Gordon Neufeld Quotes

I have four kids; three girls and a boy. The oldest girl is 13, and has her own social life now, so there's a bit of begrudging cooperation there. It's tough.

A first child is your own best foot forward, and how you do cheer those little feet as they strike out. You examine every turn of flesh for precocity, and crow it to the world. But the last one: the baby who trails her scent like a flag of surrender through your life when there will be no more coming after--oh, that' s love by a different name.

God bless you if you have one child, but I don't think anybody should have just one child. Everybody needs a sibling. I have siblings, and I have so many amazing, precious memories with my siblings. I don't know what I would do if I had been an only child.

Having one child makes you a parent; having two, you are a referee.

Once you've taken account of the quality of sibling relationships, knowing about the quality of parenting doesn't add much information.

As you get older, I have seen it a lot... fighting among siblings. The reason is usually money or spouses. But my kids don't fall into that trap.

Poor parenting may be reflected in poor sibling relationships.

Someone once told me that children are like heroin. You always want more. Yet first-borns are special because you'll never have your first child again.

As marriage produces children, so children produce care and disputes; and wrangling.

The issue you have with two competitive guys being brought up the same way is that you don't have one person who goes out of his way to make a relationship.

I have no theories about the divorce rate or things like that, but it does occur to me that dealing with kids and their problems can be real binding glue. It keeps you out of the range of too much ego.

One thing that I've noticed about big families is that they usually break down into two camps: the talkers and the watchers.

I understand how important it is for both parents to be in a child's life.

The Trees was four complete nuts. We didn't have a damn thing in common except insanity. So we fought a lot. And we had two brothers - who fought like brothers.

I don't know how it is with other people's relationships, but my wife is always much more tired than me because she works much harder looking after the children, which is an endless battle - a lot of it is battling with them to stop battling with each other.

I remember going to friends' houses and being fascinated when they got into fights with their siblings.

Sibling relationships have been underemphasised in learning about child development.

Everything you worry about as a parent can be improved by sitting down regularly with your kids.

Parenting is a learning process.

Praise the child, and you make love to the mother.

By the time we have our fifth and sixth you'll be a pro." Kane teased. He nuzzled Sebastien head. " Do you hear that, son ? You're our experiment, so you'll have all sorts of excuses to do very naughty things.

One of the things I've learned is to be much more open about my frailties and about our failures, because when you show your kids how you can resolve conflict in your life in real time, you're giving them confidence that when they have conflicts, they can push through them.

Should I be offended? (Livia) Please don’t be. I pride myself on being socially inept. But the only people I ever intentionally offend are my bevy of brothers. And speaking of, where’s Big Bad Angry One? (Zarina)

Siblings tend not to care much about boundaries and borders. Having worn each others' T-shirts, it's unlikely that they'd go to war over a border.

You try not to have a favorite when you have sons or kids. Can't have a favorite. Can't let them know know if you do. I don't. I treat my main son and the other two exactly the same way.