Jonathan Scott Opens Up About His Relationship With Zooey Deschanel’s Children

Getty Jonathan Scott & Zooey Deschanel

When HGTV’s Jonathan Scott first met his girlfriend Zooey Deschanel in 2019, the “New Girl” star had two young children, 4-year-old daughter Elsie and 2-year-old son Charlie, with her ex-husband Jacob Pechenik.

In a June 2023 interview for DrewandJonathan.com, Jonathan and his fellow Property Brother Drew Scott opened up about fatherhood (and in Jonathan’s case, stepfatherhood), and Jonathan shared how his relationship has grown with Elsie and Charlie, as well as how they refer to him in conversation.

Do Zooey Deschanel’s Children Call Jonathan Scott ‘Dad’?

Jonathan first opened up about how he approached his relationship with Deschanel’s kids when the couple first began dating, saying, “The big thing for me was them wondering, ‘Who is this giant guy who’s all of a sudden showing up around us?’ But I’m pretty good at engaging and connecting with kids. I was a professional clown for years and I can perform magic. I wasn’t going to force anything on anybody, I just wanted to let it happen naturally.”

Jonathan went on to share that one of his first big struggles in becoming a father figure in Deschanel’s children’s lives was deciding what they would call him, as they “have their dad and they have a great relationship with him, so he’s daddy. I couldn’t say papa because that’s what they call their grandpa (though at one point we tried to change the narrative and get them to call me papa instead, but they weren’t having it). Eventually they came up with ‘my Jonathan.’ So, whenever they tell a story they say, ‘There’s daddy, there’s mommy, and he’s my Jonathan.'”

Jonathan and Deschanel both have an amicable relationship with her ex-husband, as evidenced by Deschanel’s Father’s Day 2022 Instagram post, in which Jonathan and Pechenik were pictured side-by-side, each holding one of Deschanel’s children on their shoulders. Deschanel wrote in the caption, “So thankful my kids have these two awesome guys in their lives: [Jonathan Scott] and their dad [Jacob Pechenik].

Later in the interview, Jonathan shared that the adjustment to his new title of “my Jonathan” did take some time. “I also remember several times when they’d be out with other kids and someone would say, ‘Oh your daddy’s so funny,’ and they’d be like, ‘That’s not my daddy, he’s my Jonathan.’ So that would hurt a little bit. But then I realized that in their mind, that’s not a mean thing to say—it’s how they know me. Over time, I worked on expressing my feelings to them, and the things that make me sad and happy. I think it’s good for kids to know that grownups have feelings, too.”

Drew Scott Learns Parenting Tips From Jonathan

During the interview, Drew noted that “it’s nice because Jonathan is a little ahead of me, since [Drew’s son] Parker is only a year old”, so he is able to learn from his brother’s experiences with his stepchildren. One such tip Drew learned was how to handle getting children to pick up after themselves.

“One day I said to the kids, ‘Ok guys, anything you leave on the floor in your room or the playroom when you go to bed, that means you don’t want it and it’ll get thrown out or donated,'” Jonathan recounted, “Well, they didn’t believe it until the very first time I did it. They cried and were upset, but ever since if I ever say to them, ‘I guess you don’t want all this stuff on the ground?’, they’ll run in and start putting things away. Now they do a great job.”

Drew called this “one of the best tricks I’ve heard in a long time”.

READ NEXT: HGTV Stars React to Keith Bynum’s ‘Terrifying’ Experience