HGTV / YouTube Erin Napier
“Alright y’all, I’m up to something. And I can’t tell you about it… yet.”
HGTV host Erin Napier put out a message to followers about a new project she and her husband/co-host Ben Napier have been working on. The message came in her May 4 Instagram story, where Erin looked into the camera as she said, “I can tell you that I’m looking for parents who are keeping their kids social media free through high school and junior high too.”
Erin included a link in her post and went on to tell her followers, “if you are one of those parents, I want you to go to this website […] I want you to join this mailing list I’m starting because I’m doing something really exciting and I really can’t wait to tell y’all more about it. But it’s still incubating so stay tuned and I’m really excited about this, we’ll talk more about it.”
Erin Napier Will Not Let Her Daughters Helen & Mae Have Social Media
Erin’s link brings followers to a new page on her and Ben’s website with the promised mailing list signup, and it revealed the working title of her special project: “OSPREY”, which is an acronym that stands for “old school parents raising engaged youth”. Despite this project name being revealed, not much else can be deciphered from Erin’s website.
Erin shared the story clip to her profile as well, and wrote in the post’s caption, “My heart is beating so fast! More info to come this summer”.
Erin and Ben have both been vocal in the past about how they are not going to allow their daughters, 5-year-old Helen and nearly-2-year-old Mae, to have social media as they grow up and go through school.
“Our personal policy is we’re not going to let our kids have any access to social media until they’re done with high school, I think, until you’re old enough to see it for what it is,” Erin shared during a late-April visit to the Today Show with “Fixer to Fabulous” hosts Dave and Jenny Marrs to promote the second season of “Home Town Takeover”, which sees the Napiers and Marrses join forces to complete renovation projects throughout the small town of Fort Morgan, Colorado.
Jenny agreed with her co-star, saying, “As adults, we get lots of the people (on social media) that are at home, and they hurt people, and they just have to spat out their opinion … people don’t think there’s humans behind the screen reading this. I know how it makes me feel, so why would I let my kids be subjected to something like that?”
Erin & Ben Napier Had a Stalking Scare in 2021
In addition to not allowing their daughters on social media, Ben and Erin rarely post photos with their daughters’ faces visible, with one reason being a stalking scare the parents went through in May 2021.
Erin recounted the experience one year later in an Instagram post, writing about the time she and Ben were filming at a home in Laurel, Mississippi when they began getting messages from people around town “about a 54 year old California man dressed like a Star Wars storm trooper, wearing an ankle monitor bracelet” who had come to Laurel, saying things like “God sent me here to protect the women of Laurel, specifically little Helen [the Napiers’ then-3-year-old daughter]”. The stranger had bought a house down the street from the Napiers, and while he was eventually made to return to California, the weeks leading up were a stressful time as Erin was “9.5 months pregnant” with Mae. The Napiers even had to hire 24-hour security officers to keep their home safe.
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