Getty Kellie Pickler and Kyle Jacobs at the 2017 CMT Music awards.
The country music world has a lot of famous couples, including Kellie Pickler and her husband Kyle Jacobs. The two found success independently as country music artists: Pickler, after competing as a finalist on American Idol season 5, and Jacobs as singer/songwriter/musician and staff writer for Curb Music. Pickler, who has completed seven USO tours in support of the US Military, is known for songs such as “Best Days of Your Life” (which she co-wrote with Taylor Swift) and “Little Bit Gypsy.” Jacobs produced Lee Brice’s award-winning song “I Drive Your Truck,” and Tim McGraw’s “Still” with Brice and Joe Leathers.
The two met through a mutual friend, before getting engaged in 2010 and married in 2011. In an interview with The Boot, Pickler shared “He makes me feel so, so great about myself. I feel so beautiful when I’m with him. He always tells me he likes me better with no makeup on and sweatpants. He makes me feel the most beautiful when I’m with him. As long as I’m healthy, then he is fine with whatever I wear.”
Here’s what you need to know about the country music-making couple:
1. They Eloped in the Caribbean
The date Jacobs proposed, June 15, holds extra significance for the couple because that was Pickler’s late-grandmother’s birthday, who raised her. With the engagement ring, Country Living reported that Jacobs gave Pickler a seashell with her grandmother’s name on it, Faye; however, he didn’t know that June 15 was Faye’s birthday. Pickler told The Boot that by getting engaged on that day, “We both feel like we got my grandmother’s blessing.”
Though the couple planned a big Nashville wedding at first, they ultimately decided to elope in Antigua on New Year’s Day. In an interview on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Pickler got candid about their reason for the change in plans. People quotes that the singer explained to Ellen ““We were almost finished with the wedding planning. And every time we got to the guest list, it was like, ‘Oh my God, I hate half these people.’ Nothing personal.” Though they had spent so much time on their original wedding plans, Pickler revealed “We totally just put faith in God that it was all going to work out, and it did, and it was the most incredible day of my life.”
2. They Had a Reality TV Show Called ‘I Love Kellie Pickler’
Kyle Jacobs and Kellie Pickler at the 2016 Viacom Kids and Family Group Upfront.
In 2015, CMT debuted a reality TV show featuring the duo, called I Love Kellie Pickler. The show was meant to be a lighthearted look into their personal and professional lives together. According to Pickler’s website, the first season “propell[ed] the network to its highest premiere with adults since 2012 and women since 2008.” It was renewed for two more seasons, which can be watched on CMT.com.
After their show concluded, Pickler became a co-host on the talk show Pickler & Ben on ABC, which is currently airing new episodes. The show, which is filmed in Nashville, was nominated for three Emmy awards in its first season. The show’s website describes it as “daytime’s “go-to” destination for the best in lifestyle and entertainment television.” It “features today’s top celebrities and tastemakers on entertaining, cooking, decorating, gardening and beauty. It also shares the inspiring stories of everyday people doing the extraordinary.”
3. They Do Not Have Any Children
Six years after they got married, Pickler somewhat addressed the question of “When are you going to have kids?” on her reality show. On the episode, a friend of the couple asked Jacobs if a then-30-year-old Pickler was going to get her eggs frozen, a reproductive-health procedure the episode then spent time looking into. Her personal decision was not publicized, however, as the episode focused on her support of her friend Jennifer Wayne’s desire to start a family.
Oh @jenwayne! What have u gotten yourself in2 on tonite’s new episode of #ILoveKP? @CMT 10/9c @kelliepickler‘s the one who likes needles : )
Rare.us quoted Pickler’s reaction to the fact that so many people want to know when and if she and her husband are going to have kids. In response, Pickler said “I think a lot of women, including myself, get asked the question, ‘When are you going to have kids? When are you going to start having babies?’ And that’s all right, I understand, I get it. It’s not anything that someone is trying to offend me when they ask me, but it is a very personal question.” Though the interview was happening on the couple’s reality TV show, she added “With Kyle and I, I feel like we have a very successful marriage because we keep parts of our life private. We share enough, I think, with the world, and there are some things that we just need to keep sacred to ourselves.”
4. They Are Dog Parents to a Maltese & a Chinese Crested
Both Pickler and Jacobs love to post photos with and of animals on their social media, especially their dogs Pixie and Peanut. Pickler especially loves to gush about their dogs on her Instagram, referring to them affectionately with captions such as “our babies” and “my lil man.” Jacobs has even used the app to ask his wife if they should add more dogs to the family.
Pixie and Peanut aren’t the only pets the couple have adopted. Back in 2009, when MySpace was still the go-to social media platform, People reported that Pickler had adopted a pet monkey. Her update to fans said “The “Pickler Family” has gotten bigger….(and no I didn’t have a kid)…I adopted a Marmoset Monkey!” Us Weekly, however, reported that Pickler ultimately gave the monkey, which she named Ella, to her sister because the monkey didn’t adapt well to an on-the-road lifestyle. Jacobs recently referenced his wife’s taste in pets, posting a photo to Instagram of Pickler holding a monkey, with the caption “Nooooooo baby! We don’t need another monkey!!!”
5. They Wrote a Song Together for Pickler’s Fourth Album
According to Rolling Stone, Pickler got her inspiration for “The Woman I Am,” the title track of her fourth album, after a journalist asked her “which one of her songs she’d play for a new listener who had never heard her music,” and she responded “honestly I don’t know if I’ve written it yet, but I’m going to.” That night, she and her songwriter husband wrote the song together.
The country ballad’s lyrics reveals many of the truest parts of Pickler, describing, unapologetically, her likes and personality traits and flaws. It is not a romantic song, as it focuses on who she is at her core and why, but it’s special that she chose to collaborate with her husband on it. The song starts and ends with the lyrics “Sometimes I cry at night / I fall to pieces with Patsy Cline / Man how many songs sound like that? / But that’s just the woman I am.”