There seems to be a superstition among thousands of our young who hold hands and smooch in the drive-ins that marriage is a cottage surrounded by perpetual hollyhocks to which a perpetually young and handsome husband comes home to a pertually young and ravising wife. When the hollyhocks wither and boredom and bills appear the divorce courts are jammed.... Anyone who imagines that bliss is normal is going to waste a lot of time running around shouting that he's been robbed. The fact is that most putts don't drop, most beef is tough, most children grow up to be just people, most successful marriages require a high degree of mutual toleration, most jobs are more often dull than otherwise. Life is like an old time rail journey...delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders, and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling burst of speed.

Jenkins Lloyd Jones
“Big Rock Candy Mountains”
Deseret News, June 12, 1973, A4

Quoted by President Gordon B. Hinckley, "What God Hath Joined Together," Ensign, May 1991 and "A Conversation with Single Adults," Liahona, November 1997.

Children's quotes

Sarah and I were discussing dinner. "You could do whole wheat spaghetti," I suggested. Her response: "And I could die."

Anna couldn't find Peter. "Where'd my best buddy go?"

There is no one perfect way to be a good mother. Each situation is unique. Each mother has different challenges, different skills and abilities, and certainly different children. The choice is different and unique for each mother and each family.... What matters is that a mother loves her children deeply and, in keeping with the devotion she has for God and for her husband, prioritizes them above all else.

M. Russell Ballard

Grace shall be as your day.

William Clayton

Be kind to yourself.

Marion Wright, mother of 12, one of the kindest women I know

Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.

Ralph Waldo Emerson