110 Questions to Ask Your Parents (Mom and Dad)

The best questions to ask your parents are open-ended ones that invite a story: "What was your bedroom like as a kid?" gets you further than "Did you like your childhood?" Below are 110 questions to ask your mom, your dad, or both, grouped by topic: childhood, growing up, how they met, becoming a parent, work and money, life lessons, family history, and fun ones for a car ride. At the end there's a short guide to recording their answers, because the way they tell a story is worth keeping too.

Don't try to get through the whole list. Pick three to five, ask, and follow wherever the answers go.

How do you start a deep conversation with your parents?

Start small and specific, and pick a relaxed moment. A long drive, cooking together, or a late dinner works better than "Can we sit down and talk?" which sounds like bad news. Try opening with something easy ("What was your favorite food as a kid?") and let the bigger questions come later. Follow-ups matter more than the question itself: "What happened next?" and "How did that feel?" are the two most useful lines on this page.

Questions about their childhood

1. What's your earliest memory?
2. What did your childhood home look like? Walk me through it.
3. What was your bedroom like?
4. What was your neighborhood like, and who were the neighbors?
5. What did you do for fun after school?
6. What was your favorite toy or game?
7. What was your favorite meal growing up, and who made it?
8. Were you a good kid or a troublemaker? Give me an example.
9. What's the worst trouble you ever got into?
10. Who was your best friend as a kid? Are you still in touch?
11. What were holidays like in your house?
12. What chores did you have?
13. What did your parents do for work?
14. What were you scared of as a child?
15. What did you want to be when you grew up?
16. Did you have pets? What were their names?
17. What's a smell or sound that takes you right back to being a kid?

Questions about their teens and twenties

1. What were you like in high school?
2. What music were you obsessed with?
3. What did you and your friends do on weekends?
4. What's the most rebellious thing you did as a teenager?
5. What was your first job, and how much did it pay?
6. What was your first car?
7. Did you go to college? What was that time like?
8. When did you first move out, and where?
9. What did you think your life would look like at 30?
10. What was the best trip you took when you were young?
11. What's something you did in your twenties that you'd never do now?
12. What's a decision from that time that changed everything?
13. Who was your role model back then?

Questions about how they met and their relationship

1. How did you two meet? Tell me both versions.
2. What was your first impression of each other?
3. What was your first date?
4. When did you know it was serious?
5. How did the proposal (or the decision to commit) happen?
6. What did your parents think of each other's partner?
7. What was your wedding day like? What went wrong?
8. What was your first home together like?
9. What's the hardest thing you've gotten through as a couple?
10. What's the secret to staying together, honestly?
11. What do you still love most about each other?
12. If your relationship had a theme song, what would it be?

If your parents are separated, divorced, or one has passed away, adjust these: "Tell me about a relationship that shaped you" works for anyone.

Questions about becoming a parent

1. What did you feel the first time you held me?
2. How did you pick my name? What were the runner-up names?
3. What was I like as a baby?
4. What's the funniest thing I did as a kid?
5. What was the hardest part of raising me?
6. What's something about me as a kid that I don't remember?
7. What surprised you most about being a parent?
8. What did you do differently from your own parents, on purpose?
9. What's a parenting decision you'd change if you could?
10. When were you most proud of me?
11. What did you worry about most when I was growing up?
12. What do you hope I always remember from my childhood?

Questions about work, money, and big choices

1. How did you end up in your career?
2. What's the best job you ever had? The worst?
3. Was there a career you wanted but didn't pursue?
4. What's the bravest decision you ever made?
5. What's the biggest risk you took, and how did it turn out?
6. What did you learn about money the hard way?
7. What's something you saved up for that felt huge at the time?
8. What's a time you failed, and what happened after?
9. If you could have any job for one year, what would it be?

Questions about life lessons and advice

1. What do you know now that you wish you'd known at my age?
2. What's the best advice anyone ever gave you?
3. What's the hardest thing you've ever been through?
4. What got you through it?
5. What are you most proud of in your life?
6. What do you regret, if anything?
7. What makes a good friend?
8. How do you know when to forgive someone?
9. What's something you changed your mind about as you got older?
10. What does a good life mean to you?
11. What do you want to do that you haven't done yet?
12. What's the one thing you hope I never stop doing?
13. What do you want people to remember about you?

Questions about family history

1. Where did our family come from, as far back as you know?
2. What do you know about your grandparents?
3. What were your parents like when you were a kid?
4. Are there any family stories that get told at every gathering?
5. Is there a family recipe I should learn? Can you teach me?
6. What traditions did your family have that we don't anymore?
7. Is there a family heirloom, and what's its story?
8. Did anyone in our family immigrate? What do you know about that journey?
9. What languages were spoken in your house growing up?
10. Is there a relative I never met that you wish I had?
11. What's a family secret that's old enough to tell now?
12. Who in the family am I most like?

For grandparents, we have a separate list of questions to ask grandparents.

Fun questions to ask your mom or dad

1. What's your most unpopular opinion?
2. What's the most embarrassing thing that happened to you in public?
3. If you could relive one day, which would it be?
4. What's your go-to karaoke song?
5. What's a celebrity crush you'd admit to?
6. What's your guilty-pleasure TV show?
7. If you won the lottery tomorrow, what's the first thing you'd buy?
8. What's a skill you secretly think you're amazing at?
9. What would your superpower be?
10. Which of your friends would you call to help hide a body? (Hypothetically.)
11. What's the weirdest food you've ever eaten?
12. What trend from your youth should come back?
13. What's something I do that reminds you of yourself?
14. What's a word or phrase you say that I definitely picked up from you?

Questions just for mom

1. What did your mom teach you that you passed on to me?
2. What's something about being a woman in your generation that I wouldn't guess?
3. What do you do just for yourself these days?

Questions just for dad

1. What did your dad teach you, good or bad?
2. What's something you were never told as a young man that you wish you had been?
3. When did you feel most like yourself?

Questions for both parents together

1. What's a story you two tell differently?
2. What do you want our family to be like in 20 years?

How do you record your parents' answers?

Ask permission, put your phone close, and let it run. Recording turns a nice conversation into something you can replay years from now, in their actual voice, with their laugh in the middle of the story.

1. Ask first. "Can I record this? I want to keep your stories." Tell them they can skip any question and stop anytime, and tell them if you plan to share the recording with siblings.
2. Pick a quiet room. Turn off the TV, close windows, and sit somewhere soft. Kitchens and bathrooms echo.
3. Place the phone well. Set it on a soft surface 6 to 8 inches to an arm's length from whoever is talking, mic end toward them. If both parents talk, put it between them.
4. Turn on Do Not Disturb so a notification doesn't interrupt.
5. Do a 10-second test and play it back before the real thing.
6. Keep sessions short. 30 to 45 minutes is plenty; come back another day for more.
7. Back it up. Save the file in at least two places right after.

On iPhone, Voice Memos does the job; our guide to voice recording on iPhone covers settings like Lossless quality. For a longer walkthrough of interview setups, see how to record your grandparents' stories; the same steps work perfectly for parents.

Phone calls work too if you live apart, but say clearly at the start that you're recording, and check that recording calls is legal where you both are. Some places require everyone's consent. If you're away at school, our post on staying close to your parents in college has more ideas for regular calls.

Keeping their voices close

The stories matter, but so do the little things: your mom saying your nickname, your dad's "call me when you land." We're building Tucket for exactly those, a pocket of sounds for each person you love, each with a photo of them, private to the people you share it with. It's not out yet; when Tucket launches, it'll be a home for the clips you'd never want to lose.