Work hard, study harder? When it comes to Kella Ripa’s daughter Lola, that’s exactly what her life entails right now.
“She loves it,” Ripa, 49, told Us Weekly exclusively at the CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute at the Museum of Natural History in New York City on Sunday, December 8, when talking about how her daughter’s adjusting to college life.
Ripa, who cohosted the event with pal Anderson Cooper and brought Lola as her date, added, “She’s got finals this week, so she’s a little stressed out.”
Lola, 18, started her freshman year at New York University in September and according to her mom, she was always meant to be striking out on her own.
“When she was a little girl, like, 3 years old, she used to play dorm room in her bedroom,” the Live With Kelly and Ryan cohost said in October on the ABC show. “First, she played sleepaway camp, then she played dorm room. So this is, like, a girl who was meant to live away from us. She was born to live outside the house!”
The TV personality — who shares Lola and sons Michael, 22, and Joaquin, 16, with husband Mark Consuelos — admitted in September that although her daughter stayed close for college, she wasn’t going to let her come running home when things got tough.
“College is where you start establishing yourself as an independent person, so when your kid goes off to college and your kid stays local … if she feels homesick, I have to say to her, ‘You can’t come home. You have to work it out,’” the journalist said during an interview with On Air With Ryan Seacrest at the time. “I treat it [like long-distance]. I did the same thing for my son. ‘You’re going to have to figure it out.’”
Lola followed in her big brother’s footsteps by attending NYU. Michael went off to school in 2016 and now lives on his own, which Ripa revealed isn’t agreeing with him — at least when it comes to paying rent.
“He lives in Brooklyn, in Bushwick. He loves the freedom,” she said during an October appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! “He hates paying his own rent and is chronically poor. I don’t think he’s ever really experienced extreme poverty like now.”
The Emmy winner joked that her eldest couldn’t wait for the annual $20 gift he gets at Halloween from his grandparents.
“He’s called three times, like, ‘Has the Halloween envelope arrived?’ because he needs to take the subway to get [it] just so he can have electricity,” Ripa explained. “He’s experiencing being an adult.”
