Dannielynn Hopeis growing up far away from the glitz and glamour of Hollywood — and that’s exactly how dadLarry Birkheadwants it.
The photographer has been raising the daughter he had withAnna Nicole Smithas a single father in rural Kentucky, following Smith’sdeath in 2007 from an accidental overdoseat age 39.
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“I’ve had companies call me since [Dannielynn appeared in a Guess campaign] and ask for her to model, and that answer’s no,” he said during a20/20interviewin 2017. “She doesn’t show any interest in it. She wants to be a kid.”
Birkhead said during the same interview that Dannielynn enjoyed doing typical tween things, like Girl Scouts, Snapchat, eating French fries and taking care of her pet lizard.
Larry Birkhead and daughter Dannielynn.Stephen J. Cohen/WireImage
“I think here in Kentucky is as normal as you can get,” he toldInside Editionin 2017. “She loves school. She loves her friends. I just hope that she dreams big and accomplishes a lot.”
One thing Dannielynn does tend to dream about? Birkhead’s love life. He toldEntertainment Tonightthat she likes encouraging her father to go on dates: “It’s cute when she tries to push me out of the house and get me to date and do things.”
Birkhead also told the outlet that Dannielynn frequently suggests celebrities for him to date — includingBritney Spearsand Ariana Grande — but that, as he toldWendy Williamsin 2017, he doesn’t get out much because he’s “packing the lunches” and “doing the field trips.”
Dannielynn and Larry Birkhead.Dia Dipasupil/Getty Image
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“She is clinging to the female teachers,” he added in his interview withET. “She’s clingy to her girlfriends' moms, and she’ll say things like, ‘Do you want to adopt me? Would you be my honorary mother?’ She tends to do that a lot.”
Despite their low-key life, Birkhead knows that information about Smith’s past is readily available on the internet for Dannielynn to find, prompting him to take steps to ensure she knows not to believe everything she reads.
“I have a block on her [internet]. We go to the store and she sees magazine covers and stuff, and we sit down, and I have a talk with her and say, ‘You know, you’re gonna see these things that come out about your mom, and not everything that you’re gonna see is true,'“Birkhead told Williams in 2017.
Dannielynn and Larry Birkhead.Gustavo Caballero/Getty
“And the thing is, is that what I do is, I take a little bit of Anna’s life and I put it into lessons. And I say, ‘You can learn from this and … there’s some things [that are] maybe not the greatest, but there are also some really good things that you’re not going to hear about, and let me tell you those things.'”
The pair are also content living on Birkhead’s own salary — and not the wealth Dannielynn may inherit from her mom.
“My daughter asks me about that all the time, she’s like, ‘Can we go shopping ‘cause we’re worth all this money?’ And she’s supposed to be one of the richest kids in the world,” he told Williams. “And I’m like, ‘No, that’s not… We do okay, but we’re not …we’re rich in love.”
Larry and Dannielynn Birkhead.Michael Loccisano/Getty
Larry Birkhead.Michael Hickey/WireImage
“I try to keep people updated [on Dannielynn] and things, but there’s some people that Anna didn’t even really know that went out and wrote books about her and that the 10th anniversary [of her death] came and all of Anna’s childhood photos were put on the auction block,” he said.
The father of one continued, “And so you kind of have to keep your guard up when you have a little one and you don’t know who’s genuine and who’s not.”
source: people.com
