Getty Alexa and Carlos PenaVega
Carlos PenaVega and his boy band, Big Time Rush, can’t get enough of performing for fans — but it’s forcing the Hallmark Channel star to be away from his family for the next month. Though his wife and fellow Hallmark star Alexa PenaVega previously said they wouldn’t “split up” their family for more than two weeks at a time, the couple’s work schedules are making that goal impossible lately. But the PenaVegas, who married in 2014, are still committed to figuring out ways to stay connected and grounded through the “busyness.”
Alexa PenaVega Admits Limiting Time Apart to 2 Weeks is Not Always Doable
On February 6, 2023, Carlos appeared on the “TODAY Show” with fellow Big Time Rush members James Maslow, Logan Henderson, and Kendall Schmitt to perform their new single — “Can’t Get Enough” — live for the first time and to announce their 35-city summer tour, kicking off June 22.
Nearly 10 years after the final episode of their Nickelodeon sitcom aired, the boy band is hot again after a sold-out 2022 tour, upcoming concerts in Latin America, and the new summer tour. They’ve been in New York for media appearances, including a takeover of Billboard’s Instagram Stories, and are prepping for a Latin American tour that starts February 23 in Chile.
Though Alexa and their kids — sons Ocean, 6, and Kingston, 3, and one-year-old daughter Rio — joined Big Time Rush on their North American tour last summer, she shared in a recent Instagram Story that the family won’t be traveling to Latin America because of the complicated logistics with three little kids.
That means the couple is apart for the next month, which Carlos alluded to in an Instagram post on February 5. He shared a photo of himself lounging on the couch at their Maui home with Rio and Kingston while watching “Frozen.”
“One last cuddle session before daddy leaves for a month,” he wrote.
Alexa has already begun cheering on her husband from afar, posting about his “TODAY Show” appearance in her Instagram Stories on February 6.
She said, “Can we talk about the fact that the boys performed on the ‘TODAY Show’ this morning? And they were amazing! Who watched it ’cause it was so good and I’ve watched it over and over and over again.”
Though Alexa told KTLA in July 2022 that they don’t “split up” their family for more than two weeks at a time, the couple has had to extend the amount of time they spend apart in recent months.
At the time, she said, “What we’ve set up is we don’t take projects at the same time. If they conflict by two weeks, that’s fine. But anything more than that, we don’t split up our family.”
But in November 2022, Alexa had to be apart from Carlos and their kids for 23 days while she was in Paris and Bulgaria filming “A Paris Proposal,” which premieres on Hallmark Channel this Saturday, February 11. In an Instagram photo of her saying her goodbyes at the airport, she wrote about how hard it was to leave.
“Well I’m off! And already crying,” she wrote. “23 days without my beautiful family by my side. We try our best to not leave for more than two weeks if we have to. But sometimes that’s just not possible. But it’s moments like these that just remind me of how blessed I am and how much I love all of my stinkers”
During an Instagram Live with fans during her film shoot, Alexa said that though it was hard to leave her kids for so long, it was also “a little bit awesome” because she could focus entirely on work. She also said Carlos had a “little help” with the kids but was managing everything well back home.
PenaVegas Recharge in Hawaii & Florida When They’re Not Working
Alexa and Carlos, who are vocal advocates for holistic health and all-natural products, relocated their family to Hawaii from Los Angeles in 2017, according to People magazine. And in 2022, they spent a good deal of time at their second home — a catamaran on the Florida coast that they purchased with hopes of sailing the world with their kids one day.
During her July interview with KTLA, Alexa said downtime in both places has been important for staying grounded as a family in between her and Carlos’ busy work schedules.
“When we’re disconnected from work, we’re actually disconnected,” she said. “We can raise little island babies who just play outside and they’re not on screens all day long. Because…there’s always gonna be busyness. So for us, we want to really unplug.”
The family has been in Hawaii for the last few weeks, but has a busy 2023 ahead between Big Time Rush’s schedule and other work projects.
In a new interview with KTLA on February 6, Alexa said, “Now we’re about to go work for 31 weeks straight. So our downtime is really our downtime. And when we work, we work.”
That work will apparently include another new Hallmark project for the couple, who signed a multi-picture deal with Hallmark Media in October. During an Instagram Live on January 10, Carlos told fans that they will be filming a new Hallmark movie “in a couple of months.”
Meanwhile, on January 13, the couple announced that they had returned to their popular vlog after 10 months away and would be updating their “La Vida Pena Vega” YouTube channel at least weekly with new videos from their family adventures, including several videos featuring a 2022 cruise they took with their kids — the first they’d taken since the pandemic. Their most recent YouTube video, about vacationing with kids, was posted two weeks ago and has attracted over 44,000 views.