Betty MacDonald > Quotes

“There’s nothing as cozy as a piece of candy and a book.”
― Betty MacDonald, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's Magic

“Another female household-hinter gave me a recipe for a big hearty main dish of elbow macaroni, mint jelly, lima beans, mayonnaise and cheese baked until 'hot and yummy.' Unless my taste buds are paralyzed, this dish could be baked until hell freezes over and it might get hot but never 'yummy.”
― Betty MacDonald, Onions in the Stew

“I'll do it because I want to but not because you tell me to!”
― Betty MacDonald, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle

“I am neither Christian enough nor charitable enough to like anybody just because he is alive and breathing. I want people to interest or amuse me. I want them fascinating and witty or so dull as to be different. I want them either intellectually stimulating or wonderfully corny; perfectly charming or hundred percent stinker. I like my chosen companions to be distinguishable from the undulating masses and I don't care how.”
― Betty MacDonald, The Plague and I

“Her magic formula for dealing with children is ignoring all faults and accenting tiny virtues. She says, "Instead of telling Tommy day in and day out that he is the naughtiest boy in the United States of America, which could very well be true, take an aspirin and comment on his neatly tied shoes. Almost anybody would rather be known for expert shoe-tying than for kicking the cat." She always tells whiners how charming they are--bullies how brave--bad sports how good--sneaks how honest!”
― Betty MacDonald, Onions in the Stew

“On either side the wild roses, their pink dewy faces turned to the sun, tumbled over the fences, sprawled on the ground and filled the air with their pure summery smell.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“_Sunday!_ In the country Sunday is the day on which you do exactly as much work as you do on other days but feel guilty all of the time you are doing it because Sunday is a day of rest”
― Betty MacDonald, The Egg and I

“It was Christmas Eve. Big snowflakes fluttered slowly through the air like white feathers and made all of the Heavenly Valley smooth and white and quiet and beautiful.

Tall fir trees stood up to their knees in snow and their outstretched hands were heaped with it. Those that were bare of leaves wore soft white fur on their scrawny, reaching arms and all the stumps and low bushes had been turned into fat white cupcakes.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“Of course the reason that all the children in our town like Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle is because Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle likes children, she enjoys talking to them and best of all they do not irritate her.”
― Betty MacDonald, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's Magic

“Certainly,' said his mother, 'but first I want to know about the accident with your bicycle.'
Well,' Phillip said, 'if you wanta really know. I was sitting in the basket of my bike ridin' down Mission Hill backwards singing 'Polly Wolly Doodle' and I saw the bread truck comin' and I guess I didn't turn soon enough and I ran into the Wallaces' iron fence and I caught my shoe on the pedal and my pants on a picket and I hit my eye on the handlebars and I don't know what else happened. But, boy, you should have heard the kids and that ole breadman laugh!”
― Betty MacDonald, Hello, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle

“We thought about Thanksgiving, planned for Thanksgiving and talked of Thanksgiving for weeks beforehand, but the evening before the actual day was the best time of all. Then the house seethed with children and dogs, with friends and cooks, and with delightful smells of baking pie, turkey stuffing and coffee. Every time the doorbell rang we put on another pot of coffee and washed the cups and by the time we went to bed we were so nervous and flighty that when accidentally bumped or brushed against, we buzzed and lit up like pin-ball machines.”
― Betty MacDonald, The Plague and I

“Some Saturday mornings, as soon as the mountains had bottled up the last cheerful sound of Bob and the truck, I, feeling like a cross between a boll weevil and a slut, took a large cup of hot coffee, a hot-water bottle, a cigarette and a magazine and WENT BACK TO BED. Then, from six-thirty until nine or so, I luxuriated in breaking the old mountain tradition that a decent woman is in bed only between the hours of seven pm and four am unless she is in labor or dead.”
― Betty MacDonald, The Egg and I

“Miss Appleby, her library books, and her story-telling sessions were very popular with all the children in Heavenly Valley. To Nancy and Plum they were a magic carpet that whisked them out of the dreariness and drudgery of their lives at Mrs. Monday's and transported them to palaces in India, canals in Holland, pioneer stockades during the Indian wars, cattle ranches in the West, mountains in Switzerland, pagodas in China, igloos in Alaska, jungles in Africa, castles in England, slums in London, gardens in Japan, or most important of all, into happy homes where there were mothers and fathers and no Mrs. Mondays or Marybelles.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“Well, " said her daddy, "your careless heedlessness has almost lost me my life. I am now going to give you a spanking." And he did and so dinner was a snuffling red-eyed meal filled with cold looks and long silences and the cheese souffle, which was delicious.”
― Betty MacDonald, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's Magic

“THIS IS DICK -- DON'T TOUCH!!!”
― Betty MacDonald, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle

“When Molly O'Toole was looking at the colored pictures in Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's big dictionary and just happened to be eating a candy cane at the same time and drooled candy cane juice on the colored pictures of gems and then forgot and shut the book so the pages all stuck together, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle didn't say, "Such a careless little girl can never ever look at the colored pictures in my dictionary again." Nor did she say, "You must never look at books when you are eating." She said, "Let's see, I think we can steam those pages apart, and then we can wipe the stickiness off with a little soap and water, like this-now see, it's just as good as new. There's nothing as cozy as a piece of candy and a book.”
― Betty MacDonald, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's Magic

“….I have no patience with women who complain because their mothers or their husband’s mothers have to live with them. To my prejudice eye, a child’s life without a grandparent en residence would be a barren thing.”
― Betty MacDonald, The Egg and I

“Mental sunshine makes the mind grow, and perpetual happiness makes human nature a flower garden in bloom.”
― Betty MacDonald, The Plague and I

“Well, whatever you and Nancy decide to be when you grow up, I know that you'll be happy because you have discovered the comfort and joy of reading.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“After splashing icy water on their faces and rubbing them fiery red with one of the rough sweet-smelling towels, they came in and took their places at the big kitchen table. This morning the table wore a bright red-and-white checked cloth and a pot of red geraniums. Mrs. Campbell handed the girls their plates, each with a slice of ham and half of a crisp, tan waffle.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“This Dr. Wilburforce was wonderful! He sounded as if he had had adolescent children. He said that adolescence was a difficult period but entirely normal and his sympathies were with the parents, not the adolescents. He said that there was entirely too much “understanding,” actually excusing of the adolescent, his lack of manners, selfishness, tantrums, and so on. He thought that the most intelligent approach to the problem was to understand that the adolescent, just by the nature of the beast, is going to chafe and rebel and he needs something specific to chafe and rebel against. Lay down strict rules of behavior and enforce them. Rebelling against nothing is very frustrating. Demand that the adolescent go along with the family routine. Do not allow him to keep the household in a continual uproar. …Instead of giving your child too much freedom, too much money, and all the responsibility for his actions, try giving him limited freedom and money, a strict code of behavior, and oceans and gallons and mountains of love. Not the deep-hidden-river I-bore-you-so-I-will-have-to-like-you type of love, but the visible, hug-and-kiss, lavish-compliment, interested-audience kind. Tell your adolescent he is brilliant, handsome, charming, witty, and lovable. Tell him every day. Tell him even when you are taking away the keys of the car and would like to kick him. Assure him and reassure him and re-reassure him. Love is the most important element in human relationships. You can never give a child too much love.”
― Betty MacDonald, Onions in the Stew

“I learned that a stiff test for friendship is: “Would she be pleasant to have t.b. with?” Unfortunately, too many people, when you try separating them from their material possessions and any and all activity, turn out to be like cheap golf balls. You unwind and unwind and unwind but you never get to the pure rubber core because there isn’t any.”
― Betty MacDonald, The Plague and I

“Nancy grabbed Plum's hand and together they ran around the last curve and then they were leaning against the old stone wall that marked Lookout Hill. Far, far down below them, a river was trying to wriggle its way out of a steep canyon. Over to the right, thick green hills crowded close to each other to share one filmy white cloud. To the left, as far as they could see the land flowed into valleys that shaded from a pale watery green, through lime, emerald, jade, leaf, forest to a dark, dark, bluish-green, almost black. The rivers were like inky lines, the ponds like ink blots.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“Far off down the road, through the lazily drifting snowflakes, they could hear the merry sound of sleigh bells. Their gay little tinkling flying ahead of the sleigh and lighting up the night with sparks.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“I never feel that the things I tell Mrs. Monday are lies. I think that lies are only when you want not to tell the truth. With Mrs. Monday I want to tell the truth but life is easier if I don't.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“God is great and God is good,
And we thank Him for this food.
By His hand may we be led,
Give us Lord or daily bread.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“Shyly Nancy and Plum sat down at the table while Mrs. Campbell heaped pink-flowered plates with baked beans, sausage cakes and salad, passed a steaming plate of brown bread, cut them off generous pieces of the pat of new butter and handed them big mugs of ice-cold milk.”
― Betty MacDonald, Nancy and Plum

“and we might as well give up, because Standard Oil owns everything. He said they own Standard Brands, which in turn own Safeway Stores, which in turn own Pacific Fruit and Produce, which in turn has mortgages on all the farms. He says they are responsible for all the wars and that we are all just slaves being allowed to exist until the time comes when we can go into the trenches to protect Standard Oil.”
― Betty MacDonald, Anybody Can Do Anything

“imperiousness”
― Betty MacDonald, The Plague and I

“Trying to gather up my thoughts was as futile as trying to pick up spilled mercury. I had two big main depressing thoughts and each time I touched them they broke into many little morbid pieces.”
― Betty MacDonald, The Plague and I