Inside Jelly Roll’s family life—get to know his daughter Bailee and son Noah like never before.ML

NEED TO KNOW

• Jelly Roll is a dad of two, with his oldest child, daughter Bailee Ann, arriving on May 22, 2008
• His son, Noah Buddy, was born on Aug. 23, 2016
• Jelly Roll and his wife, Bunnie XO, have primary custody of Bailee

Jelly Roll is best-known for his music career, but he’s also a proud dad to kids Bailee Ann and Noah Buddy.

Over the years, Jelly Roll has shared how the birth of his daughter in 2008 forever changed his life for the better. On the day Bailee was born, Jelly Roll was in prison for drug dealing.

“I could no longer be selfish. There was something that was solely relying on me,” Jelly Roll told 105.7 The Point in September 2022. “I knew that that was an important task. So I wanted to take it seriously. And I did. I take it very seriously to this day.”

In 2016, Jelly Roll and his wife, Bunnie XO, were granted primary custody of Bailee. That year, their family grew with the addition of Jelly Roll’s son, Noah Buddy, from a previous relationship.

Here’s everything to know about Jelly Roll’s kids: Bailee Ann and Noah Buddy.

Bailee Ann, 17

Jelly Roll and his daughter, Bailee Ann in 2022.

Jelly Roll Instagram

Bailee Ann was born on May 22, 2008. A 23-year-old at the time, Jelly Roll was incarcerated when he learned of his daughter’s birth — a moment he refers to as his “road to Damascus.”

“A guard knocks on my cell door midafternoon during lockdown. He goes, ‘You had a kid today,’ ” Jelly Roll recalled during a June 2023 interview with Billboard. “I’ve never had nothing in life that urged me in the moment to know that I had to do something different. I have to figure this out right now.”

Despite being “irritated” by the news at first, Jelly Roll said his daughter’s birth “inspired him to change.” He was released from prison just in time for Bailee’s second birthday, where he “grilled hamburgers and hot dogs.”

Today, Bailee lives with her father and stepmom, Bunnie XO, as the couple were granted full custody of Bailee due to her mother’s substance issues. On an episode of Bunnie XO’s Dumb Blonde podcast, Bailee opened up about her upbringing and shared that she and her mom, Felicia, are working to mend their relationship amidst her recovery journey.

“I had an extra, interesting, traumatic childhood. Bunnie did, my dad did. They’re important reasons for why my mom is in my life now and is sober,” Bailee said during an appearance on her dad’s Hulu documentary, Jelly Roll: Save Me. “As a teenager, I’ve moved on. I’ve worked through my childhood. But that doesn’t make it go away. It made me who I am today.”

Much like her father, Bailee has turned to songwriting as a means of therapy. She wrote “Tears Could Talk” when she was 10 years old and the song was featured on Jelly Roll’s 2010 album A Beautiful Disaster. Bailee also appears alongside her dad in the song’s music video and joined him onstage during his Backroad Baptism Tour to perform the duet.Jelly Roll, Bailee Ann and Bunnie XO.

Jelly Roll Instagram

During a stop in Georgia, Jelly Roll introduced his daughter to the crowd by thanking his fans for their support. “Not only have y’all changed my life, you’ve changed her life in ways that we can’t even describe,” he shared, per Music Mayhem magazine.

Jelly Roll once again brought Bailee on stage during his performance at Stagecoach in April 2024 to celebrate her birthday since she was set to turn 16 “in, like, 10 days.”

“I figured it would be a really cool dad way to embarrass her if I can do the old ‘Happy birthday to you,’ ” he said, later adding that he was hoping it would get him “cool dad points.”

During a November 2024 appearance on the Dumb Blonde podcast, Bailee said she’s planning to go to college to study law — in particular, Columbia Law School — and focus on criminal defense.

“It’s wild, to be honest. And I think that’s part of the reason I’m so invested in it,” she said. “Because if I was going into medicine, I would have done medicine, and I hate the medical field. I hate Western medicine. I hate the way that we handle health and health insurance and everything, and I couldn’t — there was no getting into that for me.”

In April 2025, Jelly Roll got emotional as he sent Bailee off to her first prom. Bunnie XO shared the moment in a TikTok video.

“We did it. We did it guys. We made prom happen,” she said after Bailee left in a yellow prom dress with her date.

Just eight months later in December 2025, Bailee returned the favor and pulled off a major surprise for her parents: She threw them a prom after finding out that they never got to attend one themselves.

Sharing a video from the evening on Instagram, Bunnie wrote, “What we walked into stopped us in our tracks — a full room of friends and family…a night she called ‘Under the Stars.’ A prom/birthday party she created for us. She crowned us King and Queen, and we danced and sang like teenagers who finally got their moment.”

Noah Buddy, 9

Jelly Roll with daughter Bailee Ann, and son, Noah in 2016.

Jelly Roll Facebook

Jelly Roll’s son, Noah Buddy DeFord, was born on Aug. 23, 2016.

Apart from a birth announcement on Facebook, Jelly Roll has refrained from publicly speaking about his son in interviews.

Fans got their first major introduction to Noah when he and Bunnie made a TikTok video ahead of his seventh birthday in 2023.

“My name is Noah and my favorite color is red,” he says to the camera with a shy, big smile.Bunny XO and Noah Buddy DeFord.

Bunny XO TikTok

Elsewhere in the video, Noah shared that his favorite hobbies are Pokemon and soccer, and that he wants both a dog and cat for a pet. He also teased that he thinks his big sister is cooler than his famous dad.

While fans were surprised to see Noah appear in the TikTok, Bunnie clarified in the comments that she received Noah’s mom’s approval before posting the video.

Speaking with Taste of Country in August 2023, Jelly Roll shared that Noah is very much part of the family and often goes on vacation with them. In those instances, he added, they traditionally “always try to shoot [social media content] around him” out of respect for Noah and his mom’s privacy.

“With Bailee, I’m the full-time parent, I’m the judge, the jury and the executioner, when it comes to decisions with her,” Jelly Roll explained. “I try not to get in the way of what [Noah’s mom] is building over there, and I never want to step on her toes, with what she’s doing with him, that I want to just respect that boundary.”