Jennifer Garner says being a mother has changed her life more than she ever could have imagined.

“Having a baby fills your life in such a way that no matter what you’re doing, there’s something bigger,” the mom of 1-year-old Violet said Saturday while promoting her new movie Catch and Release. “I’ve just been in heaven being with her the past year.”

In the new issue of PEOPLE, Garner, 34, shares more about bringing up baby with husband Ben Affleck, also 34:

How motherhood changed her: I call my mom now and say, “You know all the dinners you made that I said ‘No’ to and went off and ate peanut butter? I’m sorry. I get it. I slaved over roasting this, and (Violet) goes, ‘No, no, no!’ ”

Lessons learned: I was rocking her, and she was fascinated by the light hitting the ceiling. I thought, “God, for the past five years, I haven’t stopped to look at light on the ceiling for (one) second.” To slow down and go at her pace has been such a gift.

Losing the baby weight: It took me a long, long time. I just wasn’t that motivated. I wanted to play with her. Then I got on the treadmill, stopped stuffing my face and lost the weight. I cut out croissants, bagels and muffins – all the good stuff. And went back to having a salad once a day and protein.

Ben Affleck on daddy-duty: He does a good job. I mean, okay, maybe I wrote out what he was supposed to make for her (to eat) today while I was gone. But that’s just me being paranoid. He’s great – he can do it.

On the Mommy-Daddy bond: There’s nothing more emotional than seeing your partner – the man you love – with your baby at any time: the first time, the second, yesterday, today. There’s nothing more beautiful.

Source

Ben Affleck, whose 2004 split from Jennifer Lopez made international headlines, has changed his ways since settling down and becoming a dad, he says.

“I’ve never been very judicious about my own behavior or choices until they had an impact on people other than me,” Affleck, 34, tells USA Today.

“Obviously, my wife. And my daughter, who’s going to have my last name – I don’t want her to mutter it over a drink. I want her to be proud of her old man.”

Affleck and his wife, Jennifer Garner, never released photos of 1-year-old Violet. “We just didn’t sell them – that was the thing,” says Affleck, whose directorial debut, Gone, Baby, Gone, is due in 2007.

“I’m extraordinarily lucky and privileged,” he says, “and I’ve tried not to be bitter, but I have developed a reactionary defensiveness.”

He adds, “But for my child, she didn’t make the bargain I did. She didn’t make that choice. And I don’t want her to have to pay for the parents’ sins. I try to protect her privacy. I’ll end up in the magazines, and that’s life, and I can live with it, but I try to shield my daughter.”

And Affleck is a hands-on – and happy – dad. “Yes, I’ve changed diapers,” he told PEOPLE Wednesday at a New York City screening of his movie Hollywoodland. “Parenthood, the whole thing is wonderful. All the clichés that all the people bore you with are, in fact, true.”

Source

Parenting agrees with Ben Affleck. The father of Violet Anne Affleck, who turns 1 on Dec. 1, says he wants more children with wife Jennifer Garner – though just how many more seems open to discussion.

Ellen DeGeneres, broaching the topic with the 34-year-old actor on Wednesday’s The Ellen DeGeneres Show asks, “Will you have more? Should I ask that question?

Affleck’s response: “You know … sure, I would love to.”

“Many? A lot?” DeGeneres wonders aloud, prompting Affleck to say, “Okay, let’s back it up there.”

Suggesting, however, that “some people” would want “five or six” kids and would “love to have a large family,” DeGeneres is told by Affleck: “I think I should probably talk to my wife before I talk to you.”

As for his hiatus from film work, Affleck tells the TV host: “I took about a couple of years off, definitely for a full year I didn’t do anything and I did this (the period drama Hollywoodland), and then the rest of the time I spent directing a movie” – the Boston detective drama Gone, Baby, Gone, to be released next year.

Affleck says he purposefully took time off because, “I was a little bit exhausted of myself and my life, so I wanted to try to control it or manage it.”

He says he wanted to figure out for himself who he is and what he wants to do instead if “looking through the reflection through a magazine or being defined by somebody else.”

And what did he discover about stepping back to take a look? “It was good for me and good things happened for me. It was nice.”

Ben Affleck is relieved he never married ex-fiancee Jennifer Lopez and admits their engagement was a mistake. The ex-couple’s high profile relationship ended in 2004, just months after they were due to marry, a wedding that was called off at the last moment. Affleck insists it was a mistake to propose to his girlfriend of two years. He says: “I should never have got engaged and never gone down that route. I thought I wanted certain things, but I didn’t. I got lost and felt suffocated, miserable and gross. “Being in the middle of a tabloid frenzy, it became so intense I had to stop and think, ‘What am I doing with my life?’ “I had to smile for the cameras, but I was really in turmoil. I was no longer in control of my life and I didn’t know which way to turn. I felt like a hamster in a cage. The faster my legs went, the less distance I seemed to travel.”

Source

I LOVE THEM… even if Jennifer is sporting Laura Ingalls’ hairdo.

“Hollywoodland” is an exploration of fame and identity. The drama, inspired by one of Hollywood’s most infamous real-life mysteries, follows a 1950’s private detective who, investigating the mysterious death of “Superman” star George Reeves, uncovers unexpected connections to his own life as the case turns ever more personal. The torrid affair Reeves had with the wife of a studio executive might hold the key to the truth.

The movie stars: Adrian Brody, Diane Lane, Ben Affleck & Robin Tunney.