Most of me was glad when my mother died. She was a handful but not in a cute festive way. More in a life-threatening way that had caused me a long time ago to give up all hope of ever feeling good about having had her as a mother.

I hope my tongue in prune juice smothers If I belittle dogs and mothers.

My mother was one of seven girls whose parents went to bed hungry so their children wouldn't. My father lost his mother when he was nine. He left school and went to work for the next 70 years. They emigrated to America with little more than the hope of a better life.

What greater aspiration and challenge are there for a mother than the hope of raising a great son or daughter?

All that I am or hope to be I owe to my angel mother.

To the former child migrants who came to Australia from a home far away led to believe this land would be a new beginning when only to find it was not a beginning but an end an end of innocence - we apologise and we are sorry. To the mothers who lost the maternal right to love and care for their child - we apologise and we are sorry.

I got a telegraph from my mother who said that my step-father had had a heart attack come home and earn a living. So I went back to England and the only thing I knew to earn any cash was through hairdressing.

My sisters both are working mothers. I understand that my being an actress as well as being at home isn't some heroic thing. That doesn't mean it isn't confusing or difficult - especially that question of how you find a balance.

When I came home for the summer after my first year of college I told my mother that my best friend and I were driving to California. She laughed out loud - 2 000 miles in a what? Well my best friend had an old Chevy. What could go wrong?

Power doesn't have to be on such a big scale for powerful things to occur. Within your own home you can be a powerful woman as a mother influencing your children's lives.

Most of us in the baby-boom generation were raised by full-time mothers. Even as recently as 14 years ago 6 out of 10 mothers with babies were staying at home. Today that is totally reversed. Does that mean we love our children less than our mothers loved us? No but it certainly causes a lot of guilt trips.

I think my children know that Mother's priority is to be with them first. But I don't think it has to be an either/or situation. Work is very important to me and it wouldn't be in the best interest of my children for me to stay home seven days a week.

When I am made fun of in the press I just remember those days when I'd come home to find that the water had been turned off because my mother couldn't afford the bill. Suddenly everything feels easier.

My mother is a special story. She went through so much to bring us up four men at home especially when our country was going through really difficult times.

My grandmother always taught me 'If you don't have a home family and church you don't have anything.'

Many working mothers feel guilty about not being at home. And when they are there they wish it could be perfect. This pressure to make every minute happy puts working parents in a bind when it comes to setting limits and modifying behavior.

When my mother got home from work she would take me to the movies. It was her way of getting out and she would take me with her. I'd go home and act all the parts. It had a tremendous influence on my becoming an actor.

It's like kids playing house: 'You play the father I'll play the mother.' You know you dress up you play they pay you go home. It's a game - acting's a game.

I think it can be hard for any man to sometimes be upstaged by his wife. So when I'm home I work very hard to be Todd's wife and Jade's mother. I have no problem going back to those traditional roles. I try to be Giada the young girl that he met 20 years ago and fell in love with.

When I met my husband I refused to invite him home for Passover because I was embarrassed my mother might serve all the catered dishes in the wrong order.

I would have gone home to my mother but I'm not that crazy about my mother.

Women are the victims of this patriarchal culture but they are also its carriers. Let us keep in mind that every oppressive man was raised in the confines of his mother's home.

Whatever feminists may say about their only advocating choices everyone knows the truth: Feminism regards work outside the home as more elevating honorable and personally productive than full-time mothering and making a home.

I remember when I was a kid watching my mother jam herself into her girdle - a piece of equipment so rigid it could stand up on its own - and I remember her coming home from fancy parties and racing upstairs to extricate herself from its cruel iron grip.