Lily Allen has prioritized being a mom since welcoming her two daughters, Ethel and Marnie.
The pop singer gave birth to her first child, Ethel Mary Cooper, 13, in November 2011 with her ex-husband Sam Cooper. Her second daughter, Marnie Rose Cooper, 11, followed shortly after in January 2013. Allen and Cooper married in 2011, before ultimately divorcing in 2018.
Allen remarried in 2020 to Stranger Things star David Harbour in an intimate wedding during the COVID-19 pandemic. He has since developed a close relationship with her daughters, even bringing them to his premieres and sporting events, including a January 2023 NBA game.
Allen has been open about how she chose to focus on raising her children over prioritizing growing her career, especially after having a distant relationship with her own parents, British actor Keith Allen and producer Alison Owen.
“Some people choose their career over their children, and that’s their prerogative,” she shared on the Radio Times Podcast in March 2024. “But my parents were quite absent when I was a kid, and I feel like that really left some nasty scars that I’m not willing to, you know, repeat on mine.”
“So I chose stepping back and concentrating on them and I’m glad that I have done that because I think they’re pretty well-rounded people,” she continued. “Fingers f—— crossed.”
From their close relationship with their stepdad to how they motivated their mom to tie the knot again, here’s everything to know about Lily Allen’s kids.
They were born a little over a year apart
Allen welcomed her first child with Cooper, Ethel, on Nov. 25, 2011, five months after announcing her pregnancy and marriage to the painter. A little over a year later, her second child, Marnie, was born on Jan. 8, 2013.
Both children came after Allen experienced a miscarriage in 2008 with her former partner Ed Simons and the stillbirth of her son George in November 2010. George was born six months into her pregnancy after Allen contracted a viral infection.
“I don’t think I did — I don’t think I ever will, really,” she said on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour on recovering from his birth. “I went into trauma and I don’t think I’ll ever really recover from that.”
They inspired Allen and Harbour to get married
Harbour proposed to Allen just before the COVID-19 pandemic, he shared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! in June 2021, and the two got married on Sept. 7, 2020 — thanks to Allen’s girls.
Harbour explained on the show that while they were riding bikes as a family and debating what they’d do during their quarantine time, Marnie and Ethel had a confusing conversation about Harbour’s role in their life.
“The little one was riding along and she was going like, ‘David, dad, David, dad.’ Because the D got her confused,” he said. “And the older one got very upset with that, which I understand. She was like, ‘He’s not our dad! He’s not our dad!’ ”
Harbour continued, “And then younger one was like, ‘Well what is he? He’s kind of our dad.’ She’s like, ‘No he’s not, he’s our stepdad.’ And she goes, ‘What is he?’ And she goes, ‘He’s just some guy in our lives!’ ”
He joked that the conversation made him realize he should tie the knot with Allen to avoid further confusion.
“I was like, ‘I need to marry this woman,’ ” Harbour said. “Because the emotional fallout … ”
They have a close relationship with Harbour
Though the girls continue to joke Harbour is “just some guy” in their life, they have fully accepted the Black Widow actor into their family. He not only brought the girls to the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 screening in May 2023, but he also scored the ultimate dad brownie points when he took one of them to Taylor Swift’s Eras tour.
Harbour joked on the Happy Sad Confused podcast in August 2023 that he had to call in a “lot of favors” to get the tickets.
Though Swift had to board a flight immediately after the concert and was unable to greet the little girl, she did leave Allen’s daughter with a special treat: a handwritten letter.
“We sat there for about 30 minutes of the opener, and then a woman came out with a letter, and it was, you know, addressed to me and my stepdaughter, and it was a handwritten letter on a particular stationary,” Harbour said. “I’ve never seen my stepdaughter speechless.”
In her letter, Swift promised to give the girl a little wave during the show, and she delivered.
“She did say in the letter at one point, ‘I’ll give you a wave from the stage,’ and at one point, during the beginning of one of her numbers, she did turn to our little booth and [wave],” he recalled.
Allen has said she’s open to having more children
A month after they got married, Allen told The Sunday Times in October 2020 that she would want to expand her family with Harbour and welcome a child together.
“I think so. Especially now Marnie’s getting so big,” she said. “It’s like, ‘No, my babies!’ ”
She added that though she missed “having little terrors running around the house,” she didn’t want to start having more children immediately.
“I’m in a really good place. I don’t know if I’d mess with my hormones, at this particular point,” she said.
They are not afraid to ask for what they want
On Mother’s Day in 2022, Allen shared funny screenshots on Instagram of conversations with her daughter Marnie, who had some special requests for her mother. In one message, she expressed anger at Allen for imposing a screen time limit on her iPad, asking to give her an exemption, and in another, she asked “can u make me crepes Pls.”
Two more requests on consecutive days followed the crepes ask, including asking her friend’s mom about roller skating and bringing up coffee grounds.
“happy mother’s day,” Allen simply captioned the images.
Allen prioritized raising her daughters over her career
During her appearance on the Radio Times Podcast, Allen joked that her children threw a wrench in her career.
“My children ruined my career,” she said. “I love them and they complete me, but in terms of pop stardom, totally ruined it.”
Allen added that it was important to her to put her energy into raising her children, rather than being a pop star.
“It really annoys me when people say you can have it all because, quite frankly, you can’t,” she said.
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