, it’s Nan and Papa. On my dad’s side, it’s Mamaw and Papaw.

12. We talked about gram-pop in my family. Pap is the default for the area I live in now.

13. I used both depending on which side of the family it was, dad’s side was paw paw and maw maw and moms side was grandma and grandpa. Godmothers are also all nanny even if they’re not my own godmother. I spell it the same way and say it the same way you do but I’ve never really thought about it like that.

14. As a child I was the one who named my grandfather Poppy.

    I am from Long Island, NY

    My nieces and nephews call my father Opa. When they were younger they would call my mother Grandma Ope.

15. I say “Abuelo” and “Grandpa.”

    They’re both alive, though just barely.

16. My grandfather in Connecticut: Grampa (but I’d spell it as “Grandpa”). My grandfather in Tennessee: Papaw.

17. Here in Kentucky we have a wide variety of names. Gramps, Papi, Poppy, Papaw, Pop, Mamaw, Nana, Nanny, Mimi, Momo, Granny, Grammy, Grandma. A huge variety of names.

    I called my Midwestern Grandparents Grandma and Grandpa. As for my southern grandparents they were always Nana/Nanny and Papaw.

18. My siblings and I were the only ones to call our paternal grandmother “Gram”. Just Gram.

19. Grandvater and Peperé.

20. Дедушка

21. Grampie, papa, nonno (italian).

    My family was Grammie and Grampie. By far.

    Massachusetts

22. Nanna and Grandpa on one side and Nanny and Pop Pop on the other.

23. My mom’s parents were Grandpa and Grandma, my dad’s parents are/were Grammy (biological grandmother) and GP (biological grandfather) and GG (step-grandmother).

24. Grandpa is how it’s spelt. Grampa is how it’s said.

25. Paw paw or pap paw

26. My Grandmother on my mother’s side was “Naam” and my Great-Grandmother (her mother) was “Granny”. All other Grandparents and Great-Grandparents were dead when I was born. When my siblings had kids my Dad was “Pee-Paw” and mother was “Mee-Maw” for them.

    While there are some regional trends, these things tend to be more family based trends than regional culture.

27. I’m probably pretty far from the norm, but I had an Opa and Oma growing up, result of my oma being a Bavarian immigrant. As far as I can tell, grampa/gramma was the norm for most other families, occasionally mixed with gramps/grammy.

28. My grandkids call me papa

29. The people I know who have silly, cutesy names for their grandparents are also very close to them and/or have enormous, complicated families where it’s important to distinguish each grandparent, step-grandparent, great-granparent, great-aunt/uncle, non-relative who’s *like* a grandparent, etc

    I have a very small extended family and was never close to any of my grandparents (one of them died when I was an infant), so they were all just Grandma and Grandpa