Little Big Town is more than a band. It’s a family. The four-member supergroup, hosts of Christmas in Little Big Town at the Opry on NBC, have experienced life’s ups and downs together, including the personal hardships of singer Kimberly Schlapman. Read all about Schlapman’s journey and the happy ending she eventually found here.

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Kimberly Schlapman grew up in Georgia

Schlapman was born in Cornelia, Georgia in 1969 and moved to Alabama for college, where she met her future bandmate Karen Fairchild. The women moved to Nashville together to pursue their singing careers, and in 1998 Little Big Town was formed.

Kimberly Schlapman found love again after the death of her first husband

Her first husband, Steven Roads, died of a heart attack in 2005. After that, “I had no intention of falling in love at all,” Schlapman said The boot in 2013. “My husband and I were really good friends, and after my late husband died, all my friends called me all the time. I just wanted to check on myself. (Stephen Schlapman) was just an old friend. We had known each other for about six years and he started calling me, just like everyone else. But he started calling me more than anyone else.

“I was shocked. I remember when I first realized I had feelings I was just like, ‘Okay, this is so weird. What is that? I haven’t felt that in a long time,'” Schlapman added. “But at some point I allowed myself to do it, and it was the best gift of my life. It pulled me out of the deepest hole I’ve ever been in and healed me.” The couple married in 2006.

Kimberly Schlapman’s children

“In my previous marriage, I had tried so hard to have a child, so there was already, I don’t want to say skepticism, but I was already pretty sure that I wasn’t going to have a child,” Schlapman revealed People about her lifelong dream of motherhood. “When we got pregnant on our honeymoon it was just the most incredible gift. I believe my first husband, who was in heaven, begged God, “Let’s give her what she’s always wanted as a wedding gift.” ”

Daisy Pearl Schlapman was born in July 2007 and grew up begging for a sibling. But after a miscarriage, both artificial insemination and in vitro fertilization were unsuccessful, so the Schlapmans considered adoption. Dolly Grace officially joined the family in 2017.

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“As soon as we held her in our arms, she was ours immediately. I secretly feared that my love for an adopted child would not be the same for my biological child; I couldn’t understand how this love could feel the same,” Schlapman wrote in a commentary essay for People. “But I’m telling you, when I held the baby in my arms, there was no difference at all between the child I gave birth to in my own womb and this child that came out of someone else’s womb.”

How the Schlapmans manage it

“My husband is great. “He gave me the foundation to pursue my dreams,” she revealed Country life. “His life kind of revolves around my schedule and everything that happens to me, and unfortunately he fades into the background.”

“His support for me is somehow the opposite of the old societal expectations where the man goes to work and the mother stays at home. I’m the one who runs the business and he’s often the one who is Mr. Mom and takes care of everything,” she added. “I cannot praise him enough for what he has done for me and our family.” They built their “forever home” in South Carolina.

Regard Christmas in Little Big Town at the Opry on NBC on Monday, December 16 at 8 p.m. ET/PT.