Kelly Ripa’s ‘Favorite’ Moments on ‘Live’ Were Once Her Most ‘Anxiety-Inducing’

Some of Kelly Ripa‘s least-favorite Live With Kelly and Mark guests are now some of her favorites.

Ripa opened up about entering her 25th season on the daytime talk show in an interview with People published on Wednesday, September 3. “That’s really nutty. Nutty!” she said of her longtime TV gig. “Mark [Consuelos] was saying to me backstage, ‘It doesn’t feel like that many seasons.’ And I go, ‘For you, it hasn’t been that many seasons!'”

Ripa made her Live debut alongside the late Regis Philbin in 2001. Michael Strahan took over for Philbin in 2012, followed by Ryan Seacrest in 2017. Consuelos has served as his wife’s cohost since 2023.

Before they hosted Live together, Ripa and Consuelos met while starring on the soap opera All My Children in 1995. They wed in 1996 and went on to welcome three kids — Michael, 28, Lola, 24, and Joaquin, 22.

While Ripa is a proud mom, she wasn’t initially a fan of mixing her family life and work life. “What I didn’t realize would become my favorite moments later on — because at the time, they were like anxiety-inducing and sort of, I was out of my head space — but when my kids would come on the show as small children and toddlers and babies, that was so special,” she told the outlet. “I have sort of this, living diary of their lives.”

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Now that her kids are all grown up, Ripa says that “they appreciate how special that time was for them.”

Ripa and Consuelos’ kids have appeared on Live several times over the year, from cooking segments to sit-down interviews to games and more. Ripa and Consuelos are also no strangers to talking about their family on the show. Last month, Ripa teased her husband for already planning for their future grandchildren.

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“Are we gonna spoil the grandkids?” Consuelos asked Ripa, who jokingly replied, “What grandkids are you talking about? The theoretical grandkids?”

Noting that their kids are “not ready yet” to become parents, Ripa added, “You’re always talking about grandkids. He’s like, ‘And then, we’ll build a bunk room for the grandkids.’ And I’m like, ‘Calm down, chief. They need to have a second date first.”

While Ripa and Consuelos won’t be becoming grandparents anytime soon, they did agree that they will “spoil” their grandchildren one day. “Of course. Yeah. That’s our whole job. But we’re not gonna go against the parents’ rules,” Ripa stated.

Consuelos went on to joke that he will especially spoil Lola’s kids as a way to “get back at her” for giving him and Ripa a “run for our money” during her childhood.

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