Quotes About Childhood

I've always had a soft spot for comic books. I learned to read from them. The words in them were so interesting.

I can do a backflip on the spot. I learned how from watching 'Ninja Turtles' movies as a kid. Whenever the Turtles got in trouble with their teacher, Master Splinter, he'd make them practice backflips as punishment - and I was so focused on becoming one of the Turtles that I taught myself how to do one, too.

My parents had this massive record player in the living room, a 'blue spot grand' they called it... it used up an entire rainforest to make this thing, and it had all these records in it. Some were rock, some were reggae, but a lot was blues - Ray Charles, Chuck Berry and all that stuff.

I started in the industry when I was 4 years old, but I started in the spotlight when I was 11 years old, when I got 'Modern Family.'

I didn't really grow up in the spotlight.

So way back, Jonathan and I were - we were entertainers as kids. We were actors; we did theater, musicals; we ended up getting into commercials and some TV spots. Actually, one of our jobs, we were clowns.

When I was a kid, in a very white boarding school in England in the '90s, I had this sort of middle part that kids had - that sort of long, floppy hair. So I was always desperate to have long, floppy hair, and I would try and brush it and spray it, and it would just look like a Brillo pad!

When I was a child, I used to help my mother decorate our house and prepare an elaborate spread of pretty lamps and flower rangolis.

Eight was about the age I was when I realized that people actually produced books, they didn't just spring out of the library shelves.

Since I was a little girl, my family has taken a holiday to Cornwall every spring half-term.

When I was young, it was fun being in the locker room and shagging balls in the outfield in spring training. But I couldn't keep my attention on the games for more than 30 minutes. I would sit there with my Game Boy the whole game.

I grew up in the small town of Greenfield Center, New York, which is in the foothills of the Adirondacks not far from the city of Saratoga Springs. It is a place I love, close to the forests and the mountains.

I had scabby knees with long socks up to my knees. I was scrumping for conkers with everyone else. I was out on my bike. I used to do the 100m sprint. We always wanted to be out playing.

I probably read Harriet the Spy about 70,000 times.

I feel really lucky that I grew up pretending to be a spy for my whole childhood.

When I was growing up, I dreamed about becoming a cowgirl, a detective, a spy, a great actress, or a ballerina. Not a dentist, like my father, or a homemaker, like my mother - and certainly not a writer, although I always loved to read.

Slightly embarrassing admission: Even when I was a kid, I used to have these little spy books, and I would, like, see what everybody was doing in my neighborhood and log it down.

My dad was this Jack-of-all-trades, entrepreneur type. I secretly think he may be a spy, when I really think about it and I kind of connect the pieces. That's what led us to moving to Japan when I was four.

I used to try to pick locks because I grew up on my grandparents' farm and I started my own little spy club. I would go around the farm and try to break into the shed and try spying on my grandpa. It was ridiculous.

I grew up on Avenue C, and Tompkins Square Park was my park. That was where I played ball every day. I lived in that park.

The music I heard growing up, since there was no TV or cinema or record covers, I didn't know if it was black, white, hip, square, male, female... whatever. I'd hear melodies and things and got intrigued on that level.

The educational highlights I remember were not in the classroom. My father spent a lot of time with me when he could. He taught me how to take square roots, a skill I have retained but do not use often, except to check that I still remember.

My childhood is more hick than I could ever possibly relate to you, and also more intellectual than you would ever expect. For instance, me and my sister, when we were little, we would compete to see who could eat the most squirrel brains.

I'm not squeamish at all. As a child I dragged a dead squirrel home on my skateboard and cut it open and tried to look at its brain.