My Fave Quotes

On Raising Kids:

Families with babies and families without babies are sorry for each other.

People who say they sleep like a baby usually don't have one.

Always kiss your children goodnight - even if they're already asleep.

To bring up a child in the way he should go, travel that way yourself once in a while.

Your children need your presence more than your presents.

It's not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can't tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself.

There are two lasting bequests we can give our children. One is roots. The other is wings.

Each day of our lives we make deposits in the memory banks of our children.

Kids spell love T-I-M-E.

When you teach your son, you teach your son's son.

My father used to play with my brother and me in the yard. Mother would come out and say, "You're tearing up the grass." "We're not raising grass," Dad would reply. "We're raising boys."

A truly rich man is one whose children run into his arms when his hands are empty.

There are three stages of a man's life: He believes in Santa Claus, he doesn't believe in Santa Claus, he is Santa Claus.

It's not easy being a mother. If it were easy, fathers would do it.

The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; the wise grows it under his feet.

On Family:

Families are like fudge... mostly sweet with a few nuts.

An ounce of blood is worth more than a pound of friendship.

What greater thing is there for human souls than to feel that they are joined for life - to be with each other in silent unspeakable memories.

On Grandparents:

The reason grandchildren and grandparents get along so well is that they have a common enemy.

Grandmas are moms with lots of frosting.

When grandparents enter the door, discipline flies out the window.

Grandmas hold our tiny hands for just a little while, but our hearts forever.

A grandmother is a little bit parent, a little bit teacher, and a little bit best friend.

Grandparents are similar to a piece of string - handy to have around and easily wrapped around the fingers of their grandchildren.

No cowboy was ever faster on the draw than a grandparent pulling a baby picture out of a wallet.

A grandmother pretends she doesn't know who you are on Halloween.

My grandson was visiting one day when he asked, "Gramma, do you know how you and God are alike?" I mentally polished my halo while I asked, "No, how are we alike?" "You're both old," he replied.

On God:

Any fool can count the seeds in an apple. Only God can count all the apples in one seed.

Every evening I turn my worries over to God. He's going to be up all night anyway.

God understands our prayers even when we can't find the words to say them.

What we are is God's gift to us. What we become is our gift to God.

You can tell the size of your God by looking at the size of your worry list. The longer your list, the smaller your God.

Maybe the atheist cannot find God for the same reason a thief cannot find a policeman.

Your talent is God's gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God.

On Gardening:

Gardens are a form of autobiography.

On Marriage:

Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what she thinks of him a year afterward, and you will have the truth about him.

More marriages might survive if the partners realized that sometimes the better comes after the worse.

A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person.

Our wedding was many years ago. The celebration continues to this day.

And, Of Course, On Politics:

Politics, it seems to me, for years, or all too long, has been concerned with right or left instead of right or wrong.

Politicians are like diapers. They both need changing regularly and for the same reason.

When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President; I'm beginning to believe it.

The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it.

The Democrats seem to be basically nicer people, but they have demonstrated time and again that they have the management skills of celery. They're the kind of people who'd stop to help you change a flat, but would somehow manage to set your car on fire. I would be reluctant to entrust them with a Cuisinart, let alone the economy. The Republicans, on the other hand, would know how to fix your tire, but they wouldn't bother to stop because they'd want to be on time for Ugly Pants Night at the country club. -- Dave Barry

The Christian Right is neither.