While Reese Witherspoon has an expansive résumé, she touts parenthood as one of her greatest achievements.
The Legally Blonde star first became a mother in September 1999, welcoming daughter Ava with then-husband Ryan Phillippe. The duo — who were married between 1999 and 2006 — then welcomed son Deacon in October 2003.
Despite getting divorced after seven years of marriage, they managed to strike up an amicable coparenting relationship. “I think we’ve gotten to a really great place,” Phillippe, who welcomed daughter Kai with ex Alexis Knapp in 2011, told HuffPost Live in 2014. “I’m proud of the way we’ve handled it and who our little people are.”
Witherspoon moved on with talent agent Jim Toth, to whom she was married from March 2011 to March 2023. They welcomed their only child together, son Tennessee, in 2012.
Since becoming a mother of three, the Walk the Line actress has frequently opened up about raising her children through different phases of their lives.
“It is about honesty. First of all, you know, you’re managing them a lot when they’re little. It is very physical,” Witherspoon said during an October 2022 appearance on the Today show. “And then, it is more emotional support and suggestions — not telling them what to do when they get a little bit older. But you have to really nurture your adult relationships with your children, too, and give them respect and space to become who they are and not who you want them to be.”
Scroll below to see Witherspoon’s sweetest photos with her children: