It's pretty easy being a grandparent, right? You've been through the whole parenting thing yourself, so you know all about it, and you can enjoy the youngsters without the stresses and worries of the first time around. But when I came to think about it, things weren't that simple. For starters, when Tabitha was born, it was 37 years since my Mum had looked at a nappy. From what I hear about the trends for older parenthood, that doesn't make her particularly unusual. A lot changes in that time: the nappies themselves, for one thing (she could have told me anything about terry squares and old-school safety-pins). And the world has changed, too. There are new ideas about almost everything, from SIDS to child nutrition; what with e-mail and the internet, kids' tv, computer games… well, maybe it's quicker to ask what has stayed the same. Dr Miriam Stoppard, purveyor of common-sense to a whole generation of parents, and now a grandmother ten times over herself, has turned her attention to the worries and queries of the modern-day grandparent. The Grandparents' Book is the result. My first thought was that this might make a nice gift for my parents, but when I looked inside, I thought again. A book of advice? They might think I was saying they weren't good enough as they are. No, this is one they will either have to buy themselves, or be given by someone else. [...]
