Mother’s Day is a special holiday to honor all mothers and motherhood.
The demand for flowers and cards spikes one day of the year, and the next day it plummets. Unfortunately, respect for mothers follows the same pattern.
Read these Mother’s Day quotes to inspire and remember her every day.
Mother’s Day Quotes
“Mama was my greatest teacher, a teacher of compassion, love and fearlessness. If love is sweet as a flower, then my mother is that sweet flower of love.”
∼ Stevie Wonder
“A mother is she who can take the place of all others but whose place no one else can take.”
∼ Cardinal Meymillod
“Life began with waking up and loving my mother’s face.”
∼ George Eliot
“All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.”
∼ Abraham Lincoln
“Mother’s love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved.”
∼ Erich Fromm
“Youth fades; love droops; the leaves of friendship fall; A mother’s secret hope outlives them all.”
∼ Oliver Wendell Holmes
“Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children.”
∼William Makepeace Thackeray
“When you look into your mother’s eyes, you know that is the purest love you can find on this earth.”
∼ Mitch Albom
“Life doesn’t come with a manual, it comes with a mother.”
∼ Anonymous
“The best place to cry is on a mother’s arms.”
∼ Jodi Picoult
“He didn’t realize that love as powerful as your mother’s for you leaves its own mark.”
∼ J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
“If at first you don’t succeed, try doing it the way mom told you to in the beginning.”
∼ Anonymous
“There’s nothing like your mother’s sympathetic voice to make you want to burst into tears.”
∼ Sophie Kinsella, Confessions of a Shopaholic
“If you bungle raising your children, I don’t think whatever else you do well matters very much.”
∼ Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
“To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power.”
∼ Maya Angelou
“A mother’s happiness is like a beacon, lighting up the future but reflected also on the past in the guise of fond memories.”
∼ Honore de Balzac
“Motherhood: All love begins and ends there.”
∼ Robert Browning
“A mother is not a person to lean on, but a person to make leaning unnecessary.”
∼ Dorothy Canfield Fisher
“God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers.”
∼ Rudyard Kipling
“Sometimes the strength of motherhood is greater than natural laws.”
∼ Barbara Kingsolver
“Successful mothers are not the ones that have never struggled. They are the ones that never give up, despite the struggles.”∼ Sharon Jaynes
“Who ran to help me when I fell and would some pretty story tell and kiss the place to make it well? My Mother.”
∼Ann Taylor
“I love my mother as the trees love water and sunshine – she helps me grow, prosper, and reach great heights.”
∼Adabella Radici
“If the whole world were put into one scale, and my mother in the other, the whole world would kick the beam.”
∼Henry Bickersteth
“I was always at peace because of the way my mom treated me.”
∼Martina Hingis
“My mom says I’m a fighter, a fierce competitor, and I think I am, too.”
∼Gabby Douglas
“My mother… she is beautiful, softened at the edges and tempered with a spine of steel. I want to grow old and be like her.”
∼Jodi Picoult
“I wondered if my smile was as big as hers. May be but not as beautiful.”
∼Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe
“Mothers are great for activating the curiosity of young children. A mother is a child’s first creative teacher.”
∼Reed B. Markham
“Blessed is a mother that would give up part of her soul for her children’s happiness.”
∼ Shannon L. Alder
“Thoughtful mothers recognize that the joy of raising children comes in the daily journey, not in reaching a specific destination.”
∼Reed B Markham
“All that remains to the mother in modern consumer society is the role of scapegoat; psychoanalysis uses huge amounts of money and time to persuade analysis and to foist their problems on to the absent mother, who has no opportunity to utter a word in her own defense. Hostility to the mother in our societies is an index of mental health.”
∼ Germaine Greer
“The Miracle of Life nurtured by a woman who gave us love and sacrifice…MOTHER.”
∼Joel Barquez
“Never marry a man who hates his mother, because he’ll end up hating you.”
∼Jill Bennett
“Who ran to help me when I fell,
And would some pretty story tell,
Or kiss the place to make it well?
My Mother.”∼Ann Taylor
“At work, you think of the children you have left at home.
At home, you think of the work you’ve left unfinished. Such a struggle is unleashed within yourself. Your heart is rent.”∼Golda Meir
“We never know the love of the parent until we become parents ourselves.”
∼Henry Ward Beecher
“By and large, mothers and housewives are the only workers who do not have regular time off. They are the great vacationless class.”
∼Anne Morrow Lindbergh
“Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to ‘jump at de sun.’ We might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground.”
∼Zora Neale Hurston
“Making a decision to have a child–it’s momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.”
∼Elizabeth Stone
“No matter how old a mother is, she watches her middle-aged children for signs of improvement.”
∼Florida Scott-Maxwell
“Women do not have to sacrifice personhood if they are mothers. They do not have to sacrifice motherhood in order to be persons. Liberation was meant to expand women’s opportunities, not to limit them. The self-esteem that has been found in new pursuits can also be found in mothering.”
∼ Elaine Heffner
“Woman in the home has not yet lost her dignity, in spite of Mother’s Day, with its offensive implication that our love needs an annual nudging, like our enthusiasm for the battle of Bunker Hill.”
∼ John Erskine
“The moment a child is born, the mother is also born.
She never existed before. The woman existed, but the mother, never. A mother is something absolutely new.”
∼ Rajneesh
“The real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men – from mothers most of all, who carry the key of our souls in their bosoms.”
∼ Oliver Wendell Holmes
“A suburban mother’s role is to deliver children obstetrically once, and by car forever after.”
∼ Peter De Vries
“It kills you to see them grow up. But I guess it would kill you quicker if they didn’t.”
∼ Barbara Kingsolver
“I remember my mother’s prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life.”
∼ Abraham Lincoln
“Nobody knows of the work it makes
To keep the home together.
Nobody knows of the steps it takes,
Nobody knows-but Mother.”∼ Anonymous
“Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own.”
∼ Aristotle
“This heart, my own dear mother, bends,
With love’s true instinct, back to thee!”∼Thomas Moore
A Mother’s Love
“Your arms were always open when I needed a hug. Your heart understood when I needed a friend. Your gentle eyes were stern when I needed a lesson. Your strength and love has guided me and gave me wings to fly.”∼Sarah Malin
“Youth fades; love droops, the leaves of friendship fall; A mother’s secret hope outlives them all.”
∼Oliver Wendell Holmes
“You may have tangible wealth untold;
Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold.
Richer than I you can never be –
I had a mother who read to me.”∼Strickland Gillilan
“My mother was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute all my success in life to the moral, intellectual and physical education I received from her.”
∼George Washington
“There never was a woman like her. She was gentle as a dove and brave as a lioness… The memory of my mother and her teachings were, after all, the only capital I had to start life with, and on that capital I have made my way.”
∼Andrew Jackson, U.S. President
“Is my mother my friend? I would have to say, first of all she is my Mother, with a capital ‘M’; she’s something sacred to me. I love her dearly…yes, she is also a good friend, someone I can talk openly with if I want to.”
∼Sophia Loren
“There is no velvet so soft as a mother’s lap, no rose as lovely as her smile, no path so flowery as that imprinted with her footsteps.”
∼Archibald Thompson
“Mothers can look through a child’s eyes and see tomorrow.
Mothers deserve the credit for raising value based leaders who accept responsibility; who possess physical, mental, and spiritual strength; who possess courage and confidence; and look with optimism to the future.
Great mothers help their children to recognize that they can achieve the impossible
Great mothers bring the arms of comfort to an insecure child in a world of uncertainty.”∼Reed Markham, American Educator
“There will be so many times you feel like you’ve failed, but in the eyes, heart and mind of your child you are Super Mom.”
∼Stephanie Precourt
“There is no perfect way to be a good mother. Each situation is unique. Each mother has different challengers, different skills and abilities and certainly different children. What matters is that a mother loves her children deeply.”
∼ Elder M. Russel Ballard.
Short Inspiring Mother’s Day Quotes
“Every successful child is the product of an enthusiastic mother.”
∼Reed B Markham
“The motto of a truly heroic mother: Hang in there, try, fight, fail, rise up and fight again, and win.”
∼Reed b Markham
“Great mothers live lives of quiet optimism and hope.”
∼Reed B Markham
“Most mothers are instinctive philosophers.”
∼ Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Only mothers can think of the future – because they give birth to it in their children.”
∼ Maxim Gorky
“I was always at peace because of the way my mom treated me.”
∼ Martina Hingis
“The mother’s heart is the child’s schoolroom.”
∼Henry Ward Beecher
“Who is getting more pleasure from this rocking, the baby or me?”
∼Nancy Thayer
“Of all the rights of women, the greatest is to be a mother.”
∼Lin Yutang
“That best academy, a mother’s knee.”
∼James Russell Lowell
“God could not be everywhere and therefore he made mothers.”
∼Jewish Proverb
“A mother is a mother still, The holiest thing alive.”
∼Samuel Taylor Coleridge
“Anyone who doesn’t miss the past never had a mother.”
∼Gregory Nunn
“Whatever else is unsure in this stinking dunghill of a world a mother’s love is not.”
∼ James Joyce
“The lullaby is the spell whereby the mother attempts to transform herself back from an ogre to a saint.”
∼James Fenton
“Being a full-time mother is one of the highest salaried jobs… since the payment is pure love.”
∼ Mildred B. Vermont
“The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother.”
∼ Anonymous
“Motherhood is priced; Of God, at price no man may dare/To lessen or misunderstand.”
∼ Helen Hunt Jackson
“No gift to your mother can ever equal her gift to you – life.”
∼ Anonymous quotes
“An ounce of mother is worth a ton of priest.”
∼Spanish Proverb
“Mother love is the fuel that enables a normal human being to do the impossible.”
∼Marion C. Garretty
“To the world you might just be one person,
but to one person you might just be the world.”∼Anonymous
“She taught me that fear is not an option.”
∼ Diane Von Furstenberg, on her mom
“I’d like to be the ideal mother, but I’m too busy raising my kids.”
∼Anonymous
Mother’s Day Quotes From Daughter
“As mothers and daughters, we are connected with one another. My mother is the bones of my spine, keeping me straight and true. She is my blood, making sure it runs rich and strong. She is the beating of my heart. I cannot now imagine a life without her.”
∼Kristin Hannah, Summer Island
“My mom is a hard worker. She puts her head down and she gets it done. And she finds a way to have fun. She always says, ‘Happiness is your own responsibility.'”
∼ Jennifer Garner
“As my mom always said, ‘You’d rather have smile lines than frown lines.”
∼ Cindy Crawford
“My mother has always been my emotional barometer and my guidance. I was lucky enough to get to have one woman who truly helped me through everything.”
∼ Emma Stone
“There is only one pretty child in the world, and every mother has it.”
∼ Chinese Proverb
“What do girls do who haven’t any mothers to help them through their troubles?”
∼Louisa May Alcott
“My mother is patient, which I want to inherit in my life. She always requests me to have patience. She never hurries up at work. Beyond this, she is a hard working woman. I am too much influenced by these qualities of hers. I have thought of adopting these qualities in my life.”
∼ Abhishek Kunwar
I feel blessed to have a mother who is no less than a superwoman. I would like to inherit all of her beautiful qualities, but the habit that I most admire about her is — her perseverance towards her work. The way she juggles multiple works with enthusiasm and honesty is overwhelming. Her love towards everyone, the way she understands everyone’s silence fascinates me. Needless to say, my mother is an angel in disguise.
— Simran Giri, Masbar 7, Pokhara
Mother’s Day Quotes From Son
“Men are what their mothers made them.”
∼Ralph Waldo Emerson
“The mother of boys work son-up to son-down.”
∼Anonymous
“My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it.”
∼Mark Twain
“A mother is the truest friend we have, when trials heavy and sudden fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends desert us; when trouble thickens around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts.”
∼Washington Irving
“Happy is the son whose faith in his mother remains unchallenged.”
∼Louisa May Alcott
“A man loves his sweetheart the most, his wife the best, but his mother the longest.”
∼Irish Proverb
“Mother is her son’s first god; she must teach him the most important lesson of all – how to love.”
∼T. F. Hodge
“A son needs a mom to teach him how to show love without restraint.”
∼Anonymous
“Few misfortunes can befall a boy which brings worse consequences than to have a really affectionate mother.”
∼W. Somerset Maugham
“But a mother-son relationship is not a coequal one, is it? He is lonely with only you just as you are lonely with only him.”
∼Mary Balogh
“Dan clung to her in speechless gratitude, feeling the blessedness of mother love, — that divine gift which comforts, purifies, and strengthens all who seek it.”
∼Louisa May Alcott, Jo’s Boys
“To a mother, a son is never a fully grown man; and a son is never a fully grown man until he understands and accepts this about his mother.”
∼Anonymous
“I got to grow up with a mother who taught me to believe in me.”
∼Antonio Villaraigosa
“My mom is my hero. She inspired me to dream when I was a kid, so anytime anyone inspires you to dream, that’s gotta be your hero.”
∼Tim McGraw
“That strong mother doesn’t tell her cub, Son, stay weak so the wolves can get you. She says, Toughens up, this is a reality we are living in.”
∼Lauryn Hill
“All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That’s his.”
∼ Oscar Wilde
“Ain’t a woman alive who could take my mama’s place.”
∼Tupac
Mother’s Day Quotes For Grandma
“A house needs a grandma in it.”
∼Louisa May Alcott
“Grandmas are moms with lots of frosting.”
∼Anonymous
“If nothing is going well, call your grandmother.”
∼Italian Proverb
“A grandmother is a babysitter who watches the kids instead of the television.”
∼Anonymous
“Grandma always made you feel she had been waiting to see just you all day and now the day was complete.”
∼Marcy DeMaree
“A grandmother pretends she doesn’t know who you are on Halloween.”
∼Erma Bombeck
“Grandmother-grandchild relationships are simple. Grandmas are short on criticism and long on love.”
∼Anonymous
“My name is NO NO but Grandma calls me precious!”
∼Anonymous
“If your baby is “beautiful and perfect, never cries or fusses, sleeps on schedule and burps on demand, an angel all the time,” you’re the grandma.”
∼Teresa Bloomingdale
“If becoming a grandmother was only a matter of choice, I should advise every one of you straight away to become one. There is no fun for old people like it!”
∼Hannah Whithall Smith
“When a child is born, so are grandmothers.”
∼Judith Levy
Mother’s Day Bible Verses
Ezekiel 16:4
As is the mother, so is her daughter.
Exodus 20:12
Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live a long time in the land that Jehovah your God is giving you.
Matthew 15:4
For example, God said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’and, ‘Let the one who speaks abusively of his father or mother be put to death.
Ephesians 6:2-3
Honor your father and your mother” is the first command with a promise: That it may go well with you and you may remain a long time on the earth.
Collossians 3:20
You children, be obedient to your parents in everything, for this is well-pleasing to the Lord.
Luke 2:51
Then he went down with them and returned to Nazʹa·reth, and he continued subject to them. Also, his mother carefully kept all these sayings in her heart.
Proverbs 30:17
The eye that mocks a father and despises obedience to a mother
The ravens of the valley will peck it out, And the young eagles will eat it up.
Funny Mother’s Day Quotes
“The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found.”
~Calvin Trillin
“My dear Mama, you are definitely the hen who hatched a famous duck.”
∼Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
“My mom was always the supplier of soccer balls, and so people were always knocking on my door and trying to get me out so we could play.”
∼Freddy Adu
“Mother – that was the bank where we deposited all our hurts and worries.”
∼ T. DeWitt Talmage
“When my mother had to get dinner for 8 she’d just make enough for 16 and only serve half.”
∼ Gracie Allen
“If nature had arranged that husbands and wives should have children alternatively, there would never be more than three in a family.”
∼ Lawrence Housman
“Insanity is hereditary; you get it from your children.”
∼ Sam Levenson
“Setting a good example for your children takes all the fun out of middle age.”
∼ William Feather, The Business of Life, 1949
“And remember that behind every successful woman……is a basket of dirty laundry.”
∼Anonymous
“Being a mom has made me really tired and so happy.”
∼Tina Fey
“It’s not easy being a mom. If it were easy, fathers would do it.”
∼Betty White
“If evolution really works, how come Mothers only have two hands?”
∼Milton Berle
“Children are natural mimics who act like their parents despite every effort to teach them good manners.”
∼Anonymous
“Working mothers are guinea pigs in a scientific experiment to show that sleep is not necessary to human life.”
∼Anonymous
“My mother told me a million times not to exaggerate.”
∼Anonymous
“The one thing children wear out faster than shoes is parents.”
∼John J. Plomp
“My mother’s menu consisted of two choices: Take it or leave it.”
∼Buddy Hackett
“Mothers of teens know why some animals eat their young.”
∼Anonymous
“Humans are the only animals that have children on purpose with the exception of guppies, who like to eat theirs.”
∼P.J. O’Rourke
“When I was a boy, my mother wore a mood ring. When she was in a good mood it turned blue. In a bad mood, it left a big red mark on my forehead.”
∼Jeff Shaw
“Mirror, mirror, on the wall, I am my mother after all!”
∼Anonymous
“I want my children to have all the things I couldn’t afford. Then I want to move in with them.”
∼Phyllis Diller
“Mother Nature, in her infinite wisdom, has instilled within each of us a powerful biological instinct to reproduce; this is her way of assuring that the human race, come what may, will never have any disposable income.”
∼Dave Barry
“When my kids become wild and unruly, I use a nice, safe playpen. When they’re finished, I climb out.”
∼Erma Bombeck
“If your kids are giving you a headache, follow the directions on the aspirin bottle, especially the part that says ‘keep away from children’”
∼Susan Savannah
“Ma-ma does everything for the baby, who responds by saying Da-da first.”
∼Mignon McLaughlin
“Sweater, n.: garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly.”
∼Ambrose Bierce
“Children are a great comfort in your old age – and they help you reach it faster, too.”
∼Lionel
“Parenthood is the passing of a baton, followed by a lifelong disagreement as to who dropped it.”
∼Robert Brault
“I have all these great genes, but they’re recessive. That’s the problem here.”
∼Bill Watterson, The Complete Calvin and Hobbes
Mother’s Day is the second Sunday in May in the USA and most countries. In 2023, Mother’s Day is May 14th.
Read this Mother’s Day article on Wikipedia to find out when Mother’s Day is celebrated in your country.
What are the qualities of a good mother?
- Patient
- Empathetic
- Strong
- Humble
- Responsible
- Authoritative
- Respectful
- Supportive
- Persistent
- Loving
What is the best quote for Mother’s Day?
“When God Created Mothers”
When the Good Lord was creating mothers, He was into His sixth day of “overtime” when the angel appeared and said. “You’re doing a lot of fiddling around on this one.”
And God said, “Have you read the specs on this order?” She has to be completely washable, but not plastic. Have 180 moveable parts…all replaceable. Run on black coffee and leftovers. Have a lap that disappears when she stands up. A kiss that can cure anything from a broken leg to a disappointed love affair. And six pairs of hands.”
The angel shook her head slowly and said. “Six pairs of hands…. no way.”
It’s not the hands that are causing me problems,” God remarked, “it’s the three pairs of eyes that mothers have to have.”
That’s on the standard model?” asked the angel. God nodded.
One pair that sees through closed doors when she asks, ‘What are you kids doing in there?’ when she already knows. Another here in the back of her head that sees what she shouldn’t but what she has to know, and of course the ones here in front that can look at a child when he goofs up and say. ‘I understand and I love you’ without so much as uttering a word.”
God,” said the angel touching his sleeve gently, “Get some rest tomorrow….”
I can’t,” said God, “I’m so close to creating something so close to myself. Already I have one who heals herself when she is sick…can feed a family of six on one pound of hamburger…and can get a nine year old to stand under a shower.”
The angel circled the model of a mother very slowly. “It’s too soft,” she sighed.
But tough!” said God excitedly. “You can imagine what this mother can do or endure.”
Can it think?”
Not only can it think, but it can reason and compromise,” said the Creator.
Finally, the angel bent over and ran her finger across the cheek.
There’s a leak,” she pronounced. “I told You that You were trying to put too much into this model.”
It’s not a leak,” said the Lord, “It’s a tear.”
What’s it for?”
It’s for joy, sadness, disappointment, pain, loneliness, and pride.”
You are a genius, ” said the angel.
Somberly, God said, “I didn’t put it there.”
~Erma Bombeck, When God Created Mothers
What do you say on Mother’s Day?
Please leave your positive messages in the comments.
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