Gwen Stefani handed her heart over to husband Blake Shelton, and she just opened up about why.
In an interview with People, the 53-year-old powerhouse singer candidly spoke about the life she’s built with the former The Voice coach in Oklahoma, motherhood, and the hobby she’s come to adore.
Stefani and Shelton met on season nine of the singing competition amid their divorces from Gavin Rossdale and Miranda Lambert, respectively. In 2015, the “Just A Girl” creator was ending her marriage of over 20 years while Shelton was managing the issues in his four-year marriage. Neither were expecting to find a sense of peace mixed with overwhelming feelings of love in one another working together on the show – at first, that is.
“I didn’t see any of this coming with Blake. This was just a big old ‘What?’ It was an amazing gift to experience love like that for the first time,” Stefani confessed. “He’s changed my life ... when I [started dating] Blake, that’s when I felt home, like: ‘Oh, this is where I’m supposed to be, with this guy.’”
Six years after their initial introduction, the two music icons tied the knot. Now, they’re home base is in the “Sooner State” amid open land. For Stefani – who grew up in Southern California – she’s found herself to be a “garden flower nerd” and thinks it’s funny that she is.
“When I was young, I’d walk home from school and see my mom in her shorts doing her gardening, and my dad would be cutting the trees and make me pick up the branches,” Stefani said. “I’d be like: ‘I’m never having a tree at my house.’”
“When we get to Oklahoma, we’re constantly working — and it’s a different kind of work,” she continued. “It’s probably what my mom was doing back in the day, and now I get it!”
The No Doubt lead returned as a coach for season 24 of The Voice. Meanwhile, Shelton – who was a coach for the last 23 seasons – retired from the competition earlier this year.
Stefani shares children Kingston, 17, Zuma, 15, and Apollo, nine, with Rossdale. In conversation with People, she opened up about how she’s been priortising her children, and spoke about a special time in her life when she brought her oldest on tour with her.
“I took Kingston on a world tour [when he was nine months old]. I would have to nurse him, then get onstage, come off, and he would twirl my ponytail,” Stefani remarked. “That’s when things got really hard for me emotionally. That time is so precious, and you don’t want to miss anything.”
Though she’s continuing her journey as a mentor on The Voice, Stefani’s trying her best to manage a balance between work and home.
“When my kids were teenagers, I really wanted to make sure that I was home for them,” she noted. “And here we are.”
