Jenna Bush Hager is perplexed by her daughter’s new nickname for her, especially since it has ties to Kylie Jenner.
“Do you know what Mila calls me now?” Bush Hager, 42, asked Hoda Kotb on the Friday, April 19, episode of the Today Show With Hoda and Jenna.
She revealed that her 11-year-old daughter, Mila, says “Jenn-er” when addressing her mom, using part of her first name and then adding an “er” at the end.
Mila has now taken the nickname a step further. “She has started calling me Kylie. Because of Kylie Jenner,” Bush Hager continued. “She’s like, ‘Kylie!’ and I’m like, ‘Is that supposed to be for me?’”
Kotb’s kids don’t have any wild nicknames for her, but she did say that it’s irksome when her girls call her “she” instead of mom.
“I don’t like when my kids go, ‘She … she said,’” Kotb, who shares adopted daughters Haley Joy, 7, and Hope, 4, with ex Joel Schiffman, explained. “No, no, no. We don’t say ‘she.’”
The hilarious back and forth prompted Bush Hager to suggest they switch kids. “I have an idea. I think we should send your children to my house and your children to mine, just like that old show [Family Swap] and see what happens,” Bush Hager, who shares Mila, Poppy, 8, and Hal, 4, with husband Henry Hager, said.
She joked: “Mila would come back all whipped into shape. She wouldn’t call me Jenn-er or worser things.”
Mila isn’t Bush Hager’s only child to recently throw her a curveball. Earlier this month, the journalist explained that she was “retiring” from water parks and large birthday parties after an incident.
“Mila and her friends were having a blast, and it was wonderful until we lost one child,” Bush Hager shared during an April episode of the Today show, noting her middle child, Poppy, briefly disappeared.
She recalled, “I panicked. I wouldn’t choose which child to lose, but I would not want to lose her, OK?”
The fear resulted in Bush Hager vowing to stop hosting large gatherings for her kids’ birthdays. “I have decided, ‘Nope,’” she said of the decision. “I’ve said, ‘You can have your cousin and a friend, we can do small things.’ No more. Mama is done.”
Bush Hager might’ve been traumatized by the event, but historically, the author has been a fan of going above and beyond for her little ones. In fact, she previously went on a girls’ trip that Mila pitched.
“We planned this before 2024,” Bush Hager recalled during a February Today episode, revealing that Savannah Guthrie and her eldest daughter, Vale, joined her and Mila in Florida. “We planned it because Vale was baptized, and Mila said, ‘Girls, I feel like we need a girls’ trip.’”
Guthrie, who shares Vale, 9, and son Charley, 7, with husband Michael Feldman, used to be Bush Hager’s neighbor. Once they lived further apart, the pals realized they don’t get to see much of one another.
“You really gotta make an effort,” Bush Hager said at the time, noting that the foursome soaked up the sun and hung out on the beach. The moms also enjoyed some rosé, according to social media.
