Looking for good quotes about moms
April 24, 2010 5:50 PM Subscribe
A short, sweet-but-not-cloying quotation for a Mother's Day card?
I'd like to make a paper-cutting for my mom for Mother's Day, and I'd like it to feature a short quotation (let's say no more than ~10 words). This shouldn't be a difficult task, but I'm having a hell of a time finding something appropriate. When I search for "quotes about mothers" most of the stuff that turns up is: too long; about God; more appropriate for stay-at-home moms, which my mother was not; about mothers as confidantes or best friends (which my mother also was/is not); or totally tone deaf (seriously, who considers "Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own" to be a heartwarming saying about moms?).
So I guess I'm looking for a short, non-religious quotation about mothers (or a quotation that could be construed as being about mothers) that's sweet but isn't all Gilmore-Girls-y in terms of presumed intimacy. I am female and (technically) an adult, in case that helps.
I'd like to make a paper-cutting for my mom for Mother's Day, and I'd like it to feature a short quotation (let's say no more than ~10 words). This shouldn't be a difficult task, but I'm having a hell of a time finding something appropriate. When I search for "quotes about mothers" most of the stuff that turns up is: too long; about God; more appropriate for stay-at-home moms, which my mother was not; about mothers as confidantes or best friends (which my mother also was/is not); or totally tone deaf (seriously, who considers "Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own" to be a heartwarming saying about moms?).
So I guess I'm looking for a short, non-religious quotation about mothers (or a quotation that could be construed as being about mothers) that's sweet but isn't all Gilmore-Girls-y in terms of presumed intimacy. I am female and (technically) an adult, in case that helps.
"My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it." -Mark Twain
It may say something about the relationship my mom and I have, but my mom seriously loves this quote and keeps it on her desk where she can see it every day.
posted by corey flood at 6:08 PM on April 24, 2010 [2 favorites]
It may say something about the relationship my mom and I have, but my mom seriously loves this quote and keeps it on her desk where she can see it every day.
posted by corey flood at 6:08 PM on April 24, 2010 [2 favorites]
Okay, this is more than 10 words, and I don't know if it is insufficiently non-intimate, but my mother gave me this on a small, pretty framed art nouveau print and I have always cherished it:
For this I bless you the most. You give so much and know not that you give at all. -Kahlil Gibran
It is worth noting that neither her nor I am religious (I'm an atheist, she is more diffusely, new-agey spiritual) and that I went through a phase in high school where I carried around a copy of The Prophet.
I'm also quite partial to this, but my mother has a terrific sense of dark humor and would love this in something handcrafted:
All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his. ~Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest, 1895
I would probably cut this off after the part about women.
posted by jeoc at 6:14 PM on April 24, 2010 [1 favorite]
For this I bless you the most. You give so much and know not that you give at all. -Kahlil Gibran
It is worth noting that neither her nor I am religious (I'm an atheist, she is more diffusely, new-agey spiritual) and that I went through a phase in high school where I carried around a copy of The Prophet.
I'm also quite partial to this, but my mother has a terrific sense of dark humor and would love this in something handcrafted:
All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his. ~Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest, 1895
I would probably cut this off after the part about women.
posted by jeoc at 6:14 PM on April 24, 2010 [1 favorite]
We are together, my child and I. Mother and Child, yes, but sisters really, against whatever denies us all that we are. Alice Walker
posted by saffry at 6:16 PM on April 24, 2010
posted by saffry at 6:16 PM on April 24, 2010
Sweater, n.: garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly. ~Ambrose Bierce
[A] mother is one to whom you hurry when you are troubled. ~Emily Dickinson
Any mother could perform the jobs of several air traffic controllers with ease. ~Lisa Alther
A mother's arms are made of tenderness and children sleep soundly in them. ~Victor Hugo
Grown don't mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child. They get bigger, older, but grown? What's that suppose to mean? In my heart it don't mean a thing. ~Toni Morrison, Beloved, 1987
A mom forgives us all our faults, not to mention one or two we don't even have. ~Robert Brault
Mother's love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved. ~Erich Fromm
Most of all the other beautiful things in life come by twos and threes, by dozens and hundreds. Plenty of roses, stars, sunsets, rainbows, brothers and sisters, aunts and cousins, comrades and friends - but only one mother in the whole world. ~Kate Douglas Wiggin
posted by b33j at 6:41 PM on April 24, 2010 [4 favorites]
[A] mother is one to whom you hurry when you are troubled. ~Emily Dickinson
Any mother could perform the jobs of several air traffic controllers with ease. ~Lisa Alther
A mother's arms are made of tenderness and children sleep soundly in them. ~Victor Hugo
Grown don't mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child. They get bigger, older, but grown? What's that suppose to mean? In my heart it don't mean a thing. ~Toni Morrison, Beloved, 1987
A mom forgives us all our faults, not to mention one or two we don't even have. ~Robert Brault
Mother's love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved. ~Erich Fromm
Most of all the other beautiful things in life come by twos and threes, by dozens and hundreds. Plenty of roses, stars, sunsets, rainbows, brothers and sisters, aunts and cousins, comrades and friends - but only one mother in the whole world. ~Kate Douglas Wiggin
posted by b33j at 6:41 PM on April 24, 2010 [4 favorites]
I came in here to suggest the Futurama one.
posted by ArgentCorvid at 8:37 PM on April 24, 2010
posted by ArgentCorvid at 8:37 PM on April 24, 2010
Slightly longer than 10 words:
"Whatever else is unsure in this stinking dunghill of a world a mother's love is not." - James Joyce
posted by Kattullus at 3:42 AM on April 25, 2010
"Whatever else is unsure in this stinking dunghill of a world a mother's love is not." - James Joyce
posted by Kattullus at 3:42 AM on April 25, 2010
Martha Stewart's site has some quotes for just this purpose. The best of the crop (in my opinion) are:
"As is the mother, so is her daughter."
Ezekiel 16:44
"To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power."
Maya Angelou
"No one like one's mother [and father] ever lived."
Robert Lowell, "Returning
posted by TEA at 10:38 AM on April 25, 2010
"As is the mother, so is her daughter."
Ezekiel 16:44
"To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power."
Maya Angelou
"No one like one's mother [and father] ever lived."
Robert Lowell, "Returning
posted by TEA at 10:38 AM on April 25, 2010
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"You created me Mom so I guess you're to blame
For the love that I feel just from hearing your name
You're as tender as corned beef and as warm as pastrami
I love my Mommy"
posted by bolognius maximus at 6:00 PM on April 24, 2010 [2 favorites]