Mum and dad thought I was going to say I was pregnant. I said oh no no I've just been nominated for a Golden Globe. They were like oh that's lovely love.

Obviously losing a parent is very difficult. I miss my dad every day but I know he would be proud to see me continuing to swim and going for another shot at the Olympics.

Every family is different. I am mom and I am dad and I'm going to do my best. You should be proud walk through life saying I have the coolest family. I am part of a modern family.

I always wanted to be a father. I have a beautiful relationship with my dad and beautiful memories. I always knew I was going to have a family.

I'm probably going to get in trouble for this but 'American Dad' is one of my favourite shows. It gets very dark in places but the jokes are there.

I was really bright as a kid and tested well and it was clear that I was going to get scholarships to any schools I wanted. My dad always said I could be an engineer at that time it was the elite of society: steady job working in science which was then the answer to every problem we had. It was kind of a mandate. Kind of a dream he had for me.

Going through the grief period of my dad and losing him - that was the worst thing because you know when you get that call. When you are seven eight years old you have that almost vision in your mind of what that's going to be like and what your going to feel like and it doesn't prepare you.

Work ethic has always been stressed in my family. My dad is going to be 80 years old and he still works part time. My mom just retired a couple years ago and she's in her mid- to late 70s.

I'm an ambassador for the Make-A-Wish Foundation and one of the children his wish was to go to the Emmys so he's going to be my date along with my husband and my dad and his girlfriend. So we're going to have a really fun night and it's going to be really exciting. I'm really excited for him to experience that.

I had always loved music. I grew up listening to classic country Waylon Jennings Merle Haggard. My dad loved Vern Gosdin and Keith Whitley. So I kept going to class and started getting totally into playing guitar and teaching myself these songs.

I look at my little girl and I wonder what she's going to be and what she's going to do and what is it that leads girls certain directions in life. I think a lot of that goes back to what kind of father they had and so it makes me want to be the best dad I can possibly be.

Dad I'm in some trouble. There's been an accident and you're going to hear all sorts of things about me from now on. Terrible things.

I can't remember a major league game where I could make eye contact with my dad. I kept wondering if he was going to yell at me for hanging a pitch or something.

So I go to my first book signing and these two girls came up and gave me a piece of paper: '10 reasons you should date our dad. He climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. He's a lawyer.' He didn't know what was going on. He didn't even know me. They called him and he came down and asked me out that day. Now I'm dating their dad!

Although becoming a singer was my plan A after first hearing Whitney Houston when I was 17 I started off with plan B by going to the teacher-training college that my dad went to. It was a slow coming of age.

I'm worried because of my mother she's going to see my performance and she's quite hard. She's going to see me naked. And my Dad woah. Yeah they're going to see me like a woman you know?

I knew that I needed to do something that I desperately loved. There was a period where I did question if it was acting because I knew that I would be making things hard on myself. I knew that there was going to be a little bit of a hullabaloo because of my dad being who he is and all that.

Keep in my mind my dad didn't become a huge huge mega actor until I was halfway through high school - so right around the time he's going through his big renaissance is right when I'm starting to do my high school revolting.

Your kids can say some cruel things to you at times. For example Nicole Miles and Sofie are standing there in the room and I'm dressed to kill in my own mind. They'll say to me 'Dad you're not going out there looking like that are you?' If that doesn't kill a star I don't know what does!

I wanted my children to have the same exposure to the water I had. My strongest memories of Northeast Harbor are going in a small Whaler with my dad looking for osprey.

David and Dad didn't get along too well growing up. I mean we all got along but it was harder on David because David wasn't going to be the son that Dad wanted. But now they're like best friends.

You can' t help being a musician because you've grown up with music yet being one means being compared to your dad and being slated for it. But I really don't have the ambitions of most people going into the industry.

It is because my dad died suddenly that I became an actor. I thought I'm going to make money doing this thing I enjoy.

And then before going back for my sophomore year I decided to change my major to arts and sciences and my dad cut a deal with me: He said if I'd quit school he'd pay my rent for the next three years as if I were in school.