Suzanne Vega Quotes

If you bungle raising your children, I don't think whatever else you do matters very much.

In my formative years, when I was a little kid, I'd get out of elementary school, and because my mother worked as a nurse, I'd have to find a way to get a ride to the high school and watch my dad's team practice.

Kids and violent TV, violent TV and violence, violence and kids. The only people missing from this discussion are the parents. Where are we? Gone. Abdicated.

Children are not to be blamed for the faults of their parents.

It's difficult to keep that perspective, I think, as a parent: to know your boundaries as to what's good parenting or just projecting your own expectations on your kids. That's the hardest.

I wasn't against becoming a dad: I'd had a good childhood, as childhoods go, and as role models, my imperfect parents were as good as or better than most.

I was one of six kids in a single-parent household.

If your parents gave you fire to play with when you were two, you'd be standing in fire by the time you were an adult.

My father wasn't the best role model to me.

I'm not a goody-two-shoes. I'm just a father with four children.

I was an adopted child of my grandparents, and I don't know how I can ever express my gratitude for that, because my parents would have been a mess, you know.

I helped my mom raise so many little sisters. At 11, I was helping get them ready for school, watching over them, putting them to sleep. It's just naturally with me.

I was raised mostly by my mom.

Mother never said to me, 'Stay out of trouble.' She didn't have to!

Most kids would be like, 'My dad's never around.' But I saw it as a positive. He was out there working to provide for me.

My dad left home when I was super young, so it was my mum bringing me and my brother up.

I was the third parent, growing up, and it did make me a very overly responsible adult.

Because I was an only child, I lived in a very grown-up world.

Bringing up children always has a bigger role for the mother.

I have always believed that the way my parents disciplined me has a great deal to do with the success I have enjoyed as a man.

Who's taking care of the children is an important question for all of us.

I think the way I approach things has something to do with growing up and seeing my parents go to work every day.

Children grow out of childhood, but parents never grow out of parenthood.

It's frightening to think that you mark your children merely by being yourself. It seems unfair. You can't assume the responsibility for everything you do --or don't do.

Youth need guidance, direction, and proper restraint...Parents, too, have a responsibility in this training not to provoke children to wrath. They should be considerate not to irritate by vexatious commands or place unreasonable blame. Whenever possible they should give encouragement rather than remonstrance or reproof.