Nothing I've ever done has given me more joys and rewards than being a father to my children.

Nothing separates the generations more than music. By the time a child is eight or nine, he has developed a passion for his own music that is even stronger than his passions for procrastination and weird clothes.

Having a child is surely the most beautifully irrational act that two people in love can commit.

I think the part of media that romanticizes criminal behavior, things that a person will say against women, profanity, being gangster, having multiple children with multiple men and women and not wanting to is prevalent. When you look at the majority of shows on television they placate that kind of behavior.

Our children are angry. The profanity is out in the street. It's on the buses and in the subway. Our children are trying to tell us something, and we are not listening.

My childhood should have taught me lessons for my own fatherhood, but it didn't because parenting can only be learned by people who have no children.

Poets have said that the reason to have children is to give yourself immortality. Immortality? Now that I have five children, my only hope is that they are all out of the house before I die.

I want to get violence - I want schools to start from K through 12 to just every day have teachers understand that they don't want to talk about anything that is violent, and they want to explain to the children how bad violence is and how behavior - violent behavior, is something that they really should not practice and think about.

People say children are charming because they tell the truth. That's a lie. I've got five of them. They only tell the truth if they're in pain.

We're not raising children with the love that we need to.

I guess the real reason that my wife and I had children is the same reason that Napoleon had for invading Russia: it seemed like a good idea at the time.

You know the only people who are always sure about the proper way to raise children? Those who've never had any.

Laughter brings out the child in all of us.

When I was a child, I was living in the housing projects of Philadelphia. I didn't even have a Christmas tree.

If you took your child to the dentist and check for cavities, the child likely won't get them. If you take them just for emergency, that's all they're gonna get.

There are teachers in the United States who cry in the daytime because they see a child or children who haven't eaten properly, children who haven't used soap in so long.

Some authority on parenting once said, ""Hold them very close and then let them go."" This is the hardest truth for a father to learn: that his children are continuously growing up and moving away from him (until, of course, they move back in).

My wife and I have five children; the reason we have five children is because we do not want six

Your parents put a curse on you - Someday your kids are going to act just like you.

Our children are trying to tell us something, and we are not listening.

There are no absolutes in raising children. In any stressful situation, fathering is always a roll of the dice. The game may be messy, but I have never found one with more joys and rewards.

A child who is disciplined will be more obedient and also more organized as a student.

My dad came over to the house... went into his pocket and pulled out a handful of money, and began to pass it out to the children... This was the same man who, when I was his child, I would ask him for 50 cents, this man would tell me his life's story.

Some authority on parenting once said, "Hold them very close and then let them go." This is the hardest truth for a father to learn: that his children are continuously growing up and moving away from him (until, of course, they move back in).

Anyone who has brought up children knows that consistency has absolutely nothing to do with discipline.

The childless experts on child raising also bring tears of laughter to my eyes when they say, I love children because they're so honest. There is not an agent in the CIA or the KGB who knows how to conceal the theft of food, how to fake being asleep, or how to forge a parent's signature like a child.

My wife and I have five children. And the reason why we have five children is because we do notwantsix.

In spite of the seven thousand books of expert advice, the right way to disciplne a child is still a mystery to most fathers and...mothers Only your grandmother and Genghis Khan know how to do it.

Whenever your kids are out of control, you can take comfort from the thought that even God's omnipotence did not extend to His kids.

All Children Have Brain Damage!

What is it about grandparents that is so lovely? I'd like to say that grandparents are God's gifts to children.

It doesn't make any difference how much money a father earns, his name is always Dad-Can-I.... Like all other children, my five have one great talent: they are gifted beggars. Not one of them ever ran into the room, looked up at me, and said, "I'm really happy that you're my father, and as a tangible token of my appreciation, here's a dollar.

When the child is twelve, your wife buys her a splendidly silly article of clothing called a training bra. To train what? I never had a training jock. And believe me, when I played football, I could have used a training jock more than any twelve-year-old needs a training bra.

We spoke to God about the children, and we were afraid to ask God for specific things. We thought that it might be too much. So we said to God 'Please give us a healthy child' and left it at that, not knowing that God is a generous God, but also has a sense of humor. And if you leave that much open for God, some wonderful jokes are going to come about.

Children today know more about sex than I or my father did.

Grandparents are God's gifts to children.

Fatherhood is helping your children learn English as a foreign language.

I'm not sure if my parents had me because they loved me, or because they wanted someone to watch their other children.

What best defines a child is the total inability to receive information from anything not plugged in.

And to those people with no children but who think they'd like to have them some day to fulfill their lives. Remember: With fulfillment comes responsibility.

I'm not saying looting is good, ... But I'm saying surely at a time when your child needs diapers and you need food, when does looting stop...

If you listen carefully to what a child is saying to you, you'll see that he has a point to make. So I listen. And I answer them just as seriously as possible. And if I don't know the answer, I'll tell them I don't know.

If you're a parent, the five worst words you can say to your children are, "When I was your age ..." You were never their age. You were older in the womb.

I was a physical education major with a child psychology minor at Temple, which means if you ask me a question about a child's behavior, I will advise you to tell the child to take a lap.

Public education is a good foundation on which to build a better life for each of us. And if we want to prove to these children who never made the mess in the first place that education is worth the trouble, our schools have to inspire them so they can do what they ought to do.

In spite of the six thousand manuals on child raising in the bookstores, child raising is still a dark continent and no one really knows anything. You just need a lot of love and luck - and, of course, courage.

A baseball manager has learned a lot about his job from having played the game, but a parent has not learned a thing from having once been a child.

My children love my mother, and I tell my children, that is not the same woman I grew up with...That is an old woman trying to get into heaven now.

One of the great mistakes that can be made by a man of my age is to get involved in athletic competition with children-unless, of course, they are under six. And even then, stay away from hide-and-seek.

We are all anxious to be accepted. But if you have a strong mother and father who tell you that you don't have to dress a crazy way, or hang out with people who are looking for trouble in order to be loved and accepted, then half the battle is over.