Quote

The art of never making a mistake is crucial to motherhood. To be effective and to gain the respect she needs to function, a mother must have her children believe she has never engaged in sex, never made a bad decision, never caused her own mother a moment's anxiety, and was never a child.

Erma Bombeck

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Erma Bombeck
Age: 69 †
Born: 1927
Born: February 21
Died: 1996
Died: April 22
Column Author
Journalist
Writer
Bellbrook
Ohio
Erma Louise Bombeck
Must
Mistake
Effective
Children
Decision
Engaged
Needs
Child
Gain
Made
Moment
Anxiety
Believe
Making
Gains
Never
Mother
Function
Motherhood
Moments
Sex
Caused
Art
Respect
Crucial

More quotes by Erma Bombeck

Image
Once you get a spice in your home, you have it forever. Women never throw out spices. The Egyptians were buried with their spices. I know which one I'm taking with me when I go.
Erma Bombeck
Image
the ultimate in longevity is the Christmas fruitcake. It is a cake made during the holidays with fruits that make it heavier than the stove it is cooked in.
Erma Bombeck
Image
I've always felt there are two things a woman should never do after the age of thirty-five: stand in natural light and have a baby.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Everyone is guilty at one time or another of throwing out questions that beg to be ignored, but mothers seem to have a market on the supply. Do you want a spanking or do you want to go to bed? Don't you want to save some of the pizza for your brother? Wasn't there any change?
Erma Bombeck
Image
I do not participate in any sport with ambulances at the bottom of the hill.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Bombeck's Rug Rule: an ugly carpet will last for ever.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Babies should enjoy the freedom to vocalize whether it be in church, a public meeting place, during a movie, or after hours when the lights are out. They have not yet learned that joy and laughter have to last a lifetime and must be conserved.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Like religion, politics, and family planning, cereal is not a topic to be brought up in public. It's too controversial.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Let us hope manufacturers can come up with a diaper that is environmentally sound. To go back to cloth would send us back to the day when breathing and raising a baby at the same time were incompatible.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Somewhere it is written that parents who are critical of other people's children and publicly admit they can do better are asking for it.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Having a delivery covered by Medicare just isn't going to fly. It's too risky for a woman to put a baby down and not remember where she left it.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Family life got better and we got our car back - as soon as we put 'I love Mom' on the license plate.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Children make your life important.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Those magazine dieting stories always have the testimonial of a woman who wore a dress that could slipcover New Jersey in one photo and thirty days later looked like a well-dressed thermometer.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Why take pride in cooking, when they don't take pride in eating?
Erma Bombeck
Image
I was leafing through a magazine where there was a before-and-after picture of a woman who went from a size 5 to a size 3 by liposuction. Was she serious? I've cooked bigger turkeys than her before picture.
Erma Bombeck
Image
I have a hat. It is graceful and feminine and give me a certain dignity, as if I were attending a state funeral or something. Someday I may get up enough courage to wear it, instead of carrying it.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Enter my first neighbor - a woman who spoke in complete, coherent sentences, who ate with a knife and fork and who only cried at weddings. I couldn't help myself. In a dramatic gesture, I bolted the door and threw my body across it to prevent her exit. She understood.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Every puppy should have a boy.
Erma Bombeck
Image
Most women put off entertaining until the kids are grown.
Erma Bombeck