- Stefani and Vanessa think
that they're hopping on a call with one of my producers.
And, neither of them have any idea
that the person on the other end of the call is going
to be me.
- Hey!
- Hey, what's up?
- Oh my God!
- Hey, what's up everybody?
So we just filmed my surprise birthday show yesterday
and it was amazing.
I loved it so much, it was perfect.
♪ Happy birthday to you ♪
(audience cheering)
So now, even though it's my birthday,
I prefer to give back to others.
I feel like I don't really need any gifts at this point.
So, I received this letter from Vanessa Ryan,
a sixth grade teacher (hums), teachers,
in Sammamish, Washington about her wife, Stefani.
So, here it is, I'm gonna read this letter to you.
"Hey Kelly, my name is Vanessa
and my beautiful wife, Stefani
and I live in Sammamish, Washington with our three kids.
Stefani is the absolute biggest Kelly Clarkson fan
on the planet, going on 20 years.
You are such an inspiration for her
from Idol, to seeing you live about 25 times," oh, 25 times,
"being in the audience to your talk show.
She's even throwing a 40th karaoke birthday party
for you with our friends, it's hilarious.
Did I mention we have matching Kelly lyric tattoos?"
This is awesome.
I hope that tattoo is, you don't get upset about that later.
"This year, we are celebrating our 10-year anniversary,"
that's cool, "I would absolutely love to try
and surprise her somehow with something completely Kelly.
Anything, would mean the world.
Thank you and happy birthday Kelly."
So, here's the thing, they actually have no idea
that I've read their letter.
And, Stefani and Vanessa think
that they're hopping on a call with one of my producers
from the show to be a part of a digital video.
That's a lie, 'cause we're liars here
at "The Kelly Clarkson Show".
And, neither of them have any idea
that the person on the other end of the call is going
to be me.
So, I'm very excited about this.
I love surprises, not me personally
but I love giving surprises to people.
So, let's do this.
- Hey!
- Hey, what's up?
- Oh my God!
- No way!
- Oh my gosh!
- Happy anniversary!
- Oh my God, thank you!
- That is so nice!
- Look, I got your letter and I was very excited about it.
So, here's the thing,
Vanessa, this is a very beautiful letter.
And, I know that Stefani, is it 10 years?
- It's 10 years, yeah.
- 10. Congratulations.
- Thank you, yes.
- Yes, we feel very good about that accomplishment.
- So, how did y'all meet?
- Oh my gosh, well, we actually met two years prior
at a teacher conference.
We were both sixth grade teachers.
We know you love teachers.
- I do, and good God bless.
The sixth grade, that's a hard age.
- Aw, it's our favorite age.
- That's puberty.
Oh my gosh, you are heaven-sent, okay.
- When we met, and we became fast friends that day
and knew that we would be friends.
But, we were both married to men at the time.
So, we knew that, you know, we have lives,
we have families, and we'll see each other when we can.
- Yeah.
- And then two years later, we ended up
on this committee together in the district.
And honestly, we were like magnets and, discovered
that we are each other's people.
She's my person, she's my human and we've-
- My puzzle piece.
- Yeah, we haven't been a part since.
- Puzzle piece, I have a tattoo of that.
Well, I hear that you both share a big love
of music, "seeing you live about 25 times," that's amazing.
- Kelly, we do, and you have been a big inspiration
in that for us.
And, what I love about your music Kelly is
that, as you've gone through life stages, I've gone
through those with you and your music has reflected that.
So, you're kind of the soundtrack to my life.
- But I wanna add on that, during a difficult time
for both of us, your music helped us get through that.
We listen to your songs over and over again.
Anybody that comes
to our house knows this is the Kelly House.
- Oh my God!
So wait, I hear that you have matching tattoos.
What's your a tattoo?
- Oh, okay, take it away.
- So, when we got together, we had this, you know, idea
that there was a transition for us.
Like I said, we'd been married to men
and we had never explored this.
And, we figured out that love is love.
I had found my puzzle piece.
She's just the missing thing, right?
And so, we were gonna get a puzzle piece
and then, from there, there was this song
that you sang back in 2006 on tour.
It's called "All I Know".
- This goes deep.
I heard that y'all like this song.
I was like, "Wait, they're like an actual fan."
♪ What I wouldn't give to live that thought of mine ♪
This is literally one of my favorite songs I've ever written
and I never released it.
And, I literally only sang it once in my entire career.
- I listen to it all the time.
When I got together with Vanessa, the lyric is,
"For all I know, you're just a thought
that crossed my mind.
What I wouldn't give to live that thought of mine."
So, she is that thought of mine.
And, we had to leave everything behind,
move Heaven and Earth to be together.
And so, we got the puzzle piece
with, "that thought of mine".
- [Kelly] Oh, I love that.
- [Stefani] On our arms.
- It's so powerful though, to not just think about it
but to live what you actually want
and design, that's amazing.
Well, you're both so awesome.
And I know Pride is coming up soon,
so what are you both most proud of?
- I have to say
that, one of the things I'm most proud
of, is the relationship that we have.
And, we model for our kids kindness
and love and a healthy, unique relationship.
And then, for my students as well,
I am in there every day telling them
we gotta wanna be our true, authentic selves.
And also, wait a second,
oh yeah, Kate, our daughter,
our six-year-old,
she calls us moms, the community around here,
our neighborhood, the moms.
- We're just the moms.
- So, we're just the moms.
- Yes, I love that.
My kids, two of their friends, they're twins
and they have two dads.
And, they're so mad about it.
They're like, "Why did they get two?"
They're like, "That's unfair, why didn't we get two?"
I was like...
- Our kid thinks it's totally rad
that she has two moms, she's like-
- I know that's what I'm saying.
It's so funny how we project what we feel
like it should be on them.
They don't know any different, you know what I'm saying?
- No, she doesn't know any different and she's cool.
- Yeah, so what are you gonna do
to celebrate your 10-year anniversary?
- Oh my God, well, Kelly, we actually had tickets
to your show on the 13th of January,
kind of our everything anniversary, right?
It's a big day, so we had tickets to come down.
And then, of course,
you remember January, COVID numbers went up
and airlines were canceling things, so that-
- Life got canceled, yeah.
- Life got canceled, we were living in a pandemic world.
So, we'll celebrate sometime this summer.
We had a nice thing at home
but we'll celebrate sometime this summer
and do something fun.
- 10 years is so worthy of a celebration,
we're gonna figure this out.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Okay, well, here's the thing,
I wanna help you figure it out.
So, we just filmed
my big surprise birthday party show yesterday
and it was awesome, it was so much fun.
And, I gave a little something to my audience
and I saved one just for you two.
And, it's just a small little thing.
So, to celebrate your 10 years together,
I'm sending you both on an anniversary trip to London.
- No, no, no, no!
- Are you kidding?
- Oh my gosh.
- You'll be spending five days
at a Hilton hotel in London, including airfares
for two and a free one-year membership
from Travel and Leisure Club, (hums), you're welcome.
How does that sound, have y'all ever been to London?
- We went, that was our honeymoon.
And, now this will be the 10-year, how cool is that?
- What?
- Yes.
- It was your honeymoon?
- Yes!
- I love that, I'm so excited for y'all.
That's so cool, how full circle that was, okay.
That really worked out!
- Thank you.
- Oh my gosh,
and thank you for being so bold and brave.
It's not easy to make that kind of big transition
in your life.
But, you did it 'cause it's what counts.
We get one life, you gotta make your life your own
and you gotta be happy, so.
- Oh my God, thank you so much.
- Thank you so much.
- And Kelly!
- How special, we love you.
- Happy birthday.
- Happy birthday!
- Oh, thank you, happy anniversary again.
- Thank you so much, bye!
- Bye.