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Love is always in the air inside the Brown household.
“We try to make time for each other on an everyday basis,” Brown tells PEOPLE exclusively of prioritizing quality time with Etheredge-Brown, with whom he shares three children:Cassius, 14, Bodhi, 8, andHendrix, 7. “It’s important to stay grounded, stay in contact with the love that we have for each other.”
TheNew Editionstar puts that love on full display in their home. “We do a lot of hugging and kissing in front of the kids to show ‘em that love is for real,” he says. “How we feel about each other is for real.”
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Brown and Etheredge-Brown recently celebrated the life of his late daughterBobbi Kristina, hosting the fourth annual Bobbi Kristina Serenity House Gala: A Night of Inspiration, Empowerment, and Hope in Los Angeles on March 4.
Bobbi Kristinadied at age 22 in 2015 months after being found unresponsive in a bathtub in the home she shared with ex Nick Gordon — an eerie parallel tothe way her mother had died several years earlier.
Brown, who continues to grieve the loss, has been open in the past about his previous struggles with drug abuse, and how he wishes he and ex-wifeWhitney Houstoncould have been a better example for their daughter.
“How much quality time can you spend with your daughter when you’re high all the time?” he wrote in hisheartfelt 2016 memoirEvery Little Step. “I would get really mad at Whitney, scream and yell that I wanted a divorce. This went on for years and years. Our daughter saw it all. When I think about it now, I just feel enormous pain. We failed her.”
When it comes to his youngest children, their dad couldn’t be prouder. “My son’s a great little kid. He’s just a little cool little dude,” he says of Cassius. “He loves acting and singing and dancing.” As for his daughters, “The little ladies love gymnastics. They’re flippers. They definitely keep us busy.”
New Edition.Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic
Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic
“I think Alicia handles it well,” he says of the legendary boyband’s admirers. Besides, he adds with a laugh, “They’re really calm these days. They still scream but they’re a little slower than they used to be. They don’t chase us anymore. They walk up to us.”
For Brown, he stayed focused on his wife, and she helped him steer clear of distractions. “It was good to have her there in Vegas,” he says, “because Vegas is one of those towns you get caught up on them poker tables, the blackjack tables. So having her there really kept me away from all of the garbage.”
source: people.com
