Barbara Bush

At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, not winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a friend, a child, or a parent.

I'm a great believer that the most important years are the sort of early years but the preschool years and then into the first and second grades. If you get a good base in the first and second grade and you can read, you can do anything.

I think togetherness is a very important ingredient to family life.

I married the first man I ever kissed. When I tell this to my children, they just about throw up.

I'm worried about parents who aren't parenting.

You have to love your children unselfishly. That's hard. But it's the only way.

My health is very good.

I want to still be able to garden while I can bend over.

You just don't luck into things as much as you'd like to think you do. You build step by step, whether it's friendships or opportunities.

Believe in something larger than yourself. . . . Get involved in the big ideas of your time.

I hate abortions, but just could not make that choice for someone else.

Somewhere out in this audience may even be someone who will one day follow my footsteps, and preside over the White House as the president's spouse. I wish him well!

When you come to a roadblock, take a detour.

The winner of the hoop race will be the first to realize her dream, not society's dream, her own personal dream.

Suddenly women's lib had made me feel my life had been wasted.

Nobody likes a child to die or losing an election.

At the end of your life you will never regret not having passed one more test not winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband a friend a child a parent.

Cherish your human connections your relationships with friends and family.

People who worry about their hair all the time, frankly, are boring.

You know, for one glorious half hour, I was the mother of the president-elect.

Believe in something larger than yourself... get involved in the big ideas of your time.

You know sit with your arm around a little kid and read. It not only teaches them to read but it keeps the family strong.

If human beings are perceived as potentials rather than problems, as possessing strengths instead of weaknesses, as unlimited rather that dull and unresponsive, then they thrive and grow to their capabilities.

I really loved living in the White House, but I don't miss it at all.

You don't just luck into things as much as you would like to think you do. You build step by step, whether it is friendships or opportunities.

I'm not being outspoken or pro or con abortion.

Nobody likes, you know, the ugly parts of politics.

I don't think that's healthy for the country when anyone thinks their morals are better than anyone else's.

One thing I can say about George... he may not be able to keep a job, but he's not boring.

You get nothing done if you don't listen to each other.

I may be the only mother in America who knows exactly what their child is up to all the time.

You just don't luck into things. You build them step by step, whether it's friendships or opportunities.

The personal things should be left out of platforms at conventions. You can argue yourself blue in the face, and you're not going to change each other's minds. It's a waste of your time and my time.

Well, look at what people are doing for returned veterans now. The wounded warriors. They're working hard to make the wounded veterans feel that they are loved and welcomed home, unlike Vietnam. It was not a very kind, gentle world then. I think we are kinder and gentler.

It seems to me I spent my life in car pools, but you know, that's how I kept track of what was going on.

You have to love your children unselfishly. That is hard. But it is the only way.

I don't like attacking.

Everything I worry about would be better if more people could read, write and comprehend.

My son, George, has been a bad, bad boy! Right, George?

To us, family means putting your arms around each other and being there.

I really built myself up, darn it, to be very strong.

Three publishers came to me at the White House after George lost and said, 'We would like to publish your book.' I said, 'Well, I don't have a book,' and they said well it's a well known fact that you have kept diaries.

I do have the most marvelous husband, children, and grandchildren.

Bias has to be taught. If you hear your parents downgrading women or people of different backgrounds, why, you are going to do that.

Cherish your human connections - your relationships with friends and family.

I'm not a competitive person, and I think women like me because they don't think I'm competitive, just nice.

Nancy Reagan was a perfectionist, and I am not.

The personal things should be left out of, in my opinion, out of platforms and conventions.

Never lose sight of the fact that the most important yardstick of your success will be how you treat other people - your family, friends, and coworkers, and even strangers you meet along the way.

Life has changed enormously, and I hope - I hope more people read good things.

You may think the president is all-powerful, but he is not. He needs a lot of guidance from the Lord.

I really feel very strongly that the person who runs for office is the courageous one, and the one who everybody has to know.

And who knows? Somewhere out there in this audience may even be someone who will one day follow my footsteps, and preside over the White House as the president's spouse. I wish him well!

It was the dumbest thing I had ever seen, but it's a family thing, and I guess it's clean.

To us family means putting your arms around each other and being there.

The state dinner is almost a formula, but you try to make it interesting. You try not to overload it with too many political types. You try to get a cross section.

Let's judge a man on what he's done.

Giving frees us from the familiar territory of our own needs by opening our mind to the unexplained worlds occupied by the needs of others.