Bill Mauldin Quotes

We kiss and hug our kids a lot! And even now when our son lives 3,000 miles away, we talk every day, sometimes several times.

My kids don't watch my movies. What I want to do is go home and hug my kids, talk to them and engage with them.

The character and history of each child may be a new and poetic experience to the parent, if he will let it.

The real question isn't whether you love your kids or not, but how well you are able to demonstrate your love and caring so that your children really feel loved.

Everyone talks about how we're on our phones all the time, but the fact remains that when I'm away on a film set for two months, I can Skype my family. I remember the phone calls my parents had to make when my dad was away for a while when I was younger - that once-a-week expensive phone call! The time pressure on talking to your father!

Since the beginning of time, every child on the planet has endeavored to please their parents.

It breaks my heart that I don't see my daughters every day, don't get to hug them and brush their hair.

Before I left home for drama school in England, my father took me outside one night and told me that wherever I was, the moon would shine on both of us. Months later, walking in London, I'd look at the moon and feel his love. Now I've shared the ritual with my own kids.

It's fun when your kids reach a point where you can actually start talking about things.

If I feel like I've done a great job during an interview with the president of the United States live in the Oval Office, it doesn't give me a tenth of the good feeling of going to the school play and making eye contact with my kids as they're onstage delivering their lines. Nothing compares with that moment of connection.

If you are lucky enough to have a parent or two alive on this planet, call them. Don't text; don't e-mail. Call them on the phone.

Your kids want to know that you can see them and that you care and we're fortunate enough to be able to do that.

I think about the milestones from my childhood and what it will be like to watch our kids go through them. Taking Riley to her first day of school was a whirlwind. I can't imagine what middle school is going to be like, and high school, and graduation.

I really want to take time and be in the moment with my kid for at least the first year. I know she's not going to remember that, but it's really for the family chemistry.

I love my parents so much. My day or night is not complete without talking to them - on Skype.

One truth I've learned as a father: Children want presence more than presents. They don't want to read about you; they want you.

I have barely seen my son since he came into the world. Even though I hear his voice on the phone almost every day, it is very tough to not be present while he is growing up.

The time and the quality of the time that their parents devote to them indicate to children the degree to which they are valued by their parents. . . . When children know that they are valued, when they truly feel valued in the deepest parts of themselves, then they feel valuable. This knowledge is worth more than any gold.

You have to empathize with your children. If you love them, you never really get too angry with them when they make a mistake, because kids are expected to make mistakes. Having children, you start to see yourself through them.

Your kids need your love and attention, and being able to devote myself to them is very fulfilling. As I get older, spending time with my daughters makes things much easier. You learn to put your ego aside.

It's a long haul bringing up our children to be good; you have to keep doing that — bring them up — and that means bringing things up with them: Asking, telling, sounding them out, sounding off yourself — finding, through experience, your own words, your own way of putting them together. You have to learn where you stand, and make sure your kids learn [where you stand], understand why, and soon, you hope, they'll be standing there beside you, with you.

When you have kids, there's no such thing as quality time. There's just time. There's no, 'Ooh, his graduation's better than going to the mall.' It's all kind of equal. Changing her diaper and her winning a contest - it's all good.

I tell my kids, 'I am thinking about you every other minute of my day.'

When you read with your child, you show them that reading is important, but you also show them they're important - that they are so important to you that you will spend 20 minutes a day with your arm around them.

I love my kids and would rather be with them than anyone in the whole wide world.